Pressure Groups and Their Influence on the Government

Pressure Groups and Their Influence on the Government

Britain is often referred to as a homogenous society as the public

tend to share similar political views. However, more recently, there

has been a decline in membership to political parties and an increase

in the membership of pressure groups. In this essay I will define

pressure groups, information surrounding such as the amount of power

they have and how effectively they can influence institutions of

power.

A pressure group is an organised group which has as one of its

principal purposes the exercise of influence on institutions (mainly

political) in order to secure decisions favourable to the interests

the group represents or to discourage decisions from being taken which

would be unfavourable to those interests. Pressure groups also are

slightly more complex and have many different forms, statuses (within

society) and amount of influence.

Pressure groups are divided into the following sub-groups: Causal (or

promotional) groups, Sectional (or Protection) groups and also how

close they are to the government known as either Insider or Outsider

groups.

Causal groups are involved with a particular issue or issues and serve

this cause by promoting it. These groups vary in size and aims and can

be permanent (such as friends of the earth) who continually campaign

for their particular cause or can be temporary (such as CND, the

campaign for nuclear disarmament) who would disperse if their cause

was attained or irreversibly lost.

Sectional groups represent and further the interests of a particular

part of society and as a result the members of these groups are more

...

... middle of paper ...

... and unorganised. The groups themselves may not be representative of

their members as many members' views are ignored if they don't comply

with the ideologies of the leaders or decision makers of that group.

The methods of influence some groups use increase social discontent

and political instability by intensifying social frustration and

injustice felt by certain sections of the population. This can ignore

the good of the whole of the community and this kind of civil

disobedience can't be justified in today's democratic system.

In conclusion, pressure groups can both detract from and strengthen

democracy to a certain extent. Pressure groups are an essential

dimension of any democracy, yet they can endanger it if sectional

groups undermine the public interest or if the methods they use are

corrupt or intimidating.