Running Header: INTEREST GROUP INFLUENCE
Interest Group Influence:
Positive, Negative, or Ambiguous?
V. Fisher
NHU Press
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Interest Group Influence:
Positive, Negative, or Ambiguous?
Interest groups have become an important and constantly scrutinized fixture of American
politics. Some argue that interest groups play too significant a role in the policy and election
process while others claim that their role is necessary to help give causes and groups of people a
collective voice in the policy process. In the current political landscape, interest groups appear
in almost every part of the political process as active competitors with other interest groups,
political parties, and even candidates for the public’s attention (Aroopala, 2012). With such a
prominent role throughout every part of the process, the impacts of interest groups cannot be so
easily relegated to wholly positive or negative; in fact, there are negative and positive impacts,
but many of the impacts remain ambiguous. Thus, strategies to help mitigate the role of interest
groups need to control for the negative impacts while still maintaining the positive roles they
may play.
Positive Impacts
Interest groups can help people with commonly shared important issue stances in a
number of ways. For one thing, interest groups organize the effort and create the group message
(Aroopla, 2012). They can bring together a number of voices into a unified voice that can take
advantage of the expertise of political consultants and other field experts who can help bring
more organization and political access to what might be a more fragmented effort. These
advocacy groups help their members to have a voice in what is an increasing multitude of
competing voices (Dür & De Bièvre, 2007; Holyoke, 2005).
Another area where interest groups can further provide saliency to their platforms while
becoming a valuable resource to political actors is through information services. Interest groups,
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because of their focus on one or a particular set of policy initiatives, have access to large
amounts of research and information on those specific policy areas (Gerrity, Hardt, & Lavelle,
2008). This information is usually provided to candidates who already share their issue and
policy stances in an effort to help strengthen their stances and build issue focus. In a positive
sense, this gives policy makers a cost effective way to access a huge resource of potentially
important information while competing groups are also providing resources on oppositional
sides, and this results in greater amounts of information and more context for debates and policy
decisions.
One final area where interest groups have become especially important is in the
relationship between Congress and the bureaucracy. Once the intended policies have passed, the
carrying out of those policies often becomes a bureaucratic matter. Representatives have a hard
time following every policy through the implementation phase to ensure that the intended
outcomes are being met, that the bureaucracy is effectively administering the policy, and that
problems have not arisen. Interest groups, therefore, can be important resources for monitoring
the implementation process. Banks and Weingast (1992) found that interest groups monitor and
“police” bureaucracies that handle their policy areas while reporting back to politicians about
those findings (p. 521). Consequently, agencies that are aware of interest group involvement,
especially in highly salient issue areas, are more likely to work hard to produce desired results
and avoid audits. Interest groups even provide representatives information about the policy
positions and backgrounds of those in the agency and during selection processes (Balla &
Wright, 2001). These groups work, because of their own personal alignment with the given
issues, independently to ensure agency compliance once policy approval has occurred, and this
makes them a valuable and important cost-savings resource to representatives and constituents to
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ensure that policy implementation is effective. While the positive effects of interest groups are
important, significant negative impacts also exist and need to be considered before suggesting
strategies to control interest group interaction.
Negative Impacts
One area where interest groups can have a negative impact on the political process is in
the use of financial resources that may inhibit electoral competitiveness. In incumbent races,
often, one of the main reasons that the competition cannot mount successful campaigns is that
incumbents have established relationships with a variety of well-funded interest groups to fund
their campaigns (Ashworth, 2006). These funding issues can depress potential opponents and
unevenly skew the political discussion as competing interests may have little to no voice in the
electoral process (Bardwell, 2003). Furthermore, in close races, interest groups may play too
large of a role in providing an advantage to one candidate over another by simply using
independent funding to promote the candidate and change the electoral narrative (Chamon &
Kaplan, 2013). This makes interest groups major players in the political process which may lead
to candidate reliance and, as many fear, significant manipulation of policy action.
Thus, another negative area of impact is in the pressure interest groups can exert on the
policy maker. As interest groups exert pressure on representatives, they may feel the need to
address and support interest group concerns quickly without creating the most efficient policies
(Dür & De Bièvre, 2007). Furthermore, this pressure from several groups may slow the overall
policy process and take needed focus from other important issues. This may result in an uneven
legislative focus that overlooks the important issues of other less powerful groups. This uneven
pressure and its impacts, however, seem most pronounced when the policy area has less public
visibility (Witko, 2006). Evidence of interest group influence being most prominent in areas
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where the issue is not highly controversial or visible, then, may be be evidence that suggests
negative impacts may be more covert in nature and management suggestions need to account for
this finding.
Ambiguities
While there are positive and negative impacts that can are more easily be seen when
assessing interest group influence, other roles in the policy process are more ambiguous. Many
argue that interest groups essentially buy or shape representatives’ decisions. However, evidence
of this is ambiguous because many of the decisions made by representatives that align with
particular interest groups are policy stances that the representative had prior to interest group
involvement (Magee, 2002). Most evidence, then speaks to a chicken and egg kind of
relationship where it is almost impossible to determine which came first: the representative’s
position stance or the interest group’s involvement. Much of the current research shows that
interest groups are primarily involved with representatives and candidates who already share
their issue stances (Boatright, 2015; Fox & Rothenberg, 2011). In fact, a study by David Lowery
(2007) found that interest groups are rarely able to influence or change policy stances and much
of their work is simply done to sustain their organization and its place with like-minded
politicians. Even corporate interest groups, which many theorize hold much sway over policy
decisions, may be less influential than originally thought, and a recent extensive study by McKay
(2012) was able to find little evidence that powerful corporate interest groups were able to
influence policy making unless they had significant public backing. There was some evidence
that greater influence also existed in policies that were less contested and less visible. Thus,
these influential impacts remain ambiguous because theory and evidence may be conflicting
given policy context.
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Management Strategies
Given the varied impacts of interest groups and the seeming importance of their role as
voice for the public, management strategies regarding interest groups must be very careful not to
stifle the positive impacts of interest groups. Since the majority of negative impacts seem to
appear in funding issues and less visible policy actions, strategies need to target greater funding
equalization and more transparency in the legislator-interest group policy interaction process
regardless of issue prominence.
To address funding, one possible suggestion is an increase in publically financed
campaigns with limits on what interest groups can spend and the amounts interest groups can
provide to candidates. In judicial elections, public funding has been used to provide financing
for lesser known candidates, to lessen the influence of outside groups, and to encourage
candidate diversity (Abbe & Herrnson, 2003). This kind of public funding provides crucial
funds for candidates, but any public funding policy needs to be accompanied by strict limits on
campaign maximums. Since public financing is based on willful public contribution, limits
could be variable based on the available funds under a matching funds model where the amount
of fundraising is equal to the amount the public fund can match (Ashworth, 2006). Some states
have already enacted public funding for campaigns where the candidate decides whether to
adhere to state maximum limits in order to participate in the public funding, and they have had
success in encouraging electoral competitiveness while reigning in unbridled spending by
outside political actors (Bardwell, 2003). Plus, positive public perception of candidates who
voluntarily accept limits in these areas has helped to encourage candidate participation.
Therefore, public financing could help to reduce the role of interest groups in the electoral
process and mitigate the aforementioned negative impacts.
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In regard to issue influence in less-visible policy areas, transparency is key. Many states
have instituted strict policies on interest group and representative interactions that require
detailed accounting of all interactions with public access to those interactions (Ozmy, 2010).
These transparency attempts could be effectively applied in the federal arena as well. Using
social media, there could be a running log of current legislative proposals along with associated
interest groups. As politicians add their support to a piece of legislation, interest groups could
also be required to also add their support or opposition to a list associated with the legislation
before they could interact with representatives on that legislation. If a group attempted to contact
a representative to campaign for or against a policy, the candidate and the group would be
required to report that interaction. With this model, all policies would be accessible to the
public, and with a simple click, voters could see what groups are working for or against that
legislation. For those who do not use social media, this information would be readily provided to
them via phone and other traditional communication methods per request. Perhaps, the prospect
of increased visibility and the requirement to essentially sign their names for or against
legislation would help to deter covert actions and bring interest group activity into a more
publicly scrutinized arena.
Conclusion
Interest groups have become major players in the political process. They take many
different roles in the process including providing an organized voice to citizens, acting as policy
experts and resources, monitoring policy intention, and financing independent and candidate
campaigns. There are negative and positive impacts associated with each of these roles. To the
public, they play a positive role of organizing and funneling the message to the representative.
They also provide important resources and information to candidates throughout the policy
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process. On the other hand, they may inhibit electoral competiveness because they provide
insurmountable funding advantages for their candidates of choice. In regard to policy influence,
they are most influential when the policy is less-visible, but other policy and candidate
influences are more ambiguous. As a result, strategies to manage interest group influence need
to focus on equalizing funding for all candidates through public financing models coupled with
campaign fundraising limits. In the policy influence area, strategies must focus on
accountability, transparency, and visibility so that the public can easily determine the interaction
and position of interest groups to oversee the policy process regardless of issue prominence.
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