Pressure groups take numerous forms. They can be permanent or temporary, they can work together or be directly opposed etc. The main functions of pressure groups are to enable participation in national and local politics between elections and to provide the decision makers with specialist knowledge of their issue(s).
Pressure groups are seen to enhance the democratic process in that joining pressure groups is a way for ordinary individuals to participate in the political process.
In our representative democracy, representatives are chosen infrequently and are elected by a majority. This means that in reality, the extent to most people’s participatory democracy is limited to casting a vote every few years (for the central and local government). This has led to the birth of a democratic deficit -the fact that people have little or no influence over decision makers between elections. By joining a pressure group, one can express their strength of feeling and take active steps to influence the government decisions concerning the matter they’re concerned about. Pressure groups can sometimes be very much a local organisation enabling local issues to be aired and discussed on a local level - in some cases the issues wouldn’t have otherwise been dealt with. Thus pressure groups are a way of articulating local grievances and they can help in the community building process, getting people involved with their local community hence the building up the notion of active citizenship. In this respect, pressure groups successfully act to fill the democratic deficiencies by providing the continuity of communication and consultation between the government ant the public between elections.
Political party membership has been subject to substantial erosion in recent years e.g. Conservative party membership in the early 50’s was 2.8m and has declined significantly to the a mere 310,000 in 1997. This reflects the general disillusionment of society with conventional parties.
One might argue that this decline in political party membership represents reduced democracy as it indicates less people being involved in political activities, however pressure groups do supplement democracy to a large extent in that the decrease in political party membership has evidently been at a benefit to pressure groups membership, which has increased (although its possible to be a member of both) meaning that pressure groups offer an alternative form of involvement in the political process to political parties.
Pressure group activities are also perceived to be complementary to those of political parties. Pressure groups can put pressure on political parties to enable their issues to receive prominence -get their interests on the party manifestos and if they’re already there, pressure groups can campaign for their issues to become a priority. In this sense, pressure groups counter the monopoly of the political process in parliament (the governmental conference of elected representatives constituting the supreme legislative body of the UK) by political parties. E.g. cause groups such as the green party (who is actually a pressure groups/political party hybrid as it has elected representatives) raise issues for discussion, which falls beyond the usual party manifesto scope. Governments can’t effectively deal with all issues. Due to the increasing complexity and growth of government areas, it is just short of impossible to expect the government to have expertise in all the areas they work in. Pressure groups supplement democracy through relations with political parties in that they provide a source of specialist knowledge/advise to the government as pressure groups are usually concerned with a single issue or a narrow policy area so have the ability to develop expert knowledge of that issue/area.
The argument for the existence of a democratic deficit is also due to the fact that currently, the elected representatives may not support the views of minorities. Pressure groups fill this void as they ensure that decision makers hear a group’s view - that is pressure groups strive to defend the interests of minorities, particularly those connected with parties not in government. This is a particularly important function of pressure groups as a supplement to democracy because it is the view of the majority, which has a tendency to prevail. This so called ‘tyranny of the majority’ means that without a system including pressure groups as a supplement to democracy, it would be difficult for the rights of the minority to be protected.
Pressure groups aid the dispersal of power away from the centralized legislative and executive institutions towards the people who are actually affected by the decisions. In addition to this supplementary function of pressure groups to democracy, pressure groups generate significant opposition to government policies that have been formulated without regard to the views of the general public or the interests of the minority affected. This means that pressure groups supplement democracy in that they’re able to check the concentration of political power. Also if the government acknowledges the pressure groups, they’re then able to exert some influence in the decision making process through consultation before the policy is finally decided e.g. the Labour government recently implemented Passports for Pets on which it heavily consulted with pressure groups such as the RSPCA and the Kennel Club for specialist advice. Also, there is the concept that pressure groups force decision makers to act as arbitrators between two possible pressure groups who may be presenting conflicting views/wishes.
So far, pressure groups have been proved to be nothing short of an indispensable and infallible supplement to democracy. However, there exists a few significant arguments to the contrary where pressure groups are instead seen to serve as a hindrance to democracy. Firstly, the concept of pressure groups forcing the elite decision makers to not implement the ideas they personally want, but in effect, to arbitrate between various pressure groups ideas hence forcing them to take into consideration the views of others is disputed. The argument is deemed merely impractical, as it is believed that decision makers will ultimately implement their own agenda and if the views and proposals of pressure groups are nonconforming with those the decision makers personally hold they’re likely to be ignored.
Perhaps the most substantial argument supporting the concept that pressure groups instead of being a supplement to democracy actually distort it is that generally pressure groups are unelected and can be unrepresentative. Pressure groups are often unrepresentative and rarely reflect the broad mass of society or even their members. Michels, an elitist, put forward the iron law of Oligarchy meaning that by the very nature of these organisations (including political parties) power resides with the dominant minority. This applies to a large extent to pressure groups whose officers/leaders are usually are unelected and an internal structure of democracy is largely nonexistent, i.e. pressure groups reinforce political inequalities as power is concentrated in the hands of a small group of dominant figures e.g. the Law Society where although a formal democratic structure is in place, it tends to be largely oligarchical in practice and despite the fact that a very high percentage of qualified solicitors belong to it, the official spokesperson of elected officials in reality don’t speak on behalf of all its members. Therefore the ideas and opinions expressed by these elites may in actuality be contrary to those of the members.
Pressure groups can also distort the democracy process by exercising disproportionate influence and therefore undermining the notion of democracy. Pressure groups do not represent society equally and so can be damaging to less influential groups in society. For example, pressure groups generally favour the stronger groups in society - more broadly, the sectional groups i.e. the key industrial workers, educated professionals and the business elite. There is also tendency for pressure groups to favour producer groups as opposed to consumer interests. Perhaps the clearest example of this is the incredibly strong position of the Bar (the governing body of barristers) - a producer group - which is often accused of being a conspiracy against reform in the public interest e.g. by maintaining very high fees. The ability for this pressure groups to exert this excessive influence lies in the fact that its members are strategically placed in positions to give them unfair advantages e.g. the current PM Tony Blair is a barrister, as is 48 other MP’s. Weaker groups such as immigrants, old-age pensioners, unemployed or the children (e.g. the CPAG) have low bargaining strength, are often poorly organised and hence have very little influence in the process.
Undoubtedly, pressure group activities limit the activities of parliament e.g. by the insider groups working closely with ministers and civil servants. There has long since been a leakage of power from parliament to the government. This is so much so that in practice parliament no longer serves to formulate legislation, as by the time it sees it, the legislation is all but decided. This actually has severe implications for the democracy of the UK as it represents the rise of a corporate state as it is in effect, moving the decision making away from the representatives the people have elected, towards the ministers and officials who are not elected by the public and therefore are unaccountable to the public for decisions they make.
In conclusion, this essay has put forward numerous points for and against the concept of pressure groups serving as a panacea to the democratic deficit, which would have otherwise existed. I personally subscribe to the view that when the arguments for and against have been taken into account, it is clear that in an increasingly pluralistic society, pressure groups are a supplement to democracy to a very large extent. I believe that pressure groups are a permanent, vital part of the political process and partially contribute to overcoming the immense democratic deficit. Despite the fact that some pressure groups are labelled largely oligarchic in practice, in most organisations, I believe that this is a natural outcome of the increasing size and complexity. E.g. I deem it extremely impractical - if not virtually impossible for the elected officials of a professional body such as the Law Society to effectively speak or act on behalf of all of its thousands and thousands of members as there are bound to be conflicting opinions of the members of an organization of such a large scale. Also with respect to the argument that pressure groups limit parliamentary activities I do agree that it contributes, but hasten re-state that parliamentary sovereignty the UK has been suffering constant erosions, from the impact of the EU to the huge parliamentary majorities being gained (effectively allowing the government to ignore even sizeable rebellions in parliament) meaning that in reality parliaments role as the supreme legislative body has and will continue to diminish with or without the existence of pressure groups. In accordance with the arguments put across earlier in this essay, I think that pressure groups are an indispensable supplement to democracy as although there are arguments to the contrary, there are more and weightier arguments for.