Interest Groups and Collective Action on the Internet

Interest Groups and Collective Action on the Internet

The Business Roundtable is a unique business-oriented interest group. The BRT was established in 1972, founded in the belief that the chief executive officers of major corporations should take an increased role in political debates and public policy on economic and trade issues. Indeed, the entire membership of the BRT is comprised of CEOs. However, a permanent seat on the BRT is granted to a company, not its CEO. For example, Philip Condit currently fills Boeing’s seat on the BRT, but if Boeing replaced Condit as CEO, his replacement would serve as Boeing’s representative.

There are currently 131 corporations with seats on the BRT. This size is relatively small and the high-profile nature of its members makes the organization very influential in political circles. BRT is sometimes criticized as a “privileged group,” particularly by union-oriented interest groups, such as the AFL-CIO. Another benefit of BRT’s small membership is their capacity to overcome the collective action problem outlined by Mancur Olson in, The Logic of Collective Action. This theory says that political groups with large memberships face a “free-rider problem.” Each individual member rationally views their own participation as insignificant and therefore, does not actively participate even though they still receive the benefits in the end1. The BRT overcomes this problem through their small membership and their ability to meet face-to-face, once a year in Washington to set their agenda for the year and assign issue-oriented taskforces. Personalized face-to-face meetings strengthen the relationships between members and reduce the chance of “free riding.”

The BRT has a single stated objective – “to promote policies that will lead to sustainable, non-inflationary, long-term growth in the U.S. economy.” Although each member speaks as a individual, even before lawmakers, the BRT believes that “the basic interests of business closely parallel the interests of the American people who are directly involved as consumers, employees, shareholders, and suppliers.” In fact, the 131 members of BRT have a combined workforce of more than 10 million employees in the U.S.2

BRT membership is granted by invitation only. The company is the member and its representative is the Chief Executive Officer. The participation of the CEO is the distinguishing feature of the BRT. The BRT is headed by a chairman, two co-chairmen, a nominating committee chairman, a president and executive director.