Authors: Kuper & Kuper
Summary: The entry reviews the major definitions and perspectives in the literature. Interest groups (or pressure groups) are organizations which seek to influence public policy. The process of doing so is referred to as "lobbying." Robert Dahl considers interest groups beneficial because they sustain policy debates. Mancur Olson observes that in order to recruit members, interest groups must provide incentives obtainable only by the membership, rather than collective goods equally available to free riders who do not join. More generally, authors who adopt a functional approach to the definition of interest groups treat individual companies and bureaucratic units as interest groups on the grounds that they attempt to influence policy.
The entry notes other important perspectives in the literature on the relationship between interest groups and government. In the 1980s, for instance, the corporatist accounts of Schmitter, Lehmbruch and others drew the most attention. The corporatist perspective held that interest representation is organized in a formal way, with a limited number of constituent units recognized by the state.