Role Of Interest Groups In Policy Making

The interest groups often lobby members of the congress for favorable policy. The members of congress often listen as well because they are depended on the interest groups for political advertising and campaigning during the

In a pluralist democracy like in the United States, interest groups have played a major role throughout the history through highly organized factions and are aimed at different levels of government. Lobbying is one of the tactics of the interest groups to aid their agenda through implementing new laws and regulations. "If you want to have your face in the light, you should have your back in the dark". Similarly, the influences of the interests groups and lobbyists have good and bad effects on the people and the society.

Interest groups have a lot of influence over decision that the government makes and has made. These groups, when formed right, are highly organized and have a definite agenda they are trying to push that is important to them. Interest groups will lobby in congress as well as other levels of government to get new laws and regulations passed.

In simple words lobbying is way of influencing a person or employee who has the power to make or change the decision on their favor. Lobbyists especially work for interest groups, law firms and corporations. 1 Interest groups are non – profit and usually voluntary organization who have a common cause for which they seek to influence public policy without seeking any political control. Many corporations and foreign countries donate a great deal of

Interest groups in the United States have many strengths to push for their interests onto the congress men. Two powerful influences in which they have the most ability is to persuade gongress their concerns andt hat is interestgroups insider tactics and outsider tactics. Insider tactics are key tactic for interest groups to be able meet congressmen, they do they do that by helping congressmen, such as helping with legislartion coahilations, drafts legilatures, and organizing hearings. Also they also could help with writing rules and legislation. The reason why a congressmen would allow for such presence because nterest groups usually focus on a particular sector or interest at which is their primary focus and could help a congress men if they not familiar with the issue. Their representatives and advisory groupsusually will get a reaction to their proposals. The other powerfull tool at which interest groups have towards influencing congress is their outsider tactics. Outsider tactics is when intersest groups use media and public opinion to get their message across also publim mobilization. This imposses pressure on congrsess to listen to the interest group. One major example used in our textbook was used by the interest group for autodeals. Which used the mobilization of public support to help the small buisnesses. The outsider tactics are very key to a interest group howver the major power and influence comes from the money that keep the group running, that is also its

Lobbyists count with several ways to influence policymakers, from entertainment, gifts, dinners, and trips. Another way of influence they have is by providing research information for legislators. Some lobbyist work for interest group of enormous wealth, that are willing to aport in research, entertainment, gifts, trips and even campaigns for legislators to benefit their proposal.

Lobbying is when special interest groups hire and pay a professional advocate to argue for specific legislation in law making bodies such as Congress. It has been going on since the Country’s inception and happens at every level of government. Corporations do most of it, and usually target congresspersons, but executive agency officials and US Supreme Court Appointments have been included.

Lobbyists are a group of people who defend and advance their interests through lobbying which is to “inform, persuade, and pressure” policymakers to support the groups objective. With more policies set in place, the more lobbyists get involved and a great example is the financial crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930’s. When the Obama administration stepped in and proposed to “repair the regulation and increase oversight,” the lobbyists were there to support and represent banks, mutual funds, credit card companies as well as companies in retail, manufacturing, and service that this proposal could affect.

The United States governmental system based on pluralism, or the theory of government that emphasizes competition for policies that support a specific interest group in Congress. Both interest groups and political parties are linkage institutions that connect citizens with their government, but in different ways. Environmental and equality interest groups are newer political interest groups that are influencing policymaking in ways a political party would not.

Lobbyists also represent special interest groups (Careers). An extensive amount of research is involved when becoming a lobbyist. Not only does the lobbyist serve as a voice on behalf of their client to legislative bodies, but it is also their responsibility to educate the client on the potential impact of the bill or law. Lobbyist must make it among one of their top priorities to remain educated on a variety of different issues at all times (Bureau of Labor Statistics). Excellent communication skills, both in written form and oral are necessary.

After reading the 6th Chapter in Pal’s book, I believe that interest groups and advocacy politics are essential to ensure a healthy democracy. As stated by Pal on page 233, public interest groups “were motivated to challenge policy and the state through collective identity and shared values.” Through this we can see that it is essential to government to have public interests groups in order to meet the publics needs. Several examples of these types of groups/movements include the Civil, women’s, and lesbian/gay rights movements. Another example is that of climate change, an issue that has an impact on everyone, and through interest groups and advocacy politics, the public have the ability to present the issue to the government in an attempt

I believe that interest groups are helpful to our political process. Interest groups have particular issues that they have faith in and do their best to advance them and cause bills/laws to be passed that support them. Interest groups have several valuable functions. They provide useful information to the government, represent members of the interest group in congress, provide political participation, educate the public, build agendas, and serve as a government watch dog. To me one of the most important functions of interest groups is that they advocate an interest for citizens who either dont have the knowledge, resources, or time to advocate what they want by themselves.

Lobbyists meet with elected officials to resent their cases, and provide public officials with information, they try to influence those who make governmental decisions. Lobbying to ensure favorable national policies and to prevent unfavorable ones has become massive in American industry. I agree when political scientists say that lobbyists serve a useful purpose, injecting valuable information into the legislative process. I allows people to be informed. By receiving information they are able to exercise their democracy by choosing between the proposals and evaluate them more deeply, selecting the candidate that would benefit them the most or will act in a way that would create favorable impact to their situation.

The highest priority of a government job is to help the citizens of that state. It sounds ideal, but there are people who become lobbyists to give a voice the people who don’t have one and there are others who are in it for other factors. These factors can include money, and their familiarity with the bills or policies. The monetary portion is quite simple, lobbying would earn more than $7,200 per year. When it comes down to skills, being a legislator provides all the necessary tools in order to become a lobbyist. A legislator knows the policy-making process, the knowledge of how these policies work and most importantly they have relationships with other lawmakers. This could be very beneficial to an interest group because the lobbyist would already be familiar with all the processes behind the

representing/lobbying- lobbyists able to marshal detailed information and arguments about difficult text in a bill offer an invaluable service to Congress. Lobbyists fill the gap by offering some of these services, including, fact-finding, giving someone’s perspective, giving a business perspective, sharing how much legislation will impact a certain sector of the economy or a country.”