118
votes
Why is there no effective anti-gun lobby in the United States?
There definitely are organizations that are counter. Brady is nearly as famous.
The reason it's not as seemingly effective is due to the fact that - due to political structure of the United States - ...
- 93.3k
106
votes
Why is lobbying not illegal in democracies?
Let's take a moment to visit how the word "lobbying" came about. In the British Houses of Parliament, there is an area called Central Lobby (between the Commons and the Lords), which is where members ...
- 28k
69
votes
Accepted
How does lobbying work in the US?
The mechanics of lobbying can work at several levels.
"Senator, I represent the National Association of Flute and Tuba Manufacturers. Were you aware that flute and tuba manufacturers are the fifth ...
- 1,459
58
votes
Accepted
What does a lobbyist offer a politician?
Expertise, information, data.
Politicians have to make complex decisions on things they are not experts in, where they cannot decide by themselves what will be the effects of a decision and which ...
- 1,181
57
votes
What are the differences between lobbying and bribery in the US?
Lobbying is trying to persuade decision makers to see a certain issue your way. Bribery is paying decision makers to do what you want.
The difference is in the "persuading" part: a lobbyist ...
- 5,214
49
votes
Accepted
How can the influence of wealthy individuals on democratic processes be reduced?
Many countries adopt some variant of solution (3):
Putting restrictions to the usage of wealth in political situations. This solution is used in many western states, but is of course a violation of ...
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48
votes
Accepted
Why does the U.S. tolerate foreign influence from Saudi Arabia and Israel on its domestic policies while not tolerating that from China or Russia?
AIPAC is not a foreign influence. It is a United States organization run by US citizens.
When you hear complaints about Russia and China, they tend to be about actions that are believed to involve ...
- 90.3k
47
votes
Accepted
What are the differences between lobbying and bribery in the US?
My version of an answer for children in Jr. High:
The first thing to know is every politician, like the Governor or a Senator, has a campaign fund that anyone can give money to. It costs at least 2 ...
- 3,810
46
votes
What does a lobbyist offer a politician?
Support.
A lobbyist's task is to convince the politician that a certain position would be advantageous to the politician.
A lobbyist is normally representing a group of people. So part of the deal is &...
- 124k
45
votes
What is a successful policy against lobbying in a democratic country?
Define good lobbying and bad lobbying.
That's a major challenge. You don't want a paid lobbyist for big oil or the arms industry to visit representatives and grease their palms, but you you do want ...
- 116k
44
votes
How can the influence of wealthy individuals on democratic processes be reduced?
I reject your basic hypothesis.
You're conflating influence with votes. It is not common to buy votes. We have secret ballots specifically to make this hard and laws to make it illegal. That's not to ...
- 5,670
44
votes
Accepted
Why can't Uber 'out-lobby' city governments to make their services legal, rather than losing to existing taxi lobbies?
This is actually exactly what Uber does. The common Uber practice is for Uber to enter a city under circumstances that range from legal, to questionable, to clearly illegal. They will then rush in ...
43
votes
Why is lobbying not illegal in democracies?
That would require a workable definition of "lobbying," and it would almost certainly exclude things you do not want to exclude.
A citizen phones his representative to tell him his opinion about a ...
- 116k
39
votes
How does lobbying work in the US?
A legitimate lobbyist is paid to explain the needs of some special interest groups to the politicians. And also how the needs of that special interest group benefit the electorate as a whole, or at ...
- 116k
33
votes
Accepted
Why did Trump rescind his executive order that barred former White House employees from lobbying the government?
There was no official explanation given by the Trump administration in the new executive order that he signed to revoke the ethics executive order (13770), as noted by Politico.
However, the Clinton ...
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30
votes
Why can't Uber 'out-lobby' city governments to make their services legal, rather than losing to existing taxi lobbies?
The question seems to assume that the only reason for business licensing and regulation by local governments is because of monopolistic cronyism.
Many of the licensing requirements for taxi companies ...
- 21k
30
votes
Why is lobbying not illegal in democracies?
One of the problems inherent in a representative democracy is that the representative must have some means of knowing what the people s'he represents want and need. People have to be able to ...
- 76.4k
29
votes
Accepted
Does Black Lives Matter have a hierarchy?
It's important to distinguish between the BLM network, co-founded by Patrisse Khan-Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Opal Tometi, and the BLM movement, which is a far less well-defined collection of anti-...
CDJB♦
- 109k
28
votes
Why is there no effective anti-gun lobby in the United States?
The simplest answer is there's no coherent anti-gun argument because the path to achieve what they want involves banning and confiscating all guns.
Whenever we have a mass shooting in the US (which ...
- 53.1k
25
votes
Does political lobbying exist in North Korea?
In a closed system like North Korea or China or Saudi Arabia (and, to some extent, Russia), political lobbying still happens between the power players. Yes, they all have one leader at the highest ...
- 10.9k
22
votes
Why is paid lobbying considered a form of 'free speech'?
Let's have a look at the text of the First Amendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of ...
- 2,451
22
votes
Why is there no effective anti-gun lobby in the United States?
There is a fairly powerful anti-gun lobby in the US. It's managed to get hundreds of laws passed.
When you get down to it, the NRA isn't really what stops most gun control measures from passing ...
- 1,098
20
votes
Why is lobbying not illegal in democracies?
Tesla wants to build cars like their cybertruck without side-view mirrors and instead give people camera's because side-view mirrors make a cars drag coefficient worse. That means that the car needs ...
- 2,097
19
votes
What does a lobbyist offer a politician?
a lobbyist cannot offer a politician a [big pile of money] to vote favorably.
So what is a representative example(s) of what a lobbyist does offer?
A campaign donation of (or PAC with) a [big pile of ...
- 4,798
18
votes
What is a successful policy against lobbying in a democratic country?
First, a bit of math re. your $100 per person. Assuming 170m (number of registered US voters) x $100, you get $17B out of it. Lotsa money, for sure, except that 2020 POTUS elections cost $14B, so ...
- 92.8k
17
votes
How can I figure out how much money a political lobbying group has given to my congressman?
If you looking in the USA, the source of data would ultimately come from legally required campaign finance and financial disclosures filed with the FEC (Federal Elections Commission).
FEC: Campaign ...
- 21k
16
votes
Why is lobbying not illegal in democracies?
Rather than cutting off lobbying, something rather difficult to do, or just plain undesirable, in principle as other answers have already pointed out, one could mitigate its issues by forbidding ...
- 92.8k
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