Group Theory Essay ⋆ Political Science Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

Group theory constitutes the intellectual precursor to pluralism and was originated by Arthur F. Bentley in his The Process of Government (1908). The theory was built upon and refined further by David Truman in his The Governmental Process (1951). Thus, group theory and its offspring of pluralism and other competitor group-based theories (such as elitism and neocorporatism) are closely entwined, and discussion of one necessitates discussion of the others. Both Bentley and Truman recognized the prominent political role of interest groups in American liberal democracy and realized that giving that type of societal institution a more salient position in social scientific theorizing would result in improved and more accurate analyses of the democratic political process in America. Truman’s fundamental declaration that politics is best understood by examining the interaction of groups resides as the cornerstone of this analytical orientation. Thus, at the heart of group theory is the recognition that politics is understood best as the action of groups. The pressures exercised by organized interest groups greatly influence the activities and actions of government—as groups pursue their varied interests, they become the basis of public policy and the essence of politics. These manifested pressures and influence are considered not to be democratically problematic; instead they are important elements that make up the actual strength and vigor of American democracy.

Pluralism

Pluralism sprung from this group theory orientation, and pluralists conclude that the wide variety and diversity of interest groups and the decentralized quality of so much of governmental decision making allows a great number of groups to have impact and relevance in the public policymaking process. So in group theory and pluralism, the primary political actors are groups, not individual citizens, and this is interpreted to be a strong positive, not a negative, in the American system of governance. This pluralism of groups serves as a useful and effective check on potential governmental tyranny. In other words, American democracy works quite well precisely because of the benevolent effects of the enormous and active universe of both actual and potential groups in the country. Thus, pluralism derives from group theory and is one of the leading schools of thought in this type of political analysis.

Robert Dahl’s seminal 1961 study of local politics in New Haven, Connecticut, entitled Who Governs?, constituted the high point of pluralistic theorizing. As his analysis adduces, government plays the role of a competitive arena where interest groups battle with each other for influence over political officials and the direction of public policy in a particular issue area. The state does not systematically privilege one set of interests over another or favor one group above others either. For pluralists, there is no inherent bias inside of government—instead, politics is a wide-open, free-ranging marketplace where leaders or representatives of various groups bargain, negotiate, and compromise with each other and political officials in the halls of power, with government acting as broker or neutral umpire.

As new interests come into being, evolving from inchoate to actual, groups develop to represent those fresh interests. Membership in these groups is open, so there is much access available for all citizens in the system. Of note, political influence or clout may not be perfectly distributed, but power still remains widely dispersed. With political power so widely dispersed, those who exercise power in one kind of decision area are not the same people exercising power in another— no one single individual or group could dominate the entire decision-making process in all areas of public policy. Different sets of groups will direct decision making in different policy areas, depending on their differential levels of intensity of preferences. The reality of group politics forces elected officials, in their unrelenting endeavors to cultivate favor to assist in reelection efforts and to consolidate their own power stakes, to reach out to a variety of groups out of necessity. Thus, pluralism works to decentralize and fragment governmental decision making across policy sectors with the result that no one single cabal of elites dictates all policy—democratic decisions are duly obtained.

Criticisms Of Pluralism

As time has passed, a variety of criticisms from other group theory competitors have arisen to contest the accuracy and validity of pluralism’s insights. The first major criticism came from the sociologist C. Wright Mills, who produced power elite theory in 1956. In the American context, Mills contended that the leaders of business, academia, military, and government compose a small cadre of power elites who dominate policy making. They do not compete for influence or power with each other, as the pluralists argue across issue areas, but instead are all generally on the same page ideologically and politically. The shared commonality of the interests of this power elite results in public policy debates occurring only at the margins and a slight tweaking of policy minutiae, with the probability of transformative policy change being quite slim. For Mills (and other critics as well), policy disagreements, political disputes, and partisan battles amongst political actors are mere façades—pluralism (and the ostensible fragmentation and decentralization of governmental decision making) is little more than a masquerade obscuring how decisions are truly made in the halls of power.

Another leading critique of pluralism in group theory is best captured by E. E. Schattschneider’s famous statement that “the flaw in the pluralist paradise is that the heavenly choir sings with an upper-class accent.” Schattschneider’s point is that there is an inherent bias in the American interest group universe that strongly favors business, industry, and the generally better organized—not every group or every set of interests has the same chance to influence policy that the more moneyed ones have. Some are clearly and consistently more favored by government officials than others, and this structural skewing undermines the pluralist contention of a level playing field for all interests and groups.

Similarly, the neocorporatist view of interest group activity posits that the idea that the government is simply and solely an arena where interests come to do battle does not adequately capture the true role of the state in these interactions. Government officials will and do choose groups and interests to favor in their decisions, and these choices end up impacting the shape and hierarchy of the interest group community and the relative strengths of specific groups in that community. Neocorporatism essentially sees a cooperative relationship between government and certain interest groups (typically peak associations and broad organizations representing business and labor) so as to more effectively and efficiently stabilize the formulation and implementation of public policy (primarily in the economic realm). So, government should not be interpreted to be the neutral, low-impact variable in the policy process that pluralism posits. The state is a relevant and important factor that does necessarily affect policy outcomes; it is not just a neutral arena. This debate between pluralism and neocorporatism continues to be one of the most salient in group theory and has been so for several decades.

Conclusion

Group theory remains a vitally important aspect of analysis of politics in the American context as well as elsewhere. Pluralism continues to be the major focus of such theorizing, with important competitors arising over time in the form of the elitist and neocorporatist analytic schools.

Bibliography:

Bentley, Arthur F. The Process of Government. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1908.
Berry, Jeffrey M. The Interest Group Society. 2nd ed. Glenview, Ill.: Scott, Foresman, 1989.
Cigler, Allan J., and Burdett A. Loomis, eds. Interest Group Politics. 7th ed. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2006.
Dahl, Robert A. Who Governs? New Haven:Yale University Press, 1961.
Garson, G. David. Group Theories of Politics. Beverly Hills, Ca.: Sage, 1978.
Hague, Rod, and Martin Harrop, eds. Political Science: A Comparative Introduction. 5th ed. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007.
Truman, David B. The Governmental Process. New York: Knopf, 1951.

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