Reconceptualizing Pac Formation

Abstract

After criticizing current models of political action committee (PAC) formation as flawed both in the samples used in tests and in the specifications tested, we develop a new explanation of PAC formation that emphasizes competition for access among those already engaged in lobbying. We test both organization-and state-level implications of this alternative account, respectively, employing survey and aggregate data on PACs in the American states. The empirical findings provide preliminary support for our explanation and sharply contradict prior evidence that PAC formation is governed by problems of free riding.If Cohen, March, and Olson (1972) applied their &dquo;garbage can&dquo; model of organizations to political science research, they might start by noting several cans holding, respectively, a variety of data sets, the concepts and hypotheses discussed in the literature, and a number of scholars in need of publishing. The temporal sorting of material in the three garbage cans would then be used to explain why certain research

The Density of the EU Interest System: A Test of the ESA Model

“…38 Applying the simple ESA model to the US case has proven remarkably productive in generating insights across a range of theoretical issues of concern to interest-group scholars. These include analyses of fluctuations in the number of interest organizations, including how the density of an interest system influences the birth and death rates of organizations; 39 studies of the life cycle of interest organizations over time, the liability of 'newness' for newly mobilized interests, and the condition of density dependence within mature interest communities; 40 analyses of the diversity of or bias within an interest population that highlight how the density functions of different interest guilds combine some interests to advantage; 41 and studies of how the structure of interest populations influences both the use of lobbying tactics 42 and their impact on public policy. 43 The ESA model offers a theoretical construct within which to link these important topics.…”

Non-Market Strategy Literature Review: The Government Relations Component

“…Population ecology theory argues that an organization is affected by other similar organizations in its external environment because they all extract similar resources from the same environment (Getz, 2002;Hannan and Carroll, 1992), that will determine both the number and the variety of organizational forms that may successfully co-exist. Diversity in environmental resources permits new or specialized organizational forms to emerge, while large amounts of similar resources results in fewer, generalist organizations which exploit economies of scale (Gray and Lowery, 1997). This theory may explain why companies become politically engaged, rather than relying upon their trade associations or other collective interest groups: the more interests there are that consider the same public official a "friend", the more likely that the company will use independent political action to differentiate itself from others (Getz, 2002).…”