Chapter 8&9

1. Public OpinionCHAPTER 8

2. THE FORMATION OF PUBLIC OPINION

3. Public opinion: attitudes held by specific
groups and people on political matters.
It’s even more readily defined as the
complex collection of the opinions of
many different people.
It is never a single or undivided view on a
subject.
WHAT IS PUBLIC OPINION?

4. Public: the group who hold their opinion on a
controversial subject.
There are more publics than anyone would
care to count in the U.S.
These groups usually have conflicting views with one
another, and engage in many arguments and debates
to support their own views.
DIFFERENT PUBLICS AND DEFINITION

5.  People are not born
with their views. All the
views that any one
person holds are
instilled in them at a
young age and are
enforced for most of
their life.
 Two of the biggest and
most important
influences on a persons
beliefs are families and
the education system.
FAMILY AND EDUCATION

7. Children latch onto
what their parents
say to them
The schools teach
them what they need
to know.
Most kids use these
two to set up their
opinions in life.
FAMILY AND EDUCATION

8.  Mass Media are means of communication that reach wide,
dispersed audiences.
 This one thing has the single greatest effect on public
opinion.
 Television, radio and printed materials are the largest forms
of Media, and every single home in America uses at least one
of them.
MASS MEDIA

9.  Peer groups: the people whom one associates with most
often, usually meaning coworkers, friends and family.
 Peer Groups are as influential to a person’s own views as
much as the Media or any other source of Public Opinion.
PEER GROUPS

10.  Opinion Leaders are the head figure in their form of Public
Opinion. These figureheads are usually the driving force
behind the media and the peer groups they control.
 Opinion leaders can be anyone from Frank at the water cooler
at work to the President of the U.S.
OPINION LEADERS

11.  History has a big influence on
Public Opinion because no one
wants the past to repeat itself.
 Many media sources point to
the past to show what could
happen in our current time.
Some opinion leaders use the
past as the basis of many of
their arguments.
HISTORIC EVENT

13.  The most common forms of tabulating public opinion are
voting, lobbying, books, pamphlets, magazine and newspaper
articles, talk shows on radio and TV, and editorials.
 Most of these can be eschewed and changed around by the
interest groups, but these are usually reliable and trustworthy
sources.
MEASURING PUBLIC OPINION

14. ELECTIONS
 In Democracy, the
elections and votes of the
people are used to voice
their opinions.
 Most political candidates
use the voting numbers
as their claimed mandate
for their elections.
 In reality, polls and
elections are usually not
very accurate because
there is such a small
range of choices offered
on ballots.

15.  Interest groups are usually large corporations that use their
power and reach to influence almost all of politics.
 They use their representatives and other forms of influence to
exert their power over the government and political
candidates. Some people say that the government is actually
just run by corporations, and Interest groups are all the proof
they need.
INTEREST GROUPS

17.  Polls are considered to be
the only really accurate
gauge of public opinion
to use in democracy.
 The earlier forms of polls
were somewhat
inaccurate and were
easily faked and
changed.
 Today, scientific polls are
more common and are
usually far more accurate
than their predecessors.
POLLS

18.  Scientific Polling is a very
complex process
involving 5 steps:
 Defining the Universe
(target population)
 Constructing a sample (a
representative of the
population)
 Preparing valid questions
(intelligent queries)
 Interviewing (questioning
the population)
 Analyze and report
findings (finishing the
poll).
POLLING PLACES

19.  Polls are usually
considered more
reliable because they
come straight from
the population.
 The only problem that
can come from polls
are the pollsters (the
poll readers) shaping
the outcome of the
poll itself.
EVALUATING THE POLLS

21. The media is a form of
communication
Although media does
not have a part in
government, it’s
influence cannot be
understated in political
races and
arguments/debates.
ROLE OF MASS MEDIA

22.  Television may be the single greatest driving force
between public and government connection.
 News shows on TV are almost all based on political
activity, and TV is the easiest form of news and world
activity that the world turns to. It only makes sense
that the government would use TV to it’s advantage.
TELEVISION

23.  Newspapers and Magazines used to be the single
largest influential force on peoples views, but has
now been forced to take the backseat under the
weight of the Internet and TV.
 Internet and TV are the most influential source
 Some magazines, such as Time and Newsweek, are
still heavily read, but newspapers are slowly starting
to fade into the past with the advent of technology.
NEWSPAPERS AND MAGAZINES

25.  The public agenda is the list of societal and governmental
problems that politicians agree all need tending and fixing.
 The media has the power to get our population to focus on
these things and to increase the publics awareness of certain
global or domestic problems that need the attention of the
government.
THE MEDIA AND POLITICS:
THE POLITICAL AGENDA

26. Even with the
media’s far
reaching
influence, over
half of the people
who vote have no
real
understanding of
their candidates
intention or plans.
PROBLEMS:

27. Some simply vote with the more popular
candidate, and some people simply rely on looks
and actions.
LIMITS ON MEDIA INFLUENCE

28. TV has become the
biggest battle
ground for
candidates, but
these political
groups spend too
much time blasting
each other and not
enough time
properly presenting
their platforms.
LIMITS ON MEDIA INFLUENCE

29. Interest
GroupsCHAPTER 9

30.  Interest groups are sometimes called “pressure groups”
and often “special interests” or “organized interests.
 They give themselves a variety of labels: leagues, clubs,
federations, unions, committees, associations, etc. .
 Every interest group seeks to influence the making and
content of public policy.
THE ROLE OF INTEREST GROUPS

31.  Because interest groups exist to shape public policy,
they operate wherever those policies are made or can
be influenced. They also function at every level of
government.
 Public policy includes all of the goals that a government
pursues in the many areas of human affairs in which it is
involved-everything from seat belts, speed limits, and
zoning to flood control, old-age pensions, and the use of
military force in international affairs.
THE ROLE OF INTEREST GROUPS

33.  The two types of political
organizations (Political Parties
and Interest Groups)
necessarily overlap in a number
of ways. However, they differ
from one another in three
striking respects:
1. In the making of nominations
2. In their primary focus
3. In the scope of their interests
POLITICAL PARTIES AND INTEREST
GROUPS

35. • Parties nominate candidates for public
office, interest groups do not. If an
interest group were to nominate
candidates, it would, in effect, become
a political party.
• Interest group do try to affect the
outcomes of primaries and other
nominating contests. However,
interest group do not themselves pick
candidates who then run under their
labels.
• It is widely known that a particular
interest group supports a candidate,
but that candidate seeks votes as a
Republican or a Democrat.
POLITICAL PARTIES AND INTEREST
GROUPS: THEIR DIFFERENCES

36. • Political parties are chiefly interested in winning
elections and controlling government while interest
group are concerned with controlling or influencing
the policies of government.
• Unlike parties, interest groups do not face the
problems involved in trying to appeal to the
largest possible number of people.
• Political parties are mostly interested in the who,
and interest groups are mostly concerned with the
what, of government.
• Political parties focus mostly on the candidate
• Interest groups focus mostly on an issue
POLITICAL PARTIES AND INTEREST
GROUPS: THEIR DIFFERENCES

37. • Political parties are necessarily concerned with
the whole range of public affairs, with
everything of concern to voters.
• Interest groups almost always concentrate only
on those issues that most directly affect the
interests of their members
• Interest group are private organizations
• Political parties are not accountable to the
public
• Their members, not the voters, pass judgment on
their performance
POLITICAL PARTIES AND INTEREST
GROUPS: THEIR DIFFERENCES

38.  In 1787, James Madison warned the new nation against
the dancers of what he called “factions.”
 “a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or
minority of the whole, are united and actuated by some
common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the
rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and
aggregate interests of the community.”
-The Federalist
INTEREST GROUPS: GOOD OR BAD?

39. •Madison thought the factions were inevitable in human
society, and he was opposed to any attempt to abolish them.
“A society can only eliminate factions by eliminating
freedom.”
•Madison states that it is necessary to moderate the
potential extremism of factions with a balance of powers
•The separations of power in that system would mean that
factions would tend to counteract and balance each others’
power.

40. •50 years later, Alexis de Tocqueville was impressed by the
vast number of organizations he found in the U.S.
•In Democracy in America he wrote that:
“In no country in the world has the principle of
association been more successfully used, or more
unsparingly applied to a multitude of different
objects, than in America.”

41. VALUABLE FUNCTIONS OF
INTEREST GROUPS
 Interest groups help to stimulate interest in
public affairs.
 They raise awareness of public affairs mostly
by developing and promoting those policies they
favor and by opposing those policies they see as
threats to their interest.

42. VALUABLE FUNCTIONS OF
INTEREST GROUPS
 Interest groups also represent their members on the
basis of shared attitudes rather than on the basis of
geography-by what their members think as opposed to
where they happen to live.
 Public officials are elected from districts drawn on maps.
Many of the issues that concern and unite people today
have less to do with where they live than with how they
make a living.

43. •Organized interests often provide
useful, specialized, and detailed
information to government.
•This data is important to the making
of public policy, and government
officials cannot obtain them from
any other source.
•Interest groups also frequently get
information from public agencies and
pass it along to their members.
VALUABLE FUNCTIONS OF
INTEREST GROUPS

44. •Interest groups are vehicles for political participation.
They are a means through which like-minded citizens can
pool their resources and channel their energies into
collective political action.
•Interest groups add another element to the checks-and-
balances feature of the political process. Many keep close
tabs on the work of various public agencies/officials which
help to make sure that they perform their tasks in
responsible and effective ways.
•Interest groups regularly compete with one another in the
public arena. That competition places a very real limit on
the lengths to which some groups might otherwise go as
they seek to advance their own interests.
VALUABLE FUNCTIONS OF
INTEREST GROUPS

45. CRITICISMS
 Some interest groups have an influence far out
of proportion to their size, or, for that matter,
to their importance or contribution to the
public good.
 Thus, the contest over “who gets what, when,
and how” is not always a fair fight. The more
highly organized and better financed groups
often have a decided advantage in that
struggle.

46. CRITICISMS:
• It is sometimes hard to tell
just who or how many people
a group really represents.
• Many groups have titles
that suggest that they have
thousands-even millions-of
dedicated members.
• Some organizations that call
themselves such things as
“The American Citizens
Committee for…” or “people
Against…” are in fact only
“fronts” for a very few
people with very few
interests.

47. •Many groups do not in fact represent the views of all of the
people for whom they claim to speak. An organization is
dominated by an active minority who conduct the group’s
affairs and make its policy decisions quite often.
•Some groups use tactics that, if they were to become
widespread, would undermine the whole political system.
These practices include bribery and other heavy-handed uses
of money, overt threats of revenge, etc. . They are not
altogether common, but the danger is always there.

49. GROUPS BASED ON ECONOMIC
INTERESTS
 Most interest groups are based on the manner
in which people make their living (economic
interests).
 The most active and most effective groups are
those representing business, labor, agriculture,
and certain professions.

50. BUSINESS GROUPS
 Merchants, creditors, and property owners were
the people most responsible for calling the
Constitutional Convention in 1787.
 The U.S. Brewers’ Association (oldest organized
interest group at work today), was born in 1862
when Congress first levied a tax on beer. Their
purpose was to assure the brewing trade that its
interests would be “vigorously prosecuted before
the legislative and executive departments.”

51. •Two best known business organizations are the National
Association of Manufacturers (NAM) and the Chamber of
Commerce of the U.S.
•NAM now represents some 14,000 firms. It generally speaks
for “big business” in public affairs
•Chamber of Commerce has some 3,000 local chambers and
now counts more than 200,000 business and professional firms
•The Business Roundtable has taken a large role in promoting
and defending in the business community. Composed of the
chief executive officers of 150 of the nation’s largest, most
prestigious and most influential corporations.

52. LABOR GROUPS
 A labor union is an organization of
workers who share the same type
of job or who work in the same
industry. Labor unions press for
government policies that will
benefit their members.
 Some 16 million Americans, less
than 13. 5 percent of the nation’s
labor forces belong to labor unions
today
 As recently as 1975, union
membership accounted for fully a
fourth of the labor force.

54. •The largest organized labor, in both size and political
power, is the AFL-CIO (the American Federation of Labor-
Congress of Industrial Organizations).
•AFL-CIO has about 13 million members and is organized on
a national, State, and local basis.
•The largest and most powerful independent union include
groups such as the Fraternal Order of Police, the National
Treasury Employees Union, and the International Longshore
and Warehouse Union.
LABOR GROUPS

55. OTHER INTEREST GROUPS
 Most interest groups are based on economic
concern. Some promote causes and others are
devoted to opposing causes.
 Examples of groups who promote: American
Civil Liberties Union fights to protect civil
and political rights. The Friends of the Earth
are pledged to conserve our earth and
environment.
 Examples of groups who oppose causes: The
National Right-to-Life committee opposes
abortion. Where Planned Parenthood is
opposed to the messages of Right-to-Life.

56. Some interest groups promote
welfare of certain segments of
the population.
Examples
 VFW and the American Legion promote
our country’s veterans.
 AARP represents our nations senior
citizens.
 NAACP an the National Urban League
are concerned with public policies
effecting African Americans
OTHER INTEREST GROUPS

57. Religious Organizations often influence
public policy also
Examples
 National Council of Churches, Christian Voice,
National Catholic Welfare council, and The
American Jewish Congress.
OTHER INTEREST GROUPS

58. PUBLIC-INTEREST GROUPS
 Interest groups seek public policies of special
benefit to their members.
 They work against policies that threaten their
members interests.
Public Interest Groups- seek to institute
certain public policies of benefit to all or most
people in this country, whether or not they
belong to or support the organization
Examples: Common Cause, and League of Women
Voters

59. SECTION 2 : TYPES OF INTEREST
GROUPS
 Nobody knows how many interest groups exist
in the United States.
 They come in all shapes and sizes. They may
have millions of members or simply a handful.
 The largest number of interest groups have
been founded on the basis of economic
interest.
An American Tradition

60. SECTION 3: INTEREST GROUPS
AT WORK
 Public opinion is the most significant long-
term force in American politics.
 Interest groups reach out to the public to
accomplish one or all of three major goals
1. To supply the public with information an
organization thinks the people should have.
2. To build a positive image for a group.
3. To promote a particular public policy.
Influencing Public Opinion

61. PROPAGANDA
 Propaganda: technique of persuasion aimed at
influencing individual or group behaviors.
 Used by interest groups to create the public
attitudes they desire
 Some view it as a form of lying
 To be successful it needs to be presented in
simple, interesting, and credible terms.

63. INFLUENCING PARTIES AND
ELECTIONS
 Interest groups try to influence political
parties in many ways.
1. Some groups keep close tie with one of the
major parties.
2. Most want support of both parties.
3. Many groups urge members to become active in
party affairs and try to win posts in party
organizations.

64. INFLUENCING PARTIES AND
ELECTIONS
 Campaigns cost a lot of money and turn to interest
groups for financial support.
 Much of their financial help goes through political
action committees (PACs).
 PACs raise and distribute money to candidates who
will further their goals.
 Single Interest Groups: PACs that concentrate
their efforts on one issue
Ex. Abortion, gun control, health care, etc.

65. LOBBYING
 Lobbying: activities by which group pressures are brought
to bear on legislator and the legislative process.
 some like to be called “legislative counsel” or “public
“representative”.
 Lobbyists know how to bring grass roots to bear.
 Grass Roots: of or from the people, average voters
 Lobbyists make campaign contributions, provide information,
write speeches and draft legislation.

66.  Each state has it’s own laws regulating lobbying
activities.
 The lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995 eliminates
the “principal purpose” standard. It requires all
individual lobbyist to register.
 They provide basic information such as name,
address, and principal place of business.
LOBBYING