INTEREST GROUPS AND PUBLIC POLICY

1. INTEREST GROUPS AND PUBLIC POLICY

2. Why have interest groups proliferated? • 1. First, America has become a nation of factions. • i) We have always had factions as Alexis DeToqueville noted when he toured the country in the 1830's. [He called them associations]. • ii) The more factions there are in a society the greater the variety of interest groups that will exist.

3. 2. Second, The American constitutional system contributes to the number of interest groups because it multiplies the number of points of decision. • i) The number of points at which such groups can gain access to the government. • ii) In the U.K., the system is much more centralized • iii) The U.K. Courts only recently gained the power of judicial review. • iv) But, in the U.S., there is the President, the two Chambers of Congress, the 535 members of the Congress, the various federal, state and local Courts, the executive agencies, the governors, the state legislatures, and lower level governments and bureaucracies. • vi) This creates an incentive for groups to form and focus their efforts on a particular points of access. • vii) If not successful in one arena, go to another.

4. 3. Third reason = the weakness of American political parties. • i) The decline of parties has left a political vacuum in which interest groups have formed to fill. • ii) Where parties are strong, interests in a society work through the parties. • iii) Where parties are weak, special interests operate directly on the government. • 4. Should we be concerned about special interest groups? • i) Are interest groups the means of democratic representation and democratic policymaking? Or a hindrance? • ii) Are interest groups representative of the public at large?

6. The Evils of Factions • The American public has traditionally viewed special-interest groups as narrowly self-interested. • James Madison warned of the dangers and divisiveness of factions (his term for interest groups) in The Federalist, No. 10. • The theme of the evils of factions has recurred throughout American history (including party factions).

7. PLURALISM (and its assumptions) • The power of groups to represent their interests is roughly equal. No one group can dominate any particular issue all of the time. • Any and all groups in society can have their views heard and considered at some point in the policymaking process. • Because of this: “Interests that are widely held in the society may be reflected in government without their being organized in groups” • They are what are called potential groups [unorganized groups]. • The government acts as an impartial referee on behalf of the general good, helping to achieve fair and just compromises to competing claims. • Political life (at the level of the citizen and at the institutional level) is independent from economic life. Rich and poor are equal in the face of government and law. • The exercise of power is visible.

8. TYRANNY OF THE MAJORITY, TYRANNY OF THE MINORITY OR TYRANNY OF THE MINORITIES (critics of pluralism) • Interest groups are not easy to form, lots of barriers to (Lowi suggests 90% of the population can not get into this pressure group system) • A small number of interest groups are in a position of influence and they have been there for so long and have established such tight ties with govt. agencies that they have been entrenched or they have captured the department or agency. • The notion of “potential groups” tended to render group theory tautological. • The break down of pluralism: • 1) “The capture of government power by small number of interest groups. • 2) efforts of interest groups and agencies to narrow the size of the policy making arena because the smaller the decision-making arena is, the easier it becomes for • Corporate pluralism: The present political system has been overwhelmed by the organized power of selective interest groups.

9. Iron Triangle

10. UNEQUAL INDIVIDUALS = UNEQUAL GROUPS • Money as a political resource is only available to those individuals who have large amounts of wealth or disposable income. • 1. Eighty percent of the American public utilizes its entire income to maintain their standard of living • 2. Only the top 20 percent of income earners can convert a significant portion of their income into a political resource • Unlike votes, which require strong political parties to be converted into an effective political resources, money or wealth can be readily converted into other key political resources. This places the elite and corporations in a position to disproportionately influence the process and continued. • Homogeneous group – similar interests • 1.Continued mergers (the joining of two different corporations-auto company purchasing a steel factory) and concentration of corporations-less than 1% of all corporations account for over 80% of the total output of the private sector. • 2.Forty of the biggest banks hold a controlling interest in the 500 largest corporations.

11. DARWIN’S THEORY OF DEMOCRACY (ONLY THE STRONG SURVIVE) • To create and maintain an organization requires financing • 1. The purchasing or renting of office space (especially in D.C.) • 2. The maintenance of an full time office staff • As a result of its large amounts of wealth, the corporate community is well organized (leadership groups of the ruling class and high level employees in institutions controlled by members of the ruling class. • For Example: The Business Roundtable: composed of the Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) from the two hundred largest corporations

12. MANCUR OLSON (ONLY THE SMALL SURVIVE) • The Logic of Collective Action: not natural to join groups (collective action problems, incentive for shirking) • To compete, public interest organization need large membership from the public, but as Olson suggests, this is not easy. • Rise and Decline of Nations: Even if you can get a large membership, such a group may be ineffective, less focused, easily divided. • This means that smaller (and well financed) groups are better at organizing, staying focused and influencing public policy

14. Super PACs • The super PACs were made possible by two court rulings that lifted many spending and contribution limits. The groups can also mount the kind of direct attacks on candidates that were not allowed in the past. • Regular PACs, which are mostly used to donate funds to individual campaigns, must adhere to strict limits on donations. • But the super PACs, officially known as "independent expenditure-only committees," are free of most of those constraints. The only caveat is that they are not allowed to coordinate directly with candidates or political parties.