Abstract
Instructors, researchers and students interested in learning about lobbying will certainly find this text a great introductory guide. The author, John C Scott, is a Research Associate Professor at UNC-Chapel Hill, who works on lobbying, tax policy and the policymaking process. Published by Polity as part of its Political Sociology Series, the book guides the reader – in a comprehensible, structured and efficient manner – through the diverse and often controversial aspects of lobbies. Built on compelling case studies, it takes us through the muddy waters of the Exxon climate change controversy, the civic boycott of racial laws in Alabama, the origins of the Tea Party as a grassroots movement (or not) and the battle between the sugar industry and the research on coronary heart disease, among others.
Every chapter begins with an aim and follows with case studies for illustration, instances of empirical research, questions to guide academic discussion and attempts at theorisation. The big picture is set out in the opening chapter, ‘Introduction: A social orientation to interest groups and political life’, which introduces the reader to the contentious approach of political sociology. In this way, the reader becomes acquainted with themes like power, influence, collective action, inequality, citizen participation and the role of lobbies vis-a-vis the nation-state. In this regard, the critical issues at stake are the democratic legitimacy of lobbying and the impact on policy and overall political processes. Scott takes an organisational approach to discussing lobbying but, to do so, he needs to walk us though the main terms. First and foremost: what is lobbying? Lobbying can be understood as ‘an attempt to influence public policy via communication methods by a person who represents a group in a way that is personal and is proximate to and often in a social relationship with policymakers and the policymaking process’ (p. 12).
Such a definition forces us to further unpack other concepts like influence, understood as an effort designed to affect what the government does; and interest groups, meaning voluntary associations independent of the political system that attempt to influence the government. Additionally, we will need a set of variables to delineate lobbying activities like proximity, degree of institutionalisation, exclusivity, physical presence, representational capacity, ability to build connections, professionalism and social-capital development.
In Chapter 1, ‘Interests and groups’, we are confronted with a crucial question: where do interest groups come from? Groups form through a process of mobilisation or collective action when people understand their problems as being shared by others. However, this coming together takes different forms, ranging from organised interest groups to social movement groups, coalitions or protests. How, then, are interest groups in liberal democracies formed and maintained? Pluralism, the dominant theory in political science, believes that there is no dominant class or set of institutionally based elites. Different groups have power on different issues and the government is neutral vis-a-vis these interests. Power is thus derived from the grassroots and is inherently instable. Other theories are also presented. Rational choice assumes the maximisation of self-interest and the rationality of actors, which inhibits the mobilisation of group interests. Corporatism legitimises organised interests as the main agents for political negotiation as part of a natural exchange of resources for influence with the state.
A distinctive approach is that of elite theory. To what extent do actual politics represent citizens’ interests? This approach posits that elite individuals and organisations collude to maintain their social and economic positions, that wealth and family ties can be converted into political influence and that checks and balances have long ceased to work so that a few agents concentrate the resources of vast bureaucratic organisations. Elites are thus defined as those who, due to their position, are able to produce regular and substantial outcomes.
In Chapter 2, ‘Power, access and influence’, Scott explains how lobbying and interest groups use their power and influence. Power is the capacity to frame what and how people see and read information, while influence is the ability to shape a decision in line with our preferences. As a result, power becomes the capacity to influence others and to make them conform to expectations. Another critical term is now discussed: access becomes the ability to produce first-hand participation through repeated contact and the creation of interdependent relations. Interest groups develop their political agenda by generating attention, raising awareness and creating a sense of urgency in ways that are tailored to different audiences. The role of interest groups is to recruit members to a cause, mobilise adherents, acquire resources, frame their own reputation as providers of reliable information and offer causes for and solutions to existing (or created) problems. A good example of a study on elites, influence and power is that of Gilens and Page (2014), in which a vast dataset serves to prove how organised groups and economic elites have substantial impacts on US government policy.
Chapter 3, ‘Interest groups as intermediaries between nation-states and citizens’, exposes the tensions between participation and representation and the controversial nature of lobbies as actors helping policymaking and yet undermining democracy. If lobbies represent people but also shape identities and spark mobilisation, to what extent are citizens truly represented, particularly when a number of public officials use the revolving door that connects private and public sectors? If, in addition, we realise that lobbying requires resources to amass technical expertise, a fundamental question for political sociologists is: how do incumbents protect the interests of the dominant groups?
Chapter 4 is devoted to ‘Inequality and interest groups’. More questions follow. What is the impact of lobbying on inequality? The case of how the American rich get richer through introducing cumulative holes in the tax code is another interesting example. How is it possible that the top rate for income tax roughly doubles taxation on capital gains, while 64% of Americans claim to be against fiscal unfairness? Interpretations on this issue take us back to square one: power. Corporate interests have the capacity to influence public opinion through public relations departments, by hiring public relations firms, supporting selected non-profit organisations, employing lobbyists or creating knowledge. But not all agents have the resources to do so.
Chapter 5, ‘Interest group politics in a global context’, explains lobbying activities beyond (and across) states. The US Foreign Agents Registration Act, for instance, is a statute that requires disclosure of all activities and expenses of agents acting in a political capacity on behalf of foreign principals. An immediate problem arises: to what extent is there such disclosure? Moreover, I would add, in these neoliberal times when bypassing laws is the way to maximise profits, why would we believe that a significant disclosure takes place?
An oft-cited case of transnational lobbying is that of the Israeli influence on US foreign policy. In 2018, US aid to Israel reached $3.1bn for unrestricted use. To that, we should also add the unconditional support of the US at the UN Security Council. How is this sustained support granted? The response was clarified some pages before when we learned that lobbies are effective when focused on a restricted set of issues to which the population is largely indifferent. Here we observe a different set of mechanisms at play. We find think tanks that provide reliable information on the Middle East, draft speeches, work on legislative texts, advise on tactics, carry out research, marshal votes, fight critics, contribute to political parties, rally individual donors, constrain the political agenda, train advocates and even keep watch over political speeches on campuses.
When we add together lobbying, globalisation and corporate power, examples of good research focus on the study of board interlocking. This is precisely the goal of the final chapter, which offers ‘New directions in the study of lobbyists and interest groups’. Scott’s quantitative preference comes to the fore in these last pages. The main challenges to research on lobbying include restricted access to data and the overall opacity of lobbies. However, the opportunities given by new network approaches to lobbying, big data or leaked materials (as, incidentally, the ones used to measure global tax evasion; see Zucman, 2015) are there, too.
By the time we reach the end of this highly informative journey, academic readers – mostly non-Americans – will notice the geographical and methodological limitations self-imposed by the author. The overwhelming use of Western (mostly American) case studies and the focus on liberal democracies will be of limited use to those trying to understand famous cases of corporate involvement in politics, like that of Khodorkovsky in Russia, or the institutionalised influence of corporations on the Chinese political system.
Similarly, part of the macro debate on the legitimacy of lobbying activities, largely bypassed by the author, questions the very Anglo-Saxon approach that sees corporations as individuals in market-like conditions – a truly American particularity, with Supreme Court rulings regularly standing on the side of corporations. Additionally, by not engaging in a macro view of lobbying, the author avoids problematising the false equality of agents at a time when we are increasingly aware of the extent of market concentration and the imperative need for antitrust and anti-lobbying legislation. In summary, Scott’s book is a great landing strip for political sociologists interested in exploring the contours of lobbying and its impact on society. Moreover, it features a long list of discussions, illustrations and theoretical reflections, and it is brief. We could not ask much more of a book with these characteristics.