what methods do interest groups use to get lists of people to target

Learning Objectives

By the end of this section, you volition exist able to:

• Clarify how interest groups provide a means for political participation
• Discuss recent changes to interest groups and the way they operate in the United States
• Explain why lower socioeconomic status citizens are not well represented by interest groups
• Identify the barriers to interest grouping participation in the United States

Interest groups offer individuals an important avenue for political participation. Tea Political party protests, for case, gave individuals all over the country the opportunity to phonation their opposition to government actions and command. As well, the Black Lives Matter motility also gave a voice to individuals and communities frustrated with diff handling from police officers. Individually, the protestors would probable have received little notice, but by joining with others, they drew substantial attention in the media and from lawmakers (Figure ten.8). While the Tea Party movement might not run across the definition of interest groups presented before, its aims have been promoted past established interest groups. Other opportunities for participation that interest groups offer or encourage include voting, campaigning, contacting lawmakers, and informing the public virtually causes.

Effigy x.8 In 2011, an Occupy Wall Street protestor highlights that the concerns of individual citizens are not ever heard by those in the seats of ability. (credit: Timothy Krause)

Group PARTICIPATION AS CIVIC ENGAGEMENT

Joining interest groups can assist facilitate civic date, which allows people to feel more connected to the political and social community. Some interest groups develop as grassroots movement s, which often begin from the bottom up amid a modest number of people at the local level. Interest groups can amplify the voices of such individuals through proper system and permit them to participate in ways that would be less effective or fifty-fifty impossible lonely or in modest numbers. The Tea Party is an instance of a so-called astroturf movement, considering it is non, strictly speaking, a grassroots move. Many trace the party's origins to groups that champion the interests of the wealthy such every bit Americans for Prosperity and Citizens for a Sound Economy. Although many ordinary citizens support the Tea Party because of its opposition to tax increases, it attracts a neat deal of support from elite and wealthy sponsors, some of whom are active in lobbying. The FreedomWorks political action commission (PAC), for example, is a conservative advocacy group that has supported the Tea Party movement. FreedomWorks is an adjunct of the interest grouping Citizens for a Sound Economic system, which was founded past billionaire industrialists David H. and Charles G. Koch in 1984.

Co-ordinate to political scientists Jeffrey Berry and Clyde Wilcox, interest groups provide a means of representing people and serve as a link between them and authorities.³³ Interest groups also allow people to actively work on an issue in an effort to influence public policy. Another function of involvement groups is to help educate the public. Someone concerned about the environment may not need to know what an acceptable level of sulfur dioxide is in the air, just by joining an environmental involvement group, they can remain informed when air quality is poor or threatened past legislative activeness. A number of education-related interests have been very active following cuts to teaching spending in many states, including North Carolina, Mississippi, and Wisconsin, to name a few.

Interest groups also help frame issues, unremarkably in a mode that best benefits their crusade. Abortion rights advocates oft utilise the term "pro-choice" to frame ballgame as an individual's individual selection to be made free of government interference, while an anti-abortion grouping might use the term "pro-life" to frame its position as protecting the life of the unborn. "Pro-life" groups often label their opponents as "pro-ballgame," rather than "pro-selection," a distinction that tin affect the style the public perceives the consequence. Similarly, scientists and others who believe that man activity has had a negative upshot on the earth's temperature and atmospheric condition patterns attribute such phenomena as the increasing frequency and severity of storms to "climatic change." Industrialists and their supporters refer to alterations in the globe's climate as "global warming." Those who dispute that such a alter is taking place tin can thus point to blizzards and depression temperatures as bear witness that the earth is not becoming warmer.

Interest groups also try to get issues on the regime agenda and to monitor a variety of government programs. Post-obit the passage of the ACA, numerous interest groups accept been monitoring the implementation of the law, hoping to utilise successes and failures to justify their positions for and against the legislation. Those opposed have utilized the court system to try to alter or eliminate the law, or accept lobbied executive agencies or departments that have a role in the law'south implementation. Similarly, teachers' unions, parent-instructor organizations, and other education-related interests monitored initial implementation and on-going operations of the No Kid Left Backside Act (NCLB) promoted and signed into constabulary by President George Due west. Bush in 2002. That constabulary was replaced in 2015 with the Every Student Succeeds Act, due in role to continual lobbying by teacher unions who tired of the stronger federal office that NCLB necessitated.³⁴ Involvement groups have increasingly utilized digital ways to take attention paid to their causes. Mayhap most piercing in effect over recent years is the use of so-called hashtag activism. The hashtag is a visible part of life on Twitter and key hashtags have induced printing coverage and press taglines. The nigh visible such utilize was likely the #MeToo movement, which snowballed quickly equally famous woman after famous woman confirmed that they, too, had faced harrassment.³⁵

Milestone

Interest Groups every bit a Response to Riots

The LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer [or questioning].) movement owes a great deal to the gay rights move of the 1960s and 1970s, and in particular to the 1969 riots at the Stonewall Inn in New York'south Greenwich Village. These were a serial of confrontational responses to a police raid on the bar and regular law harassment, humiliation, and abuse of LGBTQ people. The riots culminated in a number of arrests but also raised awareness of the struggles faced by members of the LGBTQ community.³⁶ The events are besides recognized as a turning indicate in LGTBQ identity, when many people began moving from a life of secrecy to a more public one, leading to increased cultural acceptance and securing of rights. The Stonewall Inn has recently been granted landmark status by New York Metropolis's Landmarks Preservation Commission (Effigy 10.9).

Figure 10.9 The Stonewall Inn in New York City'southward Greenwich Village was the site of arrests and riots in 1969 that, like the building itself, became an important landmark in the LGBTQ movement. (credit: Steven Damron)

The Castro district in San Francisco, California, was as well home to a pregnant LGBTQ community during the same time period. In 1978, the community was shocked when Harvey Milk, a gay local activist and sitting fellow member of San Francisco'due south Board of Supervisors, was assassinated by a onetime city supervisor due to political differences.³⁷ This resulted in protests in San Francisco and other cities across the country and the mobilization of interests concerned about gay and lesbian rights.

Today, advocacy interest organizations like the Human Rights Campaign are at the forefront in supporting members of the LGBTQ customs and popularizing a number of relevant issues. They played an active role in the endeavour to legalize same-sex marriage in individual states and later nationwide. Now that aforementioned-sex marriage is legal, these organizations and others are dealing with issues related to standing bigotry confronting members of this community. One electric current debate centers around whether an individual'south religious freedom allows that individual to deny services to members of the LGBTQ customs. This question reached a fever pitch over discussions about restroom facilities for transgender individuals. The Section of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) recommends best practices for restroom access for transgender workers indicating that all employees should have access to bathroom facilities that correspond to their gender identity.³⁸

What do yous feel are lingering issues for the LGBTQ community? What approaches could yous take to assistance increase attention and support for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender rights? Do you call back someone's religious beliefs should allow them the freedom to discriminate against members of the LGBTQ community? Why or why non?

TRENDS IN PUBLIC INTEREST Grouping FORMATION AND Activeness

A number of changes in interest groups accept taken identify over the last three or iv decades in the U.s.. The most significant modify is the tremendous increment in both the number and type of groups.³⁹ Political scientists often examine the diverseness of registered groups, in role to make up one's mind how well they reverberate the variety of interests in society. Some areas may be dominated by certain industries, while others may reflect a multitude of interests. Some interests announced to have increased at greater rates than others. For instance, the number of institutions and corporate interests has increased both in Washington and in us. Telecommunication companies like Verizon and AT&T will lobby Congress for laws benign to their businesses, merely they also target united states because state legislatures make laws that tin can benefit or harm their activities. There has besides been an increase in the number of public interest groups that represent the public as opposed to economic interests. U.S. PIRG is a public involvement group that represents the public on issues including public wellness, the environment, and consumer protection.⁴⁰

Get Connected!

Public Involvement Research Groups

Public involvement research groups (PIRGs) have increased in contempo years, and many now exist nationally and at the country level. PIRGs represent the public in a multitude of event areas, ranging from consumer protection to the surroundings, and similar other interests, they provide opportunities for people to make a difference in the political process. PIRGs endeavour to promote the common or public proficient, and near bug they favor bear upon many or fifty-fifty all citizens. Student PIRGs focus on issues that are important to students, including tuition costs, textbook costs, new voter registration, sustainable universities, and homelessness. Consider the cost of a higher education. You may desire to inquiry how education costs take increased over time. Are price increases similar beyond universities and colleges? Are they similar beyond states? What might explain similarities and differences in tuition costs? What solutions might help address the ascent costs of college educational activity?

How tin you get involved in the drive for affordable higher teaching? Consider why students might become engaged in it and why they might non practice so. A number of countries accept made tuition complimentary or almost free. ⁴¹ Is this feasible or desirable in the United states? Why or why not?

Link to Learning

Have a look at the website for Student PIRGs. What issues does this interest group address? Are these issues important to you? How can you get involved? Visit this section of their site to learn more about their position on financing higher educational activity.

What are the reasons for the increase in the number of interest groups? In some cases, it simply reflects new interests in gild. Forty years ago, stem cell research was non an issue on the regime agenda, but equally science and applied science avant-garde, its techniques and possibilities became known to the media and the public, and a number of interests began lobbying for and against this type of research. Medical inquiry firms and medical associations will lobby in favor of greater spending and increased inquiry on stalk cell enquiry, while some religious organizations and anti-abortion groups will oppose it. As societal attitudes change and new issues develop, and as the public becomes aware of them, nosotros can look to see the rise of interests addressing them.

The devolution of ability also explains some of the increment in the number and type of interests, at least at the state level. Equally power and responsibility shifted to country governments in the 1980s, the states began to handle responsibilities that had been nether the jurisdiction of the federal government. A number of federal welfare programs, for example, are generally administered at the state level. This means interests might exist better served targeting their lobbying efforts in Albany, Raleigh, Austin, or Sacramento, rather than only in Washington, DC. As the states have become more active in more than policy areas, they have become prime targets for interests wanting to influence policy in their favor.⁴²

We have also seen increased specialization past some interests and fifty-fifty fragmentation of existing interests. While the American Medical Association may take a stand on stem cell research, the issue is not critical to the everyday activities of many of its members. On the other hand, stem cell enquiry is highly salient to members of the American Neurological Association, an involvement organization that represents academic neurologists and neuroscientists. Accordingly, different interests represent the more specialized needs of unlike specialties within the medical community, but fragmentation can occur when a big interest like this has diverging needs. Such was too the instance when several unions dissever from the AFL-CIO (American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations), the nation'due south largest federation of unions, in 2005.⁴³ Improved engineering and the development of social media have made it easier for smaller groups to course and to attract and communicate with members. The utilize of the Internet to raise money has also made it possible for even small groups to receive funding.

None of this suggests that an unlimited number of interests can exist in order. The size of the economy has a bearing on the number of interests, but only up to a certain point, after which the number increases at a declining rate. As we will see below, the limit on the number of interests depends on the bachelor resources and levels of competition.

Over the last few decades, we accept also witnessed an increase in professionalization in lobbying and in the sophistication of lobbying techniques. This was not e'er the case, because lobbying was not considered a serious profession in the mid-twentieth century. Over the by 3 decades, there has been an increase in the number of contract lobbying firms. These firms are often effective because they bring significant resources to the table, their lobbyists are knowledgeable about the issues on which they foyer, and they may take existing relationships with lawmakers. In fact, relationships betwixt lobbyists and legislators are often ongoing, and these are critical if lobbyists want access to lawmakers. However, not every interest tin beget to rent loftier-priced contract lobbyists to stand for information technology. As Table 10.one suggests, a great bargain of money is spent on lobbying activities.

Summit Lobbying Firms in 2020

Lobbying Firm	Total Lobbying Annual Income
Akin, Gump et al.	$49,870,000
Brownstein, Hyatt et al.	$48,365,000
BGR Group	$31,630,000
Cornerstone Regime Affairs	$28,020,000
Holland & Knight	$27,990,000
Ballard Partners	$24,420,000
Squire Patton Boggs	$24,215,000
Invariant LLC	$21,140,000
Forbes Tate Partners	$19,400,000
Capitol Counsel	$19,110,000
Thousand&L Gates	$18,330,000
Mehlman, Castagnetti et al	$17,836,000
Peck Madigan Jones	$17,150,000
Van Scoyoc Assoc	$17,130,000
Crossroads Strategies	$sixteen,550,000
Cassidy & Assoc	$16,430,000
Covington & Burling	$16,340,000
American Continental Group	$15,000,000
Tall Grouping	$fourteen,600,000
Subject Thing	$xiv,550,000

Table 10.1 This table lists the top twenty U.S. lobbying firms in 2020 as determined past total lobbying income.⁴⁴

Nosotros have besides seen greater limits on within lobbying activities. In the past, many lobbyists were described as "good ol' boys" who often provided gifts or other favors in exchange for political access or other considerations. Today, restrictions limit the types of gifts and benefits lobbyists tin can bestow on lawmakers. There are certainly fewer "practiced ol' boy" lobbyists, and many lobbyists are now full-time professionals. The regulation of lobbying is addressed in greater item beneath.

HOW REPRESENTATIVE IS THE Interest Group SYSTEM?

Participation in the Us has never been equal; wealth and education, components of socioeconomic status, are potent predictors of political engagement.⁴⁵ We already discussed how wealth tin help overcome collective action problems, but lack of wealth also serves as a barrier to participation more generally. These types of barriers pose challenges, making information technology less likely for some groups than others to participate.⁴⁶ Some institutions, including large corporations, are more probable to participate in the political process than others, simply because they have tremendous resources. And with these resources, they can write a check to a political entrada or hire a lobbyist to stand for their organization. Writing a bank check and hiring a lobbyist are unlikely options for a disadvantaged group (Effigy 10.10).

Figure 10.x A protestor at an Occupy Times Square rally in October 2011. (credit: Geoff Stearns)

Individually, people living in poverty may not have the aforementioned opportunities to join groups.⁴⁷ They may work two jobs to make ends meet and lack the free time necessary to participate in politics. Farther, there are often financial barriers to participation. For someone who punches a fourth dimension-clock, spending time with political groups may be costly and paying dues may be a hardship. Certainly, the poor are unable to hire expensive lobbying firms to represent them. Structural barriers similar voter identification laws may as well disproportionately affect people with depression socioeconomic status, although the effects of these laws may not be fully understood for some time.

The poor may also have low levels of efficacy, which refers to the confidence that y'all tin brand a difference or that government cares about you and your views. People with low levels of efficacy are less probable to participate in politics, including voting and joining interest groups. Therefore, they are often underrepresented in the political arena.

People in certain racial and ethnic populations may likewise participate less ofttimes than the majority population, although when we control for wealth and education levels, we encounter fewer differences in participation rates. Notwithstanding, there is a bias in participation and representation, and this bias extends to involvement groups as well. For instance, when fast food workers beyond the United States went on strike to demand an increase in their wages, they could do little more than take to the streets bearing signs, like the protestors shown in Figure 10.xi. Their opponents, the owners of restaurant chains and others who pay their employees minimum wage, could hire groups such every bit the Employment Policies Institute, which paid for billboard ads in Times Foursquare in New York Urban center. The billboards implied that raising the minimum wage was an insult to people who worked hard and discouraged people from getting an educational activity to better their lives.⁴⁸

Figure 10.eleven Dissimilar their opponents, these minimum-wage workers in Minnesota have express ways to make their interests known to government. However, they were able to increase their political efficacy past joining fast food workers in a nationwide strike on Apr xv, 2015, to telephone call for a $15 per hr minimum wage and improved working weather condition. (credit: "Fibonacci Blue"/Flickr)

Finally, people do non oft participate because they lack the political skill to do and then or believe that information technology is impossible to influence regime actions.⁴⁹ They might also lack interest or could be blah. Participation usually requires some knowledge of the political arrangement, the candidates, or the issues. Younger people in particular are ofttimes cynical about authorities's response to the needs of non-elites.

How do these observations translate into the way different interests are represented in the political system? Some pluralist scholars like David Truman suggest that people naturally join groups and that there will exist a great bargain of competition for access to decision-makers.⁵⁰ Scholars who subscribe to this pluralist view assume this competition among diverse interests is good for democracy. Political theorist Robert Dahl argued that "all active and legitimate groups had the potential to make themselves heard."⁵¹ In many ways, this is an optimistic assessment of representation in the United States.

However, non all scholars have the premise that mobilization is natural and that all groups have the potential for access to conclusion-makers. The elite critique suggests that certain interests, typically businesses and the wealthy, are advantaged and that policies more frequently reflect their wishes than anyone else's. Political scientist E. East. Schattschneider noted that "the flaw in the pluralist heaven is that the heavenly chorus sings with a strong upperclass accent."⁵² A number of scholars have suggested that businesses and other wealthy interests are frequently overrepresented before government, and that poorer interests are at a comparative disadvantage.⁵³ For example, equally nosotros've seen, wealthy corporate interests have the means to hire in-business firm lobbyists or high-priced contract lobbyists to represent them. They can also afford to make fiscal contributions to politicians, which at to the lowest degree may grant them access. The ability to overcome collective action problems is non equally distributed across groups; as Mancur Olson noted, small groups and those with economic advantages were amend off in this regard.⁵⁴ Disadvantaged interests face up many challenges including shortages of resource, fourth dimension, and skills.

A study of almost 18 hundred policy decisions made over a twenty-year catamenia revealed that the interests of the wealthy accept much greater influence on the government than those of average citizens. The approval or disapproval of proposed policy changes by average voters had relatively little effect on whether the changes took place. When wealthy voters disapproved of a item policy, it almost never was enacted. When wealthy voters favored a particular policy, the odds of the policy proposal'south passing increased to more fifty percent.⁵⁵ Indeed, the preferences of those in the summit 10 percentage of the population in terms of income had an impact fifteen times greater than those of average income. In terms of the effect of involvement groups on policy, Gilens and Folio found that business interest groups had twice the influence of public interest groups.⁵⁶

Effigy 10.12 shows contributions by interests from a variety of dissimilar sectors. We can draw a few notable observations from the table. First, big sums of money are spent by different interests. Second, many of these interests are business organization sectors, including the existent estate sector, the insurance industry, businesses, and constabulary firms.

Figure 10.12 The nautical chart higher up shows the dollar amounts contributed from the business organisation sector to Democratic (blue) and Republican (ruby) federal candidates and political parties during the 2019-2020 election cycle, equally reported to the Federal Election Commission.

Interest grouping politics are oftentimes characterized by whether the groups accept access to determination-makers and can participate in the policy-making procedure. The iron triangle is a hypothetical system among iii elements (the corners of the triangle): an interest grouping, a congressional committee member or chair, and an agency within the hierarchy.⁵⁷ Each element has a symbiotic relationship with the other two, and information technology is hard for those outside the triangle to pause into it. The congressional committee members, including the chair, rely on the involvement group for campaign contributions and policy information, while the interest grouping needs the committee to consider laws favorable to its view. The interest grouping and the committee demand the agency to implement the law, while the agency needs the interest grouping for information and the committee for funding and autonomy in implementing the law.⁵⁸

An alternate explanation of the organisation of duties carried out in a given policy surface area by involvement groups, legislators, and bureau bureaucrats is that these actors are the experts in that given policy expanse. Hence, perhaps they are the ones most qualified to procedure policy in the given area. Some view the iron triangle idea as outdated. Hugh Heclo of George Mason Academy has sketched a more open pattern he calls an event network that includes a number of dissimilar interests and political actors that work together in support of a unmarried issue or policy.⁵⁹

Some involvement group scholars accept studied the human relationship among a multitude of involvement groups and political actors, including quondam elected officials, the way some interests course coalitions with other interests, and the manner they compete for access to conclusion-makers.⁶⁰ Some coalitions are long-continuing, while others are temporary. Joining coalitions does come with a cost, because information technology tin can dilute preferences and split potential benefits that the groups try to accrue. Some involvement groups will even align themselves with opposing interests if the brotherhood will attain their goals. For example, left-leaning groups might oppose a land lottery system because information technology disproportionately hurts the poor (who participate in this form of gambling at higher rates), while correct-leaning groups might oppose it considering they view gambling every bit a sinful activity. These opposing groups might actually join forces in an try to defeat the lottery.

While most scholars concord that some interests practise have advantages, others have questioned the overwhelming authority of certain interests. Additionally, neopluralist scholars fence that certainly some interests are in a privileged position, but these interests do not ever get what they want.⁶¹ Instead, their influence depends on a number of factors in the political environment such as public opinion, political culture, competition for access, and the relevance of the result. Fifty-fifty wealthy interests do not ever win if their position is at odds with the wish of an attentive public. And if the public cares about the effect, politicians may be reluctant to defy their constituents. If a prominent manufacturing firm wants fewer regulations on environmental pollutants, and ecology protection is a salient issue to the public, the manufacturing business firm may not win in every commutation, despite its resource advantage. We too know that when interests mobilize, opposing interests oftentimes counter-mobilize, which tin can reduce advantages of some interests. Thus, the conclusion that businesses, the wealthy, and elites win in every situation is overstated.⁶²

A good case is the recent dispute between fast food chains and their employees. During the spring of 2015, workers at McDonald's restaurants beyond the land went on strike and marched in protestation of the low wages the fast food giant paid its employees. Despite the opposition of eating house chains and claims by the National Eatery Clan that increasing the minimum wage would effect in the loss of jobs, in September 2015, the country of New York raised the minimum wage for fast nutrient employees to $15 per hour, an corporeality to be phased in over time. Buoyed by this success, fast nutrient workers in other cities connected to campaign for a pay increase, and many low-paid workers have promised to vote for politicians who plan to heave the federal minimum wage.⁶³ While the goal of a nationwide $15 minimum wage has not however been realized, two developments demonstrate significant progress in that management. Commencement, since 2014, 20-eight states and the District of Columbia have raised their state-level minimum wage to a higher place the federal level, as have forty-five cities. 2d, in April 2021, President Biden issued an executive order to raise the minimum wage of federal contractors to $15 per hour.⁶⁴

Link to Learning

Visit the websites for the California or Michigan secretary of state, country boards of elections, or relevant governmental entity and ethics websites where lobbyists and interest groups must register. Several examples are provided just feel costless to examine the comparable web folio in your ain state. Spend some time looking over the lists of interest groups registered in these states. Practice the registered interests announced to reverberate the important interests inside us? Are at that place patterns in the types of interests registered? Are certain interests over- or underrepresented?

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Source: https://openstax.org/books/american-government-3e/pages/10-3-interest-groups-as-political-participation

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