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On Joining Interest Groups: An Empirical Consideration of the Work of Mancur Olson Jr.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2009

David Marsh
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Extract

The academic literature on interest groups has tended to concentrate on the assessment of the relative influence of these groups in different political systems, and on the implications of the activities of interest groups for democratic ideology. In recent years, however, the work of Mancur Olson has stimulated an increasing interest in the formation of interest groups, and in the reasons why individuals (or corporate bodies) join them. The aim of this article is to examine Olson's analysis in the light of a study of one major British economic interest group, the Confederation of British Industry. In the course of this examination I hope to illustrate some of the weaknesses of Olson's analysis and to suggest how it might be refined and developed.

Type
Research Article
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 6 , Issue 3 , July 1976 , pp. 257 - 271
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1976

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References

1 I have used the term ‘interest group’ rather than ‘pressure group’ throughout. The general consensus of academic opinion would appear to be that ‘interest group’ is the more appropriate term for organizations like the CBI. See Wootton, G., Interest-Croups (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1970).Google Scholar

2 See Olson, M. Jr., The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967).Google Scholar All references are to the paperback edition published by Schocken Books, New York, 1968. See also Frohlich, N., Oppenheimer, J. and Young, O., Political Leadership and Collective Goods (Princelon: Princeton University Press, 1971).Google Scholar The most relevant statements of the pluralists' position are to be found in Bentley, A. F., The Process of Government (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967, first published 1908)Google Scholar; Truman, David B., The Governmental Process: Political Interests and Public Opinion (New York: Knopf, 1952)Google Scholar and Latham, Earl, The Group Basis of Politics (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1952).Google Scholar

3 The study obviously deals mainly with a consideration of the role of the CBI as an interest group in British politics. Grant, W. and Marsh, D., The Confederation of British Industry (London: University of London Press, 1976).Google Scholar

4 As Brian Barry says more generally. ‘The powerful attraction which economics holds for the other social sciences is not hard to understand… since it has for so long possessed a MARSH theoretical structure much more impressive than theirs.’ Barry, Brian, Sociologists, Economists and Democracy (London: Collier-Macmillan, 1970), pp. 10–11.Google Scholar

5 See Salisbury, R. H., ‘An Exchange Theory of Interest Groups’, Midwest Journal of Political Science, 1 (1969), 1–32, esp. pp. 4–5.Google Scholar Indeed it is crucial to the pluralists' conception that individuals with latent common interests can at any time form an actual association if their interests are threatened. If they don't assume this to be so then existing strong associations might dominate the polity. The pluralists thus stress the ease of establishing a formal organization and ignore the problems of the incentives necessary to encourage people to actually form such an association.

6 To the economist the two key variables which distinguish public goods are that they are non-rival and non-excludable. These characteristics are lucidly discussed by Peston, M., Public Goods and the Public Sector (London: Macmillan, 1972).Google Scholar A collective good is defined by Olson as ‘Any good such that if any person x1 in a (potential) group, x1,…, x2,…, xn consumes it, it cannot feasibly be withheld (from other eligible members of the association)’. Olson, , ‘Logic of Collective Action’, p. 14.Google Scholar

7 Olson, , Logic of Collective Action, pp. 15–16.Google Scholar

8 Olson, , Logic of Collective Action, p. 132.Google Scholar

9 Olson, , Logic of Collective Action, p. 135.Google Scholar

10 Grant, and Marsh, , Confederation of British Industry, Chap. 2.Google Scholar

11 Dexter, L. A., Elite and Specialized Interviewing (Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press. 1970), p. 39.Google Scholar

12 It is generally recognized that there are special problems in interviewing ‘elite’ groups such as business. Kincaid and Bright maintain that ‘To a greater extent than is probably the case in most types of interviewing, interviews with the business elite must be flexible. It is more sensible – indeed often inescapable – to shape the interview around the respondent rather than conduct it in a certain specified manner’. We didn't use a simple questionnaire in our interviews with CBI members but simply had a list of topics which we pursued in an open-ended discussion. Although we found that this technique had many advantages, it does present problems about the comparability of responses; see Kincaid, H. V. and Bright, M., ‘Interviewing the Business Elite’, American Journal of Sociology, LXIII (1957), 304–11, p. 309.Google Scholar

13 The role of the nationalized industries in the CBI is dealt with at some length in Grant, and Marsh, , Confederation of British Industry.Google Scholar

14 Subscriptions have since been substantially increased. The old system discriminated against labour-intensive industries; the new system will base subscriptions on a member's total United Kingdom salary and wages bill and its United Kingdom turnover. Some firms faced subscription increases of between 300 per cent and 400 per cent. Many of them were not too happy about this development.

15 See The Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Industrial and Commercial Representatives, chairman. Lord Devlin (London: Association of British Chambers of Commerce and Confederation of British Industry, 1973), p. 76, paras. 342–3.Google Scholar

16 See SirKipping, N., Summing Up (London: Hutchinson. 1970), pp. 227–8.Google Scholar

17 One respondent commented, ‘We pay even larger subscriptions to SMMT than to CBI. We are members of SMMT because otherwise you can't participate in the annual motor show.’

18 Although, of course, in decision-making theory even optimal decisions may be made under different conditions, known as conditions of certainty, conditions of risk and conditions of uncertainty. This distinction is lucidly developed by Watkins, John, ‘Imperfect Rationality’ in Berger, R. and Cioffi, F., eds., Explanation in the Behavioural Sciences (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), pp. 167–217, see especially pp. 179–96.Google Scholar

19 Watkins, , ‘Imperfect Rationality’, p. 206.Google Scholar

20 Watkins, , ‘Imperfect Rationality’, p. 208.Google Scholar

21 Olson, , Logic of Collective Action, pp. 37–43.Google Scholar

22 Frohlich, , Oppenheimer, and Young, , Political Leadership and Collective Goods, Chap. 1.Google Scholar

23 A similar point is made concerning the ‘cost’ of voting by Brian Barry in his extremely useful critique of Downs, in Barry, , Sociologists, Economists and Democracy.Google Scholar

24 Olson, , The Logic of Collective Action, p. 160.Google Scholar

25 Olson, , The Logic of Collective Action, pp. 33–6Google Scholar