Interest Groups
The Character of Interest Groups
• An interest group is a group of people that
organizes to be heard by and influence
government programs and policies. They are
sometimes referred to as lobbies.
• Interest groups represent the interest of their
members, encourage political participation,
enhance democracy, educate and mobilize voters,
lobby, and monitor governmental activity.
• However, not all interests are represented
equally; their politics can sometimes work to the
advantage and disadvantage of others.
Common Types of Interest Groups
• Business and Agricultural Groups – U.S. Chamber
of Commerce
• Labor Groups – AFL - CIO
• Professional Associations – American Medical
Association
• Public Interest Groups – Sierra Club
• Ideological Groups – American Conservative
Union and People for the American Way
• Public Sector Groups – American Federation of
Teachers and Professors
Unique Interest Groups in the U.S. and
how much they spend on lobbying
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•
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U.S. Association of Reptile Keepers - $20,000
Cigar Rights of America - $320,000
The Balloon Council - $60,000
Sports Fan Coalition - $60,000
The American Onion Association - $14,000
Manned Space Flight Education Association $30,000
• Free Speech Coalition of America - $5,000,000
• NORML – Marijuana Reform Advocacy $3,000,000
• NAMBLA – North American Man Boy Love
Association - $0
Organizational Components
of Interest Groups
• Leadership: The decision making structure that may
consist of informal entrepreneurs initially, and then
develop professional leadership.
• Money: The financial structure to fund the groups’
activities. These groups rely on member dues, sale of
services, and contributions.
• Agency or Office: Groups must be able to establish an
agency that carries out the group’s tasks.
• Members: Groups must attract and keep members.
Interest groups must persuade individuals to invest the
money, time, and energy to participate in the group.
Types of Benefits of Interest Groups
• Why Join? Groups make “selective benefits” only available
to members, including:
• Information benefits: Special newsletters, periodicals,
training programs, conferences, and other information are
provided to group members to join.
• Material benefits: Special goods, services, or money are
provided to group members to entice others to join.
• Solidarity benefits: These are selective benefits of group
membership that emphasize friendship, networking and
consciousness raising.
• Purposive benefits: These are selective membership
benefits that emphasize the purpose or pursuit and
accomplishment of important group goals.
Member Characteristics
• People with higher incomes, higher education
levels, and management or professional
occupations are more likely to be group members
than those in lower socioeconomic levels.
• This is because the have the time, money, and
education needed to play a role in a group.
Therefore, interest group politics has an upper
class bias. In general, for the bottom
socioeconomic rungs to obtain representation,
they must organize on a massive scale.
The Proliferation of Interest Groups
• Over the past decades there has been an increase in the number of
groups seeking to influence public policy and the opportunity to
influence that process.
• The Expansion of Government: Government expansion has
stimulated increased group activity and organization.
• The New Politics Movement and Public Interest Groups: The
emergence of a new set of American political forces called New
Politics has stimulated recent lobbying activity. The New Politics
movement is a political movement that began in the 1960s and
1970s, made up of professionals and intellectuals for whom the civil
rights and antiwar movements were formative experiences. The
New Politics movement built or strengthened public interest
groups.
• Examples of successful New Politics movements: The Civil Rights
movement and the Antiwar movement of 1960s and 1970s.
The Importance of Interest Groups in
Shaping Public Policy Priorities
• U.S. government policies reflect the desires of the
wealthy and interest groups more than the average
citizen, according to researchers at Princeton University
and Northwestern University.
• The analysis on 1,779 policy issues from 1981 to 2002
and compared changes to the preferences of medianincome Americans, the top-earning 10 percent, and
organized interest groups and industries.
• The research supports the theories of Economic Elite
Domination, which says policy outcomes are influenced
by those with wealth who often own businesses, and
Biased Pluralism, which says policy outcomes "tend to
tilt towards the wishes of corporations and business
and professional associations."
The Iron Triangle
• The Iron Triangle is defined as the stable,
cooperative relationship that often develops
among a congressional committee, an
administrative agency, and one or more
supportive interest groups (e.g. the defense
industry).
• Other policy domains such as welfare and the
environment are not controlled by iron triangles
but by rival issue networks (loose networks of
elected leaders, public officials, activists, and
interest groups drawn together by specific policy
issue).
Iron Triangle Diagram
Mobilizing Public Opinion
• 1. Institutional Advertising. This form is designed to create a positive
public image of an organization in order reach Congress. For example,
major oil companies and large corporations advertise how much they are
doing for the nation.
• 2. Protest and Demonstrations. Many groups resort to going public
because they lack the resources, the contacts, or the experience to use
other political strategies. They may use boycotts, sit-ins, mass rallies, and
marches to go public and create a more favorable climate of opinion (e.g.,
Martin Luther King, Jr.).
• 3. Grassroots Mobilizations. Another way to go public with a campaign
is for a group to mobilize its membership to contact government officials
in support of the group’s position. Among the most effective grassroots
groups in American politics is the religious right. Grassroots lobbying has
become more prevalent in Washington over the last couple of decades,
because the adoption of congressional rules limiting gifts to members has
made traditional lobbying more difficult.