Politics of the United States
Discussion 7: Interest Groups and Democracy
Please note: This discussion will be graded and you need to post twice: one original post and one post responding to someone else. Please cite pages and consider using direct quotes from the reading to support your points. Be considerate in your responses to your peers (and follow the norms of ‘netiquette’ listed in the introduction module).
Interest groups play a major role in US politics. Drawing on this week’s readings, how well does this process seem to promote representative democracy?
Among the questions it might be helpful to consider in relation to your post:
1. How do interest groups participate in politics, and is this good for the health of the system?
2. Are there reasons some groups might be more successful than other groups?
3. In the Siplon and Grover reading, what do they mean by an “iron triangle”? Is there an example they provide that you find illuminating?
4. Drawing on Siplon and Grover and/or Hacker and Loewentheil, what evidence do you see for the power of wealthy elites and business interests compared to other groups? To the extent these interests have more power, do you see ways to potentially counteract this “over-representation”? For more information on the Politics of the United States check on this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_the_United_States
