Key Interest Group and Political Finance Terminology

Interest Group and Political Finance Terminology

Foundational Concepts

• Faction: What founders called parties or interest groups.
• Pluralism: Theory that open, multiple, and competing groups can check the asserted power of any single group.
• Interest Group: A group with a common interest that seeks to influence government.
• Movement: A large number of people sharing a common issue who are willing to take action.

Organizational Structures and Membership

• Open Shop: A company cannot require union membership as a condition of employment.
• Close Shop: Union membership can be a condition of employment (Note: This practice is largely illegal in the U.S. today).
• Free Rider: An individual who joins a group to collect benefits without being interested in or contributing to the group's efforts.
• Professional Associations: People with a common profession organized for political purposes.
• NGO (Non-Governmental Organization): A nonprofit group operating outside government that advocates for and pursues policy objectives.

Political Action and Influence

• Collective Action: How a group organizes to pursue its goals or objectives.
• Public Choice: The study of how government officials, politicians, and voters respond to positive and negative incentives.
• Lobbying: Activity aimed at influencing public officials and policies.
• Lobbyist: Employed by an interest group or corporation to influence policy, often holding positions in executive or legislative branches.
• Revolving Door: When people who work for government agencies that regulate certain interests later end up working in the interest groups with the same policy concerns.
• Issue Network: Relationships among interest groups, congressional committees, and government agencies that share a policy concern.

Legal and Financial Mechanisms

Campaign Finance Terms

• PAC (Political Action Committee): Entitled to raise funds on a voluntary basis to contribute to candidates or parties.
• Leadership PAC: A PAC established by an officeholder that collects funds from individuals and other PACs.
• Bundling: A tactic where PACs collect money and present it to a candidate or political party as a single bundle.
• Soft Money: Money raised in unlimited amounts by political parties for party-building purposes.
• Independent Expenditures: Spending that can be unlimited on campaigns for or against candidates, provided it operates independently of their campaigns.
• Issue Advocacy: Unlimited and undisclosed spending by individuals on topics that do not use explicit words like "vote for" a specific candidate.
• 527 Groups: Political groups that can accept and spend unlimited money on election activities, as long as the spending does not occur within 30 days before a primary or 60 days before a general election.

Regulatory Documents and Legal Filings

• Federal Register: The official document that lists new and proposed regulations.
• Amicus Curiae Brief: A "friend of the court" brief submitted to influence judicial decisions.

Legislation Impacting Finance

BCRA (Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act)

• Banned party soft money.
• Banned the use of general treasury funds for electoral purposes.
• Narrowed the definition of issue advocacy.