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Summary PAPER 1 - PRESSURE GROUPS - POSSIBLE QUESTIONS AND ESSAY PLANS
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PAPER 1: PRESSURE GROUPSPressure groups – democracy (eg: Evaluate the view that pressure groups promote
democracy in the UK)
Point 1: pressure groups are increasing participation and help people access the political
system -> enhances the quality of democracy
Allow citizens to take part in other political activities such as demonstration, marches,
organizing and signing petitions, writing letters to politicians.
Offer ways of taking part in politics -> improve participation -> in turn makes
pressure groups more influential and improve the quality of democracy
Eg: RSPB, with 1.1 million members, becomes the largest and successful wildlife
conservation charity in the Europe.
More people get involved in pressure groups to express their personal beliefs that
sometimes ignored by the main political parties.
Eg: pressure groups such as Extinction Rebellion or Black Lives Matter, focusing on issues
like environment, racism,.. also play an active role in boosting participation through
protesting, creating viral campaigns using social media.
Increasing membership is not always benefiting the pressure groups but it is one of
the significant factors to enhance the quality of democracy.
Point 2: although pressure groups do improve participation, they still damage the aims of
democracy as they promote it in an unequal way.
Some pressure groups are far more powerful than the others as they might have better
tactics, organisation
Eg: the rich, privileged are way more able to form influential pressure groups as they might
have more staff, better advertising, organisation.
British Bankers Association, with the membership of 80% of global systematically important
banks, successfully prevented the government legislation from further regulating banks.
Common definition of ‘chequebook participation’ also shows that large membership doesn’t
always mean enhancing the quality of democracy. This is because people join and donate
without actually joining political activities.
Miners Strike with around 142.000 members still failed due to the decline of number of
strikes as a result of the ‘demonstration effect’ and trade union power.
Pressure groups do not improve participation effectively as they might be privillege and see
a decline in active participation.
Not enhance the quality of democracy.
Point 3: pressure groups represent the public, organising new concern, giving the opinions
also results in improving the quality of democracy.
Organise petitions + encourage people to sign in -> raise awareness among politicians of
public view about specific problems, especially with the effective use of the media.
Gurkha Justice Campaign Petition: fought for the right of the Gurkhas to have the same
rights as their British and the Commonwealth counterparts, were signed by about 250000
people.
Provide platform for various minorities in our society to have a voice -> help the government
understand what issues are important.
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