A. INTEREST GROUP - an organized body of people who try to influence public policy
B. Interest groups - contribute or threaten democracy?
1. Alexis de Tocqueville - ease with which Americans form organizations is a reflection of a strong democratic culture.
2. James Madison - warned of dangers of factions
a. Causes of factions - sown in the nature of man
b. A mistake to try to eliminate factions / would restrict liberty.
C. Interest groups - play many roles in American political system.
1. REPRESENTATION - represent their constituents in government.
2. PARTICIPATION - facilitate participation in politics.
3. EDUCATION - educate members / public at large / government
4. AGENDA BUILDING - Bring news issues to political agenda.
5. PROGRAM MONITORING - keep track of how programs are working / persuade government to take action..
II. Where do interest groups come from?
A. Interest groups form when people affected by disturbance.
B. Quality of leadership - key to successful interest group formation.
1. Leader an ENTREPRENEUR / must convince members there are reasons to join organization.
C. Wealthy / educated more likely to form / join lobbies.
III. Interest group resources.
A. Best to have a large membership.
1. Business / professionals / trade associations hold onto members than CITIZENS GROUPS.
2. Citizen groups - rely on ideological appeals. / DIRECT MAIL. to attract new members.
3. Interest groups have free rider problem attracting members / non-members can obtain benefits of lobbying even though they pay no dues.
4. People join interest groups anyway. Some for nonpolitical benefits
B. Lobbyists - either full-time employees of organization, or from law firms / public relations firms.
1. Interaction between lobbyist / policy maker is information from lobbyist to official.
2. Lobbyists try to convince policy maker that lobbyist's data are accurate / deserve more attention than those presented by opposing lobbyists.
C. POLITICAL ACTION COMMITTEES - pool contributions from group members / donate funds to candidates for office.
1. Two types of PACs - greatest growth
a. Corporate PACs
b. Non connected PACs (ideological PACs)
2. Most PACs - goal to gain access to incumbents.
3. Role of PACs - financing elections (has become most controversial aspect of interest group politic)
a. Critics charge - contributions lead to influence / influence should not be tied to money.
b. Defenders - PACs are way people can participate.
IV. Lobbying tactics
A. DIRECT LOBBYING - direct contact between group's representatives and policy maker.
1. Lobbyists make personal presentations to officials.
2. Testifying before committees.
3. Organizations may go to court.
B. GRASSROOTS LOBBYING - rank-and-file members
1. Letter writing.
2. Protests sometimes used / difficult to sustain anger / energy of large numbers..
C. INFORMATION CAMPAIGNS - organized efforts to gain public backing by making group's views public
1. Public relations - may involve advertising / sending speakers to meetings /handing out pamphlets / fact sheets.
2. Sponsoring research
3. Publicize voting records of Congress / Publish indexes of how Congress voted.
D. COALITION BUILDING - several groups joining together
E. Lobbying - evaluated through pluralist / MAJORITARIAN frameworks.
1. Reinforces pluralist definition of who has power.
2. Party in power has more say in POLICYMAKING.
3. MEMBERSHIP BIAS - some better represented by interest groups (i.e., middle / upper middle class).
4. Lower-income people - represented by issue-oriented lobbies (positions involve the problems of the poor.)
V. Growth of interest groups.
A. PUBLIC INTEREST GROUPS - have no economic self-interest in policies they pursue.
1. Common Cause - pushes for good government
2. Public interest groups - can be liberal / conservative.
B. Business lobbies - increased significantly.
1. Number of trade associations / corporate offices in Washington has gone up sharply.
2. Growth of federal regulation - one reason for growing number of business lobbies.
VI. Issue of access
A. Government officials - may limit access by certain interest groups/ officials / may keep door open.
B. All access not useful to interest groups / some groups gave better access over time.
VII. Reforms / issues of reform
A. Difficult to limit interest groups without limiting fundamental freedoms.
B. Federal Regulation of Lobbying Act (1946) – ineffective in achieving its goals.
C. Congress has required disclosure of all campaign contributions / sources can be identified.
D. Reformers called for reducing role of PACs in financing elections.
1. Controversy of PACs reflects tension between freedom / equality.
2. Critics charge - PACs reinforce / expand inequities between rich / poor.
3. Supporters - people should have right to join others who think like they do/ support candidates of their choice.
INTEREST GROUPS AND ORGANIZATIONS
Interest group - an organization that represents people who hold similar views.
A. Consequence of banding together - they have to find a way of maintaining that organization.
1. Money needed for the organization's office / salaries / overhead expenses .
2. Money used to search for money. People hired / postage / other expenses must be paid.
B. Different kinds of interest groups face different challenges.
1. Change in economy from industrial economy to service economy - difficult for unions to find new members.
2. Trade associations - What business advantages will new member get by joining?
3. Citizen groups - Letters sent to people on lists purchased from brokers. On the basis of some known characteristics there are chosen as good bets to respond.
a. 2 percent of those solicited will send money / competitive markets / many other citizen lobbies trying to attract same people. Direct mail returns below 1 percent - damaging financially.
b. Growth potential - direct mail / Gray Panthers – senior citizens, grew from 4,000 to 30,000 members in over several years.
C. Why is it important? Interest groups represent people in political process. Unless able to find money will be at a disadvantage
D. Some disadvantaged because they have little money to begin with / For poor small contribution - a luxury they cannot afford.
II. Interest groups - exchange relationships / benefits.
A. If interest group formed - must be able to find resources to pay costs.
B. Interest groups attract resources by giving people something they value / members of political organizations may be attracted by different benefits.
1. PURPOSIVE benefits - ideological in nature.
2. MATERIAL benefits - financial benefit to participants (health / insurance / life insurance / mortgage loans / credit cards etc.
3. SOLIDARITY benefits - derived from directly participating with others in a group endeavor.
C. Different kinds of groups stress different incentives. National citizen groups purposive benefits. Environment groups emphasize environment / labor union will emphasize material benefits / citizen's organization might emphasize solidarity benefits / business trade group might use all three types to attract members.
III. Free-rider problem
A. Interest group finds benefit that is attractive / markets that benefit to maintain itself.
B. Interest groups may have trouble supplying the benefit only to members / may be free riders who benefit without having to join organization / may mean organization can't attract as many members as it needs.
1. Public television stations depend on contributions from viewers for large portion of their budgets / Many more people watch public television than contribute to it / receive benefit without paying.
2. Same true for many interest groups / If business trade group wins a tax break for firms in its industry, all the firms in that industry will benefit, regardless of whether they paid dues to that group.
C. Why pay dues when can become a free rider?
Interest groups can offer a SELECTIVE INCENTIVE. / firm not in the group may share spoils of lobbying victory but may not be able to go to organization's yearly convention. Convention - good place to drum up new business or learn new manufacturing processes.
D. Many groups don't have selective incentive / manage to survive quite well / national citizen groups are examples / no real selective incentive for joining an arms control group
IV. How do interest groups arrive at resources decisions?
A. Interest group organizations - must find resources to survive / must make decisions about how best to utilize those resources.
B. Resource allocations - decisions about how represent members.
1. Process should reflect what members want / leadership should be making choices that members want.
2. Most interest groups - democratic in structure. Major decisions overseen by a representative board.
3. Most interest groups - not democratically run / Rank - and - file members do not usually have say in running organization. / Participation symbolic.
4. Interest groups - examples of iron law of oligarchy. Most members not interested in being involved in operation.
5. Rank and file can "vote with their feet" - by not renewing their membership. Organizational directors / staffs do not want to act out of line.
C. Advocacy budgets are limited. Groups cannot take on every issue. / Must allocate resources to issues that are most central to their objectives.
LOBBYISTS AND LOBBYING
Thousands of lobbyists in Washington - all trying to influence government / Who are these people? / How do they operate? What strategies used to accomplish their goals?
I. Washington representatives
A. Lobbyists do not like lobbyists. / Not a particularly flattering term and those who try to influence government on behalf of an interest group
B. No accurate count of lobbyists in Washington / Federal Regulation of Lobbying Act (1946) / requires lobbyists to register with the government, Loopholes make regulation lists incomplete.
C. Many lobbyists are for hire / work primarily for corporations / trade associations on a fee-for-services basis.
II. Competition and conflict
A. Lobbying - difficult job / demanding hard work / long hours / difficult to get government to do what you want it to do / there are usually other lobbyists working on same issue / do something else.
1. In four different policy domains (health, energy, agriculture, and labor) / These events were actions such as a congressional committee reporting out a bill or an agency proposing a regulation.
2. In each of the four policy areas - there is an average of two-dozen interest groups involved in each event.
C. Proliferation of interest groups has fundamentally altered the nature of interest group politics.
1. Agriculture - perfect example of decentralized POLICYMAKING / tripartite relationships / self-serving results."
2. Iron triangles of agriculture politics are gone / now two hundred groups trying to influence government decisions on agriculture.
D. Source of conflict among interest groups is the rise of public interest lobbies.
1. Public interest groups - flourish in the late 1960s. / Groups range widely in purpose (saving the whales)
2. Groups almost always have entrenched opponents. / Environmental groups - repeatedly fought corporate interests.
3. During late 1960s early 1970s most new public interest groups were on liberal side / recently many new conservative groups have come to Washington.
III. Expert advisers
A. To stand out from competition - lobbyists must sell themselves / must be trustworthy / need to be seen as reliable sources of information. / Optimally they want to be seen as real policy experts.
B. Lobbyists help themselves by being able to support their arguments with sophisticated studies. They want to be able to walk into a legislator’s / administrator's office with data that show that the facts are on their side.
C. Much lobbying - struggle between groups to establish facts as an accurate description of problem.
D. Lobbyists must rely on others inside or outside their organization to produce original studies to bolster their advocacy work?
1. Business for economic consulting firms has been helped by interest groups' need for data.
2. Lobbies without staff to carry out complex analyses will often turn to a consulting firm to provide it with a study that can be presented to POLICYMAKERS.
E. Some organizations large enough to have a research staff to help lobbyists by providing data / reports for their use.
IV. Strategy
A. Lobbyists often reacting to events / trying to cope with new situations. Yet they do have long-term strategies that guide them in general ways.
B. One important cornerstone of a lobbyist's approach to influencing government is trying to develop ongoing relationships with POLICYMAKERS.
1. Lobbyist must not alienate legislators / administrators / staffers.
2. Lobbyists must be seen as having something to contribute to POLICYMAKING process
3. Contributions from political action committee – helpful for gaining access to a legislator's office
5. Contributions go to incumbents / most lobbyists more concerned about being able to talk to whoever is in office than trying to change makeup of Congress.
C. Lobbyist's job - develop means of mobilizing support
1. Washington lobbyists know that legislators are more concerned with what people back home want than with what lobbyists want.
2. Need to make sure that people back home gets in touch with POLICYMAKERS in decision-making process.
3. Members won't write frequently / lobbyists must be judicious in making such requests.
4. Well-organized lobbies have network of activists who are more likely to write or call POLICYMAKERS when asked. / Activists prompted to act when organization feels that rank-and-file membership not a good prospect to act or should not be approached at that time.
D. Lobbying stereotyped as work of interest group representatives trying to twist arms of members of Congress to vote one way or the other.
1. Providing data to legislators before any votes are even contemplated.
2. Try to get a committee to examine a problem. / Interest group may act in agenda-building capacity.
E. Must be skilled negotiators / No group gets all of what it wants. Politics is art of compromise.
1. Interest groups - want to minimize what they give up / and maximize what groups on other side concede.
2. Difficult process for any one lobbyist to navigate / Often a lobbyist must bargain within his coalition of groups as well as with POLICYMAKERS.