Reading the survey compare the author’s view with that of the above chapter.

From the discussion of organizations resting on economic foundations it might be deduced that a group theory of politics is essentially a theory of economic determinism. Under that theory it might be reasoned: A steel industry exists; therefore an American Iron and Steel Institute will exist, and it will have predictable views on public policy. If there is a steel industry, the chances are good that there will be something on the order of the Institute, but what its views will be is not so predictable. Group views are not cleanly cast from the matrix of economic circumstance: they are hammered out by internal group debate and conflict. Moreover, to equate a group theory with a theory of economic interest is to ignore the many groups whose endeavors have only the most tenuous economic basis. The Anti-Defamation League, the Americans for Democratic Action, the National Catholic Welfare Conference, the League of Women Voters, the Daughters of the American Revolution, the American Correctional Association, the American Friends Service Committee, and the John Birch Society can all raise quite a commotion and. under propitious circumstances, influence public policy.

Obviously all sorts of groups that affect public policy have fundamental similarities; one common denominator is that the members of each group possess shared attitudes. These attitudes may or may not be related to the economic interest of the members of the group. Even if they are, they are not extruded in a predetermined form from a given set of circumstances. They develop somewhat unpredictably in the processes of interaction – the give-and-take – among the members of the group. Thus, many years ago the American Medical Association took a benign attitude toward health insurance proposals. Then gradually it swung around to the most spirited opposition in response to the shifting balance of power in its own internal politics.

In his group theory David B. Truman holds that shared attitudes, not property, income, or other material concern, constitute group "interests." Under this conception of interest, the Izaak Walton League is as much an interest group as is the Gray Iron Founders Society. The members of each group share attitudes that underly its offensive excursions and defensivemaneuvers in relation to government and to other private groups. Under this theory, too, an interest group need not possess the apparatus of formal organization to carry weight in the political process. Even thoughno group machinery exists, politicians will take into account and seek to exploit the common attitudes of the home owners, the suburbanites, the good people of eastern Oregon, or the fine citizens of downstate Illinois. More commonly, of course, organization exists, and an executive secretary and a board of directors see that group attitudes are translated into resolutions and communicated to the points of decision.

The conception of group interest as shared attitudes also permits one to take into account other aspects of politics that escape us if the notion of group is limited to organized group. Among the population are many categories of people with like attitudes, but they are quiescent politically and do not technically constitute groups. Once interactions develop among these people – communications, discussions, reactions, responses – an operative, although not necessarily organized, group comes into being and affects the balance of strength among existing groups. These groups, called to life by events that activate the latent attitudes of their members, Professor Truman calls "potential" groups. A new highway, say, is to be routed through a residential district. The citizenry concerned are activated, the potential group quickly becomes a reality, and its executive committee builds a fire under the state highway commission. Or a bill that appears to be a big steal seems about to be passed by the legislature. Mass meetings are called, indignant editorials appear, delegations call on the governor; a quiescent or potential group, based on a shared attitude of hostility toward thievery, becomes a reality for the duration of the crisis and then may lapse back into mere potential.

The idea of interest group that has been set out has sufficient breadth to include all the organizations dealt with earlier. It also covers others that have less of an economic base. Thousands of groups make themselves heard in the affairs of local, state, and national government. To catalogue all pressure organizations would be a task of census-like proportions, but their variety may be suggested by brief mention of several classes of groups.

One category consists of those groups concerned with the scope and nature of public activities. Commonly a pressure group moves the government to act (or not to act), though at times organized groups come into being after the government has acted. The beneficiaries of governing activities are likely to be alert and insistent in presenting their recommendations on appropriationsand legislation. Examples are the National Rivers and Harbors Congress, the National Reclamation Association, the National Rehabilitation Association, the Mail Order Association of America, and the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. Similarly, groups may be concerned chiefly with the character of specific regulatory or tax measures. Organizations of public employees at times wield a powerful influence.

Women are banded together in diverse groups with a concern about public policy. The National Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs has fought, with some success, for the elimination of economic discrimination against women. The League of Women Voters has a long record of lobbying in support of governmental measures ordinarily in the general interest, and the American Association of University Women has been active on some issues. The General Federation of Women's Clubs has stood for such proposals as the elimination of roadside billboards.Women, as women, have few common political interests, and, hence, women's organizations often have difficulty in finding issues in which their members have a joint concern and in avoiding issues that generate schisms. Women's groups with a multi-class membership maintain unity on only the most innocuous matters. Women's groups with a class membership, however, can push for sharplydefined objectives without threatening their unity.

Another differentiation among groups may be noted. Some groups – most of those discussed in earlier chapters – are permanent organizations that act from time to time as public issues of concern to their members arise. Another sort consists of organizations created, ad hoc, to agitate for or against specific proposals; they are usually fairly short-lived.They often serve to mobilize or to coordinate the efforts of several permanent associations with a common concern about legislation. Illustrative are the National St. Lawrence Project Conference, the National Committee for Repeal of Wartime Excise Taxes, and the National Committeeto Defeat the Mundt Bill.

Pressure organizations are also clustered about state and local governments. Each state capital has its own complement of representatives of organized groups within the state. Often the division of functions between national and state government is paralleled by a division of spheres within a federated national private organization. The American Medical Association takes care of matters in Washington, while the state medical societies handle problems of state legislation and politics. State manufacturers' associations, state labor federations, state chambers of commerce, and other organizations are further examples.

A few of this miscellany of groups may profitably be subjected to analysis. Their prominence on the national scene justifies attention to veterans' organizations, religious groups, associations concerned with foreign policy, and professional associations. Consideration of their operations will also permit reference to some patterns of behavior that are characteristic of many other groups.

The treatment ofindividual pressure groups and the analysis of selected aspects of their behavior leave untouched the question of their place in the political system as a whole. This matter may be approached by an examination of the methods employed by groups in their relations with government. An understanding of their interactions in the political process will lay a foundation for characterization of their collective role in the political order.

Interest groups have existed since the founding of the Republic, yet the great proliferation of organized groups came in the twentieth century. Our complex array of private organizations sprang from changes in the social order that created political needs met only inadequately by older political institutions and procedures. Chief among these changes were the diversities introduced by specialization in the productionand distribution of goods and services. This multiplication of specialized segments of society threw upon government an enormous new burden. Specialization has as its corollary interdependence; interdependence has as its consequence friction. New frictions put to government new problems in the mediation of conflicts born of the new relations among interests within society. The growing work load alone strained the capacity of representative and administrative institutions designed for a simpler day, but the old institutions were also ill-adapted to many of the newer problems brought to government for settlement. New types of interests needed new mechanisms to formulate and state their needs – instruments better suited to the purpose than the older type of geographical representation of interests.

Increased specialization almost inevitably means increased governmentalintervention to control relations among groups. In turn, governmental intervention, or its threat, stimulates the formation of organized groups by those who sense a shared concern. This chain reaction may be set in motion not so much by government itself as by the formation of one organization to press its claims, through the government, upon other groups which in turn organize in self-defense. Almost every proposed law represents the effort of one group to do something to another. When a law or a proposed law impinges upon a class of individuals, they are likely to be drawn together by their common interest in political offense or defense. Organization begets counter-organization.

The upshot of these processes has been the erection of an impressive system of agencies for the influencing of public attitudes and for the representation of group interests before Congress and other governmental agencies. Perhaps 500 organizations have a continuing interest in national policy and legislation. While the major groups may not number over two or three score, hundreds of others have an occasional interest in legislation. A complete picture of the system of group representation would also take into account the great corporations which often deal directly with Congressmen rather than through trade organizations. The views of individual corporations tend to be made known with less fanfare than are the demands of organized groups. Often single firms constitute substantial proportions of their industries, and they have a stake in public policy warranting advocacy by the individual firm. A corporation such as Pan American Airways, with its dependence on public policy, could, scarcely rely solely on an association of air transport companies to look out for its interests. On the other hand, in an industry made up of many small units the association commonly plays a larger role.

As he speculates about the significance of pressure groups the student may well keep in mind a warning about the popular stereotypes of these organizations. The term "pressure" itself can be misleading, for much of the work of these groups does not involve turning the heat on Congress. Nor is the notion correct that groups invariably seek indefensible privilege; their objectives spread over as wide a spectrum of good and evil as do the motives of mankind generally. The view that pressure groups are pathological growths in the body politic is likewise more picturesque than accurate. A safer assumption is that groups developed to fill gaps in the political system.