Lobbying in Washington, London, and Brussels: The Persuasive Communication of Political Issues

Citation

McGrath, C. (2006), "Lobbying in Washington, London, and Brussels: The Persuasive Communication of Political Issues", Society and Business Review, Vol. 1 No. 3, pp. 285-288. https://doi.org/10.1108/sbr.2006.1.3.285.5

This book has two main objectives: on the one hand, it sets out to characterise the activities of lobbyists from a professional perspective; and on the other hand, to compare lobbying practices in three different institutional environments: Washington, London, and Brussels.

The author is a Lecturer in Political Lobbying and Public Affairs at the University of Ulster, Northern Ireland. He was formerly a self‐employed lobbyist, and he has worked as an aide to a British MP, and in the office of a US Republican Member of Congress. The author's aim is to produce a work which is midway between a purely academic work and the numerous works written by professional lobbyists. The author's dual status as both a scholar and a practitioner enables him to navigate between the academic and the professional world.

We can profess nothing but admiration for the immense work of investigation carried out by the author: over 60 lobbyists interviewed, both commercial lobbyists and in‐house lobbyists within companies or professional organisations. This enables the author to draw up an extremely wide‐ranging and illuminating overview of lobbying practices in three major political environments of the Western world.

There are six chapters to the book. In the first chapter, the author presents several definitions of lobbying, and various ways in which this practice is regarded. In the second chapter, the author gives a general overview of the activities of lobbyists, and then in chapter three he looks at the methods of persuasion that are employed in lobbying strategies. The two final chapters allow the author to expand on the features which characterise American, British and European lobbying practices. In the appendices – which constitute, however, a central part of the book – the author transcribes at length some of the interviews that he carried out with professional lobbyists. An exhaustive bibliography (no less than 18 pages) concludes this wide‐ranging description of lobbying activities.

Concerning definitions, we may note that the term “lobbying” generally has negative connotations for politicians and for the general public. This encourages lobbyists to resort to more neutral terms, such as “public affairs”, “government relations” or “public relations” to describe their profession. This is all the more justified since lobbying, in the strict sense of the word – i.e. providing information to politicians – only represents a small part of their activity. For the author, the term “lobbyist” is to be preferred above all other terms, in spite of its negative connotations, since it has the advantage of being explicit: influencing public decisions.

In the second chapter, the author sets out the different activities of the lobbyists' business. Four main types of activity may thus be identified: providing information to public decision‐makers, monitoring and searching for information, developing political strategies, communicating with policy‐makers. Lobbyists play an important role in acting as a channel of two‐way communicating between organisations and public institutions and as a translator. We may note three important points that emerge from the author's analysis. First, lobbying based on personal relations with politicians is no longer sufficient, since today's lobbying is based more on the analysis of issues: forecasting emerging issues, managing current issues, building coalitions, interacting with policy makers. Secondly, pressure‐based lobbying is inefficient: it is better to inform political allies or to convince neutral political leaders than to put pressure on political opponents. Finally, lobbying requires the establishment of long‐term relations with public institutions and with political leaders.

The author then goes on to look at the different methods of persuasion. Communication and persuasion are at the heart of lobbying. Lobbyists have to communicate effectively in order to exercise an influence: to legitimate and to persuade. Advocacy is the second most widely‐used method of influence for lobbyists. Two others methods of persuasion can be extremely effective. Grass roots campaigns consist in getting voters to send letters, telegrams or e‐mails, and to telephone or visit political leaders. This practice uses the vote as a lever in order to exert influence on politicians. From the interviews carried out by the author, it emerges that the power of the vote carries more weight than the power of money. Coalitions enable lobbies to multiply their influential capacities by pooling their resources. Coalitions moreover seem to be regarded favourably by political leaders, as they constitute a kind of synthesis of the interests that are at stake in a political issue. In all these activities, the professional lobbyist acts as an adviser and as an organiser. The lobbyist is not just a “gun for hire” with an address book, but also someone who will be able to advise and help his clients to formulate an influencing strategy, and to coordinate the different actions that have to be led.

In the last two chapters, the author looks at the characteristics of lobbying in Washington, London and Brussels. It emerges, that the relationship between money and power is the main factor which differentiates the American lobbying system on the one hand, and the British and European lobbying system on the other hand.

American lobbying takes its legitimacy from the political culture of the country, and from the very principles which underlie American democracy. Indeed, the First Amendment guarantees “rights to free speech and to petition”. Lobbying is encouraged by a decentralised political system, in which elected representatives are subject to pressure from their electorate. Lobbying is also encouraged by the way in which the whole political system is financed, which grants power to lobbies through Political Action Committees. It is then more effective to lobby elected representatives, thanks to the pre‐eminence of the legislature above the executive, but also because of the power of representatives over political parties. Parliamentary commissions are a particularly favourable means of influencing (amending or blocking) parliamentary decisions.

Lobbying in London is quite different, because of the existence of a culture which is less reliant on the written word. There is, therefore, no written constitution to justify lobbying, and there is no lobbying regulation. Lobbyists prefer to set down their own code of conduct. However, lobbying is well and truly considered as the right of every British citizen. Because of the overwhelming role of political parties and the executive, influence actions are generally aimed at the Government. Thus, parliamentary lobbying is seen as a way of supplementing government lobbying if the latter should fail. In these cases, parliamentary commissions also appear to be a privileged entry point for legislative lobbying.

Lobbying in Brussels seems to be closer to American‐style lobbying, even though we may notice a distinction between the perception of lobbying by Northern European countries, which are more opened to lobbying, and Southern European countries, which have more hostile attitude towards lobbying. The construction the European Union has, however, encouraged lobbying, by setting up procedures of consultation and audition of interest‐groups. These practices are still at an early stage of development, and rely to a large extent on self‐regulation. The functioning of European institutions favours lobbying the executive institutions, i.e. the European Commission and the Council of Ministers. However, the growing power of the European Parliament makes it an increasingly frequent target for lobbyists. Here, too, because of the strong influence of national interests within the European Parliament, parliamentary commissions and inter‐groups are privileged targets for lobbying.

These differences in lobbying culture are clearly illustrated in the sixteen monographs presented by the author in the last part of the book. We may thus follow the activities of Charles H. Cunningham from the powerful American pro‐gun lobby (the National Rifle Association), of Julius Hobson Jr from the no less powerful American Medical Association, and of Diageo's Alan Butler. Nine lobbyists talk about their work in Washington, alongside four from London and three from Brussels.

In spite of all these positive aspects, a certain number of reserves should however be expressed, concerning the book's presentation as well as its content.

The book is well‐written and makes pleasant reading. However, the author's analysis relies too heavily on quotations, at the expense of his original ideas and viewpoints. Thus, in the chapter devoted to definitions of lobbying, the author presents various viewpoints, but never gives his own definition of what the practice entails.

The overall structure of the book is also badly planned and lacks coherence. There is no real articulation between the different chapters, which seem to have been stuck together rather arbitrarily. Similarly, no explicit link is made between the first part of the book (the six chapters of analysis) and the nine monographs of lobbyists presented as an appendix (although they make up about a third of the whole volume). It is also unfortunate that the conclusion is placed before the monographs, which has the effect of relegating the latter to a simple function of illustrations, non‐central to the book. Moreover, given the numerous viewpoints expressed by the interviewees, the reader would have gained by having some charts or graphs to summarize the author's main points.

But the main criticism that can be levelled at the book concerns the ethical dimension of lobbying. Although the author deals with some of the “darkness side” of lobbying by examining questions of money and regulation, the criticisms that can be made of certain undesirable side‐effects of these practices (corruption, manipulation, pressure…) are under‐estimated. This can partly be explained by a methodological bias of the research, since the people interviewed are, mainly, professional lobbyists. It would no doubt have been useful to interview other actors involved in lobbying strategies, such as representatives, civil servants, civilian interest groups leaders (ecologists, consumer organisations…) or lawyers in order to have others points of view about the limits of lobbying and about its anti‐democratic consequences.

However, in spite of these few flaws, the book written by Conor McGrath is of genuine interest, both for the academic community who are concerned with lobbying and corporate political strategy, and for professional lobbyists and managers. McGrath's work is undoubtedly a remarkable contribution to the understanding of the current practices of lobbying, and their usefulness – or their danger – for our democratic societies.