Pressure Groups

A pressure groups is an organised group of people that aim to influence government

• Exert influence, not win govt power
• Narrow issue focus
• Members united by shared belief 

Similarities

• Small parties and PGs have a narrow issue focus
• Some PGs use elections as a tactical weapon
• Parties and PGs may form part of larger social movements

Differences

PGs                                                             Parties

• Seek to exert influence                         Seek to win power
• Narrow issues focus                             Broad issue focus
• Shared interests/common causes        Shared preferences

Types of Insider subcategories:

• High profile insider groups (CBI, NFU)
• - straddle the insider/outsider divide by operating behind the scenes and in media
• Low profile insider groups (Howard League for Penal Reform)
• - concentrate on developing contact with govt, not influcne public
• Prisoner groups (Commission for Equality and Human Rights)
• - dependent on govt for funding or bc govt created them (quangos)

Types of Outsider groups:

• Potential insider groups (Countryside Alliance)
• - aspire to insider status
• Outsider groups by necessity (Fathers 4 Justice)
• - lack political knowledge/skills to become insider
• Ideological outsider groups (Stop the War Coalition)
• - radical aims incompatible with govt

Drawbacks of insider/outsider distinction

• Many groups use both insider and outsider tactics
• Some groups are more insider than others 
• Insider/outsider status changes over time 

Differences

Insider                                                         Outsider

• Access to policy makers                   No/limited access to policy makers
• Often low profile                                    High profile
• Mainstream goals                                  Radical goals
• Strong leadership                                  Strong grass roots

Differences

Interest/sectional                                               Cause/promotional

• Defend interests                                           Promote causes
• Closed membership                                     Open membership
• Material concerns                                         Moral concerns
• Benefit members only                                  Benefit others/wider society

Examples: Interest

• Peak groups (a groups that coordinates the activities of other PGs with the same interests e.g. the CBI and TUC)
• British Medical Associaiton (BMA), The Law Society, The National Union of Teachers (NUT)

Examples: Cause

• Friends of the Earth, Amnesty International, Shelter, RSPB, the Electoral Reform Society
• Non governmental organisaitons (international non profit): Greenpeace, Red Cross, the Catholic Church

Representation

• PGs represent groups/interests that aren't adequately represented through parties
• - bc groups are concerned with specific things
• PGs provide an alternative to the formal representative process through functional representation (the representation of groups based on their function within the conomny/soceity, e.g. industries, employers, workers etc.)
• HOWEVER
• Groups have a low level of internal democracy, creating the possibility that they express the views of their leaders not members
• The influence of the PGs on govt doesn't always reflect their membership size or popular support

Political Participation

• 40-50% of people belong to at least 1 voluntary association and 20% belong to multiple
• PGs seek to exert influence using opular support through petitions, marches etc. (young people like these)
• HOWEVER
• Group membership doesn't always involve participation (tendency to become chequebook groups - activism is undetaken by full time professionals and other members are used for donations/funding)

Education

• PGs communicate with the public to raise political conciousness
• PGs devote resources to researching, maintaining websites, commenting on govt policy, and using high profile academics and celebrities to get their view across
• Emphasis places on cultivating expert authority - respect for people's views based on their specialist knowledge; to be 'an' authority rather than 'in' authority
• HOWEVER
• PGs are biased and subjective as parties - few checks and constraints on what the spokesperson can say

Policy Formulation

• PGs can participate in the policy making process (as a source of info and advice to govt)
• PGs are therefore regularly consulted by govt
• HOWEVER
• Only insider groups are involved in policy formulations
• Argued that PGs shouldn't influence the policy process as they're not elected

Policy Implementation

• Role of PGs extended beyond trying to shape public policy to playing a role in putting policy into practice e.g. National Farmers' Union works with Dpt. for Rural Affairs in implementing policies
• Such links blue the distinction between groups and govt. 
• Give PGs leverage in influencing content of policy 
• HOWEVER
• Criticised such groups for being too close to govt and therefore endangering their independence 
• Argued that polict implementation gives groups unfair political leverege in influencing policy decision

Ministers and Civil Servants

• Work in the core executive which makes govt policy - where the power lies
• Govt consults PGs for 3 reasons:
• - the need for specialised knowledge and advice to inform the policy process
• - the desire to gain the cooperation of important groups 
• - the need to gauge the reaction of affected groups to proposed policies or govt measures 
• Economic, industrial, and trade policies need to consult major cooperation, trade associations and business groups

Political Parties

• Influencing party policy therefore leads to influence on govt policy
• - through funding and donations
• Trade unions and Labour have strong link
• - trade unions Provide the bulk of Labour's funding (declined from 3/4 to 1/3 in last 20 years)
• - trade unions control most of the voters are the party's conferences
• Lab and Con rely on businesses and wealthy individuals for their main funds
• Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 introduced new rules on party fundraising and spending
• - have to reveal where their funding comes from and some sources of funding

Parliament

• PGs may use parliamentary lobbying to supplement contact with ministers and civil servants
• Less is achieved with Parliament than the executive (changes can still be made to legislation)
• - this can happen through influence on private members bills, parl qs & select committees
• Lobbyists seek to make contact with sympathetic MPs & peers - provide them with expensively produced briefing and info packs
• Parliamentary lobbying has grown for many reasons:
• - more independently minded backbenchers
• - the introduction of departmental select committees 
• - growing use of professional lobbyists and political consultation
• - the fact that the partially reformed HofL is more assertive

Public Opinion

• These strategies are adopted by outsider groups, although high profile insider groups may also engage in public opinion campaigning
• Purpose = to influence govt indirectly by pushing issues up the political agenda and demonstrate the strengths of commitments and the level of public support for a particular cause
• Hope = govt pays attention for fear of suffering electoral consequences
• Strategies - public petitions, marches, and demonstrations 
• Public opinion campaigning attracts media attention and therefore gain wider influence 
• - anti (tuition) fees protests by students and anti-cuts by trade unions
• Protests rarely have direct influence on public policy but can have wider impact - damage image of govt/PM
• HOWEVER
• PGs aren’t always concerned about wider public opinions and the mass media, but focus on informed opinion, sometimes called the chattering class
• Influencing mass public opinion - alert govt to possibility of damage
• However the purpose of focussing on ‘informed’ classes (professional bodies, specialist media, quality press and magazines) is to exert influence via ‘opinions formers’ 
• - these are the people best placed to sway decisions of ministers, civil servants and MPs

Direct Action

• Direct action = political action that's direct, in that it imposes sanction that affect govt or the running of the country; direct action is often illegal
• Overlaps with forms of public opinion campaigning
• Direct action aims to cause disruption or inconvenience
• Can be violent or non violent
• Strikes, blockades, boycotts, sit ins
• Civil disobedience - doing something that will result in arrest to gain publicity

The Courts

• Growing use of judicial review - encouraged growing number of campaigning groups to seek influence through the courts
• - challenge govt policy - saying ministers have exceeded or breached their legal powers

Success may mean:

• Affecting government policy - policy making power
• Pushing an issue up the political agenda - agenda setting power
• Changing people's values, perceptions and behaviour - ideological power

Organisation and Leadership

• Organisation helps groups mobilise their resources 
• Some groups are easier to organise than others (doctors-patients, teachers-students, producers-consumers)
• - helps explain why interest groups are more powerful than cause groups
• - supporters of cause groups are usually scattered 
• Effective organisation requires financial resources and good leadership
• Attributes of a good leader:
• - good political skills
• - good political contacts
• - media/presentational skills
• - a high public profile 

Wealth

• Government listens to wealthy PGs - powerful
• - explains the power of business groups 
• Advantages of business groups:
• - all govts seek cooperation and support bc they're the main source of employment and investment in the economy
• - have knowledge/expertise essential to the formulation of the economy, industrial and trade policies
• - have financial strength to employ professional lobbyists and public relations consultants 
• - often high profile, have access to media, and can run advertising campaigns

Size 

• Advantages of large membership:
• - big groups can claim to represent public opinion, and govt listens to them as they can have more electoral impact 
• - more members = more subscriptions and donations
• - big membership allows groups to organise political campaigns and protests 
• HOWEVER
• Membership size can’t compensate for a lack of economic power
• Also, some groups may be small, but exert influence through their knowledge and expertise

The Government’s Views

• Groups are more likely to succeed when govt is sympathetic to their goals
• Groups that aims clash with those of govt are ideological outsiders 
• Traditionally, business groups were more influential under Cons, and trade unions under Labour

Public Support

• High levels of public support = greater political influence
• Govt calculate how much electoral damage may be caused by no acceding to a groups demands 
• HOWEVER
• This isn’t always the case - Stop the War Coalition was against the Iraq War 2003 and had great support, but Blair still went ahead with the war

Effectiveness of Opposition

• PGs may succeed or fail, less because of their own resources, but bc of how good the opposition is 
• Groups inevitably clash
• Groups may be made to go against other groups and set them back 

Yes

The growth of cause/promotional groups

• Membership of many PGs is more than of political parties
• - RSPB's membership is larger than all parties combined
• More participation - protests, cyberactivism (e-petitions, electronic voting etc)
• HOWEVER lots of people don't join PGs for political reasons (RSPB - support birds, AA - breakdown service

More access points

• Devolution allowed PGs to exert influence though Scot Parl, Welsh & N Ire Assemblies
• - HRA has increased PG activity focussed on the courts which has benefitted PGs that represent ethnic minorities & religions - civil liberties, judicial review
• - process of European integration has encouraged PGs to exert influence through EU bodies, especially when they fail to influence the domestic policy process - lead to EU wide PGs

Yes

Use of new media and e-campaigning

• New media strengthened PGs in two ways:
• - marches, protests & demonstrations are easier to organise and more effective - social media
• - new media has helped rise a new generation of decentralised and non-hierarchical protest movements
• --- groups used social media to publicise, organise, lobby and fundraise
• --- 'virtual' organisations have thus come into existence e.g. 38 Degrees 

Advance of globalisation

• Globalisation strengthened PGs
• Business groups = more powerful in global age
• - more able to relocate production and investment, so exerting greater leverage on national govts
• Emergence of NGOs (non-profit organisations) e.g. World Development Movement as actors on global age 

No

The end of corporatism

• 1970s = high point of PGs
• - period of tripartite govt, or corporatism (incorporation of key economic groups into process of govt - create partnership between govt, business and labour)
• CBI and TUC = close relationship in peak groups 
• Economic policy developed through a precess of routine consultation and group bargaining
• Corporation dismantled in 1980s
• Thatcher suspicious of trade unions and organised interests
• - therefore adopted an arms length approach to group consultation
• Free market ideas dominated all subsequent govts - have discouraged the return of 'beer and sandwiches at No. 10'

No

A decline in meaningful and active participation

• Recent years - upsurge of group activity
• - group membership may have increased but members become more passive
• - phenomenon of chequebook participation
• - members will pay for subscription but have little interest in wider activism
• May be due to decline in 'social capital'
• Political activism confined to small class of full time professionals
• Large groups of people may be attracted to marches and demonstrations but it rarely leads to longer term political involvement/commitment - 'lifestyle' politics

Supplementing electoral democracy

• Pluralists highlight the advantages of group representation over representation through elections and political parties
• PGs may either supplement electoral democracy (make up for its deficits/limitations), or may have replaced political parties as the main way that people express their views
• - PGs keep govt in touch with public opinion between elections
• --- elections are so far apart, so in between, PGs show public views
• - PGs give a political voice to minority groups, and articulate concerns that are overlooked by parties
• --- PGs are better at articulating views about issues like the environment, CLs, global poverty, abortion, etc. as they have a narrow issue focus

Participation

• Levels of participation = important for democracy (power given to govt by the people)
• Declining turnout = democratic deficit
• Effectively combatted by growth and size of PGs
• PGs also more attractive to young people

Education

• PGs promote political debate, discussion, and argument
• Creates better informed and educated electorate
• - improves quality of public policy
• Without PGs, the electorate would have to rely on a narrow range of political views expressed by major parties
• PGs offer alternative viewpoints 
• - through access to mass media and new communications technology
• PGs therefore 'speak truth to power'

Benefits of Competition

• PGs promote democracy by widening the distribution of political power
• - because groups compete against one another - ensures no group is permanently dominant
• Pluralists argue there's no such thing as a 'power elite'
• - instead, as one group becomes influential, others are made to oppose them 
• - pluralists call this 'countervailing power - trade unions made in response to business groups
• Public policy developed through ongoing debate between rival groups
• - ensures political power is widely and evenly dispersed

Political inequality

• PGs tend to empower the already powerful - groups already powerful get more power
• - therefore increasing, not reducing, political inequality
• Pluralists argue that political inequality is democratic, in that the most successful groups are normally big 
• - they therefore have intense public support (difficult to sustain)
• Most powerful PGs = wealthiest, expertise, institutional leverage and links to govt
• Some PGs are more powerful than others
• - influence exerted by major corporations would be bigger than by a trade union or charity
• PGs strengthen the voice of the wealthy and privileged
• Some sections of society excluded from PG universe bc they're hard to organise and therefore rely on others to protect them e.g. children, asylum seekers, homeless, old, mentally ill

Non-legitimate power

• PG leaders are unelected 
• - therefore not publicly accountable & the influence they exert isn't democratically legitimate
• Also, few PGs operate on the basis of internal democracy
• When leaders are elected (trade unions), it's often with a low turnout
• Growing trend for PGs to be dominated by a small group of senior professionals
• Some leaders may be more than a self appointed political spokesperson

'Behind the scenes' influence

• PG influence isn't subject to scrutiny and public accountability
• PGs usually exert influence 'behind closed doors' (especially insider groups)
• - their representatives stalk the 'corridors of power', unseen by the public, & away from media scrutiny
• No one knows who said what to whom - unaccountable power
• This contrasts with the workings of representative bodies like Parliament, but also diminishes Parliament and undermines parliamentary democracy
• Insider link between groups and the executive bypass Parliament, making MPs impotent bc policy is increasingly made through deals between Parl and PGs the HofC don't get to discuss

Tyranny of the minority

• PGs represent minorities (this is a strength fro pluralists) & help prevent a 'tyranny of the majority' 
• - one of the inevitable features of electoral democracy
• However, PGs may create the opposite proble
• Minority views may prevail at the expense of the interests of majorities 
• - therefore, as PGs become more powerful, govt may struggle to serve the public interest and do what's best for society as a while 
• Problem of 'tyranny of the minority' is most extreme when PGs use direct action to achieve goals
• - strikes, blockade, intimidation and violence 'hold the country to ransom'
• Once PGs start to operate outside the law, they also operate outside the democratic process

For                                                                   Against

Widen power - articulate views ignored by   Concentrate power - only wealthy, well organised     parties, influence govt between elections,     and well educated groups are effective                 give voice to minorities                                                                      

Promote education - stimulate dicussion,   Narrow self-interest -  PGs are concerned with the help make informed electorate, give new      particular, not general, and may make it harder for     viewpoints                                                      govt to act in the interest of the larger society

Extend participation - offer opportunities    Unaccountable power - non elected, lack               for grass roots activism, group                       democracy                                                 participation attractive to young people

Limit government - PGs check govt            Undermine Parl - bypass representative process,   power, defend rights                                      make policy not subject to public scrutiny                 

Maintain stability - ensure govt                   Ungovernability - PGs make society more difficult to responds to popular concerns                  govern, create an array of vested interests that can                                                                            block govt initiatives