Sigs In Congress Case Study

The structure of our government is complex. With local, state, and federal levels of government, it can be confusing to understand how the government works. Luckily, Morris Fiorina wrote a document about the structure of the government called The Rise of the Washington Establishment. The Washington establishment simply refers to big government workers such as, included but not limited to, house representatives, senators, congressmen, and party leaders. These legislators and bureaucrats are the ones who run the government and establish laws. In his document, Fiorina argued that these people are in office only for personal gains. He strongly focused on congress, in which he believes they act in favor of their reelection. Power, money, and insurance benefits are the main influences that motivate congressmen to hold their position. Governmental representatives are supposed to reflect the values of the people, but they ultimately act in a selfish manor. The Rise of the Washington Establishment analyzes how congressmen act for their own self-interest.

Moreover, the Schoolhouse Rock presentation identified the major committees that play a vast role within legislation, but furthermore failed to acknowledge the significant influence of interest groups, lobbyist, and campaign contributors. Interest groups are pertinent to the legislation process because of their vast influence. While interest groups strive to “influence public policy” to benefit its members, it accomplishes this task by using inside strategies that “pursue a narrow policy of change and directly influence legislation” and through its relationship within the iron triangle that works to “seal off” external influencers that are irrelevant to the groups view towards public policy; thus leaving a “closed

Recently, many political scientists have argued over whether today’s Congress is centralizing or decentralizing. Centralization allows Congress to act quickly and decisively, but at the expense of the members of Congress and their constituents, while decentralization protects and enhances the interests of individual members and their constituents, but at the expense of its ability to act quickly and decisively. At its birth, Congress was created as a decentralized body, and although it has fluctuated over the years, the Constitution, congressional incentive for reelection, the committee system, and weak central leadership has certainly maintained such a decentralized institution.

Lobbying of government institution affects congress members simply because there is a steady flow of information being put upon them from different lobby groups for a certain topic. The utilization of likely overall power from the individuals on persuasion is an important part of the lobbying of government institutions. Grassroots of mobilization deals with the individual level raise attention to a specific topic in the community. This mobilization can affect the voting outcome from the congressmen running for that community. If the community doesn't get the wanted results from the congressman, they are not going to vote for him/her. The effect of public policies are clearly shown in the Lobbying of government institution and the Grassroots

In this essay I will compare and contrast the different legislative agendas of various interest groups involved with the Texas Government. An interest group (also called an advocacy group, lobbying group, pressure group, or special interest) is a collection of members that are determined to encourage or prevent changes in public policy without trying to be elected. The essay will discuss the four kinds of interest groups, trade, professional, single and public, as well as provide one detailed example of each type. It includes examples from the Texas Alliance of Energy Producers, Texas AFT, MADD and TexPIRG interest groups, which are just a few of the many groups in existence out, but it provides an idea of what different types of

Special interest groups help to put pressure on elected officials to support and act on legislation. There are two main categories of special interest groups, business and societal special interest groups. A couple of special interest groups that are very well known is Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) and American Red Cross. These groups are very focused on making sure to gain as much support as possible to make sure that there are changes made in legislation that supports their cause. Mothers Against Drunk Driving was a very big part in lowering the legal alcohol blood level from .10 to .08. Now this may be not seem like a very big deal, but it all started with one person who had one voice and was able to make changes all the way up to the Federal level. Special interest groups can be very effective and are capable of making big changes when they are ran effectively and gain the much needed support from Federal

Gaurav Sharma Professor Sherry Sharifian Texas Government 2306 SLO#3 April 24, 2017 Local Control in Texas In Texas, there are very many functional Interest groups and lobbyists that operate effectively influencing the policy-making processes. The Interest groups and lobbyists are in close association with policy-makers whereby they act as negotiators of democracy to the citizens who cannot reach the legislatures (Texas Vox: 1). This has impacted local control in Texas greatly. However, the nature of laws that have been passed recently in Texas shows that the policy-makers are diverging from interest from the citizens and favoring individual groups and companies. The following essay will address the impact depicted by Interest groups and lobbyists

Which is the most likely cause for rapid increase in number of interest groups in recent decades?- Developments in technology made interest group activities easier.

But interest groups do not have a real place in congress. For them to affect motions in congress they need to utilise their powers of persuasion to influence the right people.

Decades ago, the US Congress would assign specific priorities and focuses to federal agencies when approving the yearly federal budget. This guidance is especially important because the legislature exerts little other control over independent agencies, like the Federal Trade Commission or the Federal Communications Commission. Now, because the federal budget is so often approved during crisis conditions (and sometimes merely extends the previous year’s budget into the next), Congress offers little guidance to independent agencies. This enhances the power of independent agencies while leaving them without guidance. Unger’s preferred mode of organizing politics would entail a substantial increase to the last-minute compromises and revisions that cause such confusion.

One key debate among the authors is what is actually influenced by lawmaking. On one hand, Hansen (1991) takes the perspective that lobbying influences the relationship between interest groups and lawmakers. Hansen bases his argument on the belief that because legislators want to be reelected and they lack information about the “issue preferences of their constituents, the salience of issues to their constituents, and the effectiveness of various policy options,” they will seek information to reduce this uncertainty. The service that interest groups provide the, is this information. Certain interest groups, Hansen argues have “competitive advantage,” (p. 13) in the sense that they can provide certainty about constituent beliefs in an efficient and effective manner, in order to help lawmakers get reelected. Given that elections re-occur, an additional point Hansen makes is for interest groups to have some kind of influence over lawmakers, the conditions that provide this competitive advantage must be expected to recur. When these conditions are met, interest groups

Dilankumar Patel Professor Sharifian GOVT-2306-73004 25th March 2017 Impact of Interest Group and Lobbyist on Lawmaking An interest group is any governmental sorted out interest that looks for shaping public policies. It plays an important role in American politics and they are necessary groups in the governmental system. Interest groups works to give data to policy makers that can prompt those legislators receiving the position of being supported by interest groups. Interest group hires onto people such as analysts, researchers, scientist and staffs whose works gets assembled into a report that serve to impact legislators as well as on-screen characters that indirectly influence policymaking, for example, the media and public opinion.

In this comparison between David B. Truman and V.O. Key, Jr.’s views on lobby groups they have different interpretations on role and interaction of these groups in government. In a democratic system there is bound to be resentment and desire for change because it is impossible to satisfy everybody. Truman and Key describe how those individuals try to be recognized while forming groups for “strength in numbers”. In the comparison of interest and pressure groups it is apparent that although they created resentment in the inner layers of government, they were necessary to the development and progress of the political system.

Roberts, 2011). Powerful corporations are able to exert direct power over government policy making process to make public policy decisions more favorable to the industry represented, giving significantly greater power to large corporate lobby groups over environmental and public interest groups who lack the financial resources and political support necessary to direct government policy decisions (J. Roberts, 2011).

Nutt and Backoff, (1992, p. 112) explain that some types of public organizations that can control change and other types that cannot easily control change. Professional agencies such as the IRS and FBI have considerable prerogative to act in a prescribed arena and have a protected budget. Political agencies, such as the State Department, have high control over their actions and may have legislation to protect it. Thus, change may be in the hands of parties outside of the agency.