Interest group- is a private
organization that tries to
persuade public officials to
respond to the shared attitudes
of its members
ROLE OF INTEREST GROUPS
1. They are sometimes called pressure groups or
special interest groups
2. They all seek to influence the making of public
policy
( goals of government)
3. They are organized groups that try to control
government and exercise political power
POLITICAL PARTIES AND INTEREST GROUPS
1. Differences between parties and groups
 Making of nominations (interest groups cannot
nominate a candidate, but do try to affect a
primary)
 Primary focus (parties want to win elections and
control government, groups what to influence
polices of government)
 Scope of interest( parties deal with all issues,
groups try to influence select issues only)
INTEREST GROUPS: GOOD AND BAD?
Valuable functions of interest groupsRaise awareness to public issues
Represent their members based on
same attitudes rather than basis of
geography ( which is what candidates
are elected by)
Provide useful, specialized and detailed
information on government
Like minded citizens can pool their resources
Make sure government performs itself in
responsible and effective ways
Allows for competition in public arena
Criticisms
 have an influence far out of proportion to
their size, to their importance to the public
good (rich larger groups can influence any
issues even if bad)
 Hard to tell how many people a group
represents
Many groups don’t represent the views
of the people they tend to represent.
Some groups use tactics that become
widespread and would undermine the
whole political system ( bribery and
heavy uses of money)
TYPES OF INTEREST GROUPS
No one really knows how many interest groups
are in America today
Whenever an association tries to influence
government it is an interest group
There are thousands with millions of members
The largest numbers are ones that focus on
business, labor, professional interests and
agricultural groups
ECONOMIC INTEREST GROUPS
1. Business groups- business communities form their
own interest groups called trade associations
2. Labor groups- also called labor unions which fight for
the rights of the worker
3. Agricultural groups- speak for the production of food
supply and everything surrounding farms and the
farming community
4. Professional Groups- medical, law, teaching career
groups to fight for the future of the profession
OTHER INTEREST GROUPS
1.Groups that promote causes - rights for
woman, abortion, gay marriage
parenthood
2.Groups promote welfare of certain
groups- veterans, immigrants, and
senior citizens
3.Religious organizations- catholic groups,
Jewish groups
PUBLIC INTEREST GROUPS
Interest groups that seek to
promote policies for all the
country whether you are part of
there organization or not. For
example Health care
INTEREST GROUPS AT WORK
1.
Influencing Public Opinion- to supply
the people with information on an
organization, to build a positive
image of a group and to promote a
particular public policy
2.
Propaganda- a technique of
persuasion aimed at influencing
individual or group behaviors, its
goal is to create a particular
belief
3. Influencing Parties and Electionsinterest groups keep close to parties and
try to urge their members to become
party members and try to win elections.
They influence election by give money to
the party and the political action
committee ( raise and distribute money
to candidates)
4. Lobbying- interest group
pressures are brought to
bear on all aspects of
public policy makers
4.1. Lobbyist’s task is to
work for those matters that
benefit their clients and
against those that they
harm.
4.2. Lobbyists use articles,
reports and all sorts of other
information favorable to their
causes to reach officeholders
4.3. Lobbying abuses do occur now
and then, misleading information,
bribery and unethical pressures. So
states have set up laws to regulate
lobbying activities