Lobbying Essay ⋆ Political Science Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

Lobbying is the practice of trying to influence a government policy by actors outside that particular government. The term arose from the practice of advocates gathering in the lobbies outside the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives so that they could plead their cases to officeholders. While all forms of government experience some form of lobbying, capitalist democracies, with their economies largely in private hands but subject to public-sector regulation and their governments concerned with public opinion, spawn entire industries aimed at influencing public policy.

Lobbying In The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries

Lobbying grew rapidly in the United States after the Civil War (1861–1865), with the development of a modern industrial economy and the public sector playing an increasing role in regulating that economy. Railroads, banks, and other corporations sought favors from the federal and state governments—or found themselves “shaken down” by politicians—and the Gilded Age became notorious for its scandals.

The early twentieth century saw lobbying become increasingly professionalized. Overt bribery became less common, and lawyers gradually became the main actors in influencing government. Technical expertise became particularly important as progressivism, the New Deal, and the Great Society imposed regulation on business, and the “revolving door” became institutionalized as each presidential administration generated sets of well-connected insiders eager to capitalize on corporations’ need for access.

The 1960s and 1970s marked a further explosion in government advocacy. The Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon administrations greatly expanded Washington’s role in civil rights, environmental, energy, health care, and consumer issues. A variety of mass movements mobilized millions of citizens as new technologies such as direct mail and computer databases greatly lowered the cost of forming large membership organizations. Large transfers of funds from Washington to state and local governments gave birth to a new industry of intergovernmental lobbying. The business-dominated culture of midcentury Washington collapsed, and corporations responded by increasing their lobbying and public relations efforts.

Lobbying Groups

Despite the growth of citizens’ groups, business remains the most important force in Washington lobbying, but these businesses rarely act as a coherent whole. Cor porate lobbyists are often concerned with winning on narrow, low-profile issues in which conflict and publicity are minimal. Many of the most heavily lobbied issue areas—telecommunications, financial services—feature conflicts among corporations and highly technical matters that do not easily fall along ideological lines. Other issues—environmental regulation, tort reform, workplace standards—come closer to traditional liberal-conservative divides.

Trade associations usually focus on broader issues that affect most or all of their membership. The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association (PhRMA) spent millions of dollars on lobbying and public relations to shape the Medicare prescription drug benefit passed in 2003. Professional associations take a broader focus than do corporations. The American Medical Association (AMA) claims to speak for all American physicians, and it dominated health care policy through the 1960s but failed to stop the creation of Medicare in 1965.The rise of specialty societies undermined the AMA’s ability to speak for the entire medical profession, and today, the health care industry is fragmented in its representation.

Peak business associations claim to speak for the entire business world and usually speak out against government intervention in the economy. These groups are especially close to the Republican Party; the U.S. Chamber of Commerce often serves as a mouthpiece for Republican administrations. This group led the most expensive lobbying campaign in recent history in support of tort reform, leading to the passage of legislation in 2005.

Labor unions have long enjoyed a close relationship with the Democratic Party. Citizens groups, such as the National Rifle Association and the Sierra Club, often take a more ideological stance than do corporations and are more willing to mobilize their members as activists.

How Lobbyists Do Their Work

Washington lobbyists include many former elected officials, government appointees, and political staffers. These individuals can trade in skills and connections developed in the relatively low-paying public sector for the far higher salaries of the lobbying world while maintaining an interest in partisan politics. Both at the federal and state levels, lobbyists focus their efforts on the legislative branch. Legislatures write laws and offer more access to outside actors than do the executive and judicial branches.

The most important commodity lobbyists can provide to policy makers is information. Members of Congress often confront legislation of which they know little. Lobbyists, by contrast, may have spent decades working on one particular issue and can transmit that knowledge to officeholders. Lobbyists also acquire information, however, whether it is through reading legislation, studying the Federal Register and other publications, or attending committee hearings or through personal contacts or reading journalistic accounts. Lobbyists often focus their efforts on congressional committees, known as the “workshops of Capitol Hill”—committees write the bulk of legislation, and their members and staff often know more about their specific issues than anyone else in Congress.

Much of lobbyists’ time is spent building the relationships necessary to make their case on behalf of clients. They need to ensure that their phone calls are returned and that their requests for appointments are received favorably. So lobbyists attend the fund-raisers, they frequent the bars patronized by congressional staffers, and they throw the parties that can attract the “right” people.

Once in members’ offices, lobbyists must make their case effectively. They need the technical expertise to understand legislation, and they need to be succinct. Above all, lobbyists need to engender trust. A member of Congress needs to know that any advice received from a lobbyist is, if not unbiased, at least reasonably accurate. Lobbyists who make the overloaded lives of members and staffers easier may become trusted advisers and be consulted on matters outside their narrow purview.

Lobbyists can raise money for members of Congress, through political action committees, through individual contributions, and by “bundling” the contributions of other donors. They also may contribute to party committees and think tanks and foundations with ties to important policy makers.

Academic studies of lobbying rarely show it to have profound influence despite lobbyists’ strongest efforts; PAC contributions seem to only buy access, and lobbyists seldom dominate the legislative process. Their influence cannot compete with those of party, ideology, or constituent opinion. For this reason, much lobbying activity is defensive in nature, fending off legislation that might damage a client’s interests.

Lobbying the executive branch poses challenges different from those found in legislative advocacy. In the executive branch, many of the key decisions are in the hands of career civil servants. Due to this, lobbying the executive branch must rely on policy arguments far more than personal affability. Among the most heavily lobbied entities in the executive branch are regulatory agencies and commissions, including the Food and Drug Administration, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Federal Trade Commission. These agencies make decisions that can be worth millions of dollars to corporations and trade associations, and they are notorious for their “revolving doors,” with lawyers and other employees putting in a few years to gain the necessary expertise, and moving onto lucrative positions in the private sector.

Lobbying The European Union

As the European Union has gained power (especially after the Single European Act of 1987 and the Maastricht and Amsterdam treaties), lobbyists have increased their activity in Brussels. As a means of providing greater democratic legitimacy for the EU, the European Commission (the community’s executive body) has encouraged the growth of interest groups, both through direct funding and widespread consultation on policy making. The commission itself attracts the most attention from lobbyists. It drafts all legislation that will be considered by the European Parliament (EP); lobbyists especially seek to influence the early stages of this process, when many details are worked out. The commission has a highly fragmented structure, with thirty-eight directorates general and countless advisory committees allowing for multiple points of access. The commission also is chronically understaffed, giving lobbyists wide opportunity to exploit technical expertise.

The EP, once dismissed as inconsequential, acquired more power during the 1980s and 1990s. If lobbying the commission is much like lobbying the American executive branch in the emphasis on the low-key exchange of technical expertise, then lobbying the EP resembles working with the U.S. Congress in its embrace of public opinion and political horse-trading. Few lobbyists can gain access to COREPER (composed of member states’ permanent representatives to the EU), the Council of Ministers (foreign ministers), and the European Council (heads of government).

Lobbying the European Union traditionally was dominated by large, well-connected peak business associations such as the Union of Industrial and Employer’s Confederation of Europe (UNICE), the European Roundtable of Industrialists (ERT), and the EU Committee of the American Chamber of Commerce (AMCHAM-EU). European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) spoke for organized labor. But since the 1980s, a much broader variety of interests have emerged, including environmentalists and consumer activists, while an increasing number of individual firms now have offices in Brussels.

Bibliography:

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Baumgartner, Frank, Jeffrey Berry, Marie Hojnacki, David C. Kimball, and Beth L. Leech. Lobbying and Policy Change: Who Wins, Who Loses, and Why. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009.
Berry, Jeffrey M. The New Liberalism:The Rising Power of Citizen Groups. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 2000.
Berry, Jeffrey M., and Clyde Wilcox. The Interest Group Society. 5th ed. New York: Longman, 2008.
Cigler, Allan, and Burdett Loomis, eds. Interest Group Politics. 7th ed. Washington D.C.: CQ Press, 2006.
Coen, David, and Jeremy Richardson, eds. Lobbying the European Union: Institutions, Actors, and Issues. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003.
Greenwood, Justin. Interest Representation in the European Union. Basingstoke, U.K.: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.
Levine, Bertram. The Art of Lobbying: Selling Policy on Capitol Hill. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2008.
Wolpe, Bruce, and Bertram Levine. Lobbying Congress: How The System Works. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 1996.
Wright, John R. Interest Groups and Congress: Lobbying, Contributions, and Influence. New York: Longman, 2002.

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