Civic engagement and voluntary associations: Reconsidering the role of the governance structures of advocacy groups

Polity

Volumn 37, Issue 3, 2005, Pages 315-334

  Barakso, Maryann ^a,b,c  

^a AMERICAN UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b Department of Government ^*

^c AMERICAN UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

Civil; Feminist; Interest groups; National Organization for Women; Participation

Indexed keywords

EID: 30744455309     PISSN: 00323497     EISSN: 17441684     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1057/palgrave.polity.2300016     Document Type: Review

References (102)

1. Steven E. Schier, By Imitation Only: The Rise of Exclusive Politics in the United States (Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2000);
2. Theda Skocpol, "Advocates Without Members: The Recent Transformation of Associational Life," in, Civic Engagement in American Democracy, ed. Theda Skocpol and Morris P. Fiorina (Washington, DC and New York: Brookings Institution Press, 1999), 461-510;
3. Robert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (New York: Touchstone, 2000);
4. John B. Judis, "The Pressure Elite: Inside the Narrow World of Advocacy Group Politics," The American Prospect 3 (Spring 1992): 15-19;
5. Jack L. Walker, "The Origins and Maintenance of Interest Groups in America," American Political Science Review 77 (June 1983): 390-406;
6. Robert H. Salisbury, "Interest Representation: The Dominance of Institutions," American Political Science Review 78 (March 1984): 64-76;
7. Christopher J. Bosso, "Rethinking the Concept of Membership in Mature Advocacy Organizations" (paper prepared for delivery at the Annual Meeting of the Northeast Political Science Association, RI, 7-9 November 2002), with permission.
8. Martha L. McCoy and Patrick L Scully, "Deliberative Dialogue to Expand Civic Engagement: What Kind of Talk Does Democracy Need?" National Civic Review (Summer 2002): 118.
9. Sidney Verba, Kay Lehman Schlozman and Henry E. Brady, Voice and Equality: Civic Voluntarism in American Politics (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 1995).
10. See also Frank Baumgartner and Beth Leech, Basic Interests: The Importance of Groups in Politics and in Political Science (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998).
11. Harry C. Boyte, "On Silences and Civic Muscle, or Why Social Capital is a Useful but Insufficient Concept" (paper prepared for delivery at The Havens Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 10 April 2001).
12. Sidney Verba, Norman Nie and Jae-On Kim, Participation and Political Equality: A Cross-National Comparison (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978);
13. Verba, Schlozman and Brady, Voice and Equality;
14. Raymond E. Wolfinger and Steven J. Rosenstone, Who Votes? (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1980);
15. Robert D. Putnam with R. Leonardi and R.Y Nanetti, Making Democracy Work Civic Traditions in Modern Italy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993).
16. Verba, Schlozman and Brady, Voice and Equality, 313.
17. See, for example, Verba, Schlozman and Brady, Voice and Equality;
18. Putnam, Bowling Alone: the Collapse and Revival;
19. Jocelyn Elise Crowley and Theda Skocpol, "The Rush to Organize: Explaining Associational Formation in the United States, 1860s-1920s," American Journal of Political Science 45 (October 2001): 813-29;
20. James E. Curtis, Douglas E. Baer and Edward C. Grabb, "Nations of Joiners: Voluntary Association Membership in Democratic Societies," American Sociological Review 66 (December 2001): 783-805;
21. Pamela Paxton; "Social Capital and Democracy: An Interdependent Relationship," American Sociological Review 67 (April 2002): 254-77;
22. Richard A. Couto with Catherine S. Gutherie, Making Democracy Work Better: Mediating Structures, Social Capital and the Democratic Prospect (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1999).
23. Ann Costain, "Representing Women: The Transition from Social Movement to Interest Group," in Women, Power and Policy, ed. Ellen Boneparth (New York: Pergamon Press, 1982), 19-37.
24. Robert D. Putnam, "Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital" Journal of Democracy 6 (January 1995): 65-78.
25. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival;
26. Skocpol and Fiorina, eds., Civic Engagement in American Democracy;
27. Couto with Gutherie, Making Democracy Work Better;
28. Michael W Foley and Bob Edwards, "Is it Time to Disinvest in Social Capital?" Journal of Public Policy 19 (May-August 1999): 219-31.
29. Also see the extensive database of research abstracts at the World Bank website: http://www.worldbank.org/poverty/scapital/. Accessed on May 12, 2002.
30. Michael W Foley and Bob Edwards, "The Paradox of Civil Society," The Journal of Democracy 7 (September-December 1996): 38-52.
31. Boyte, "On Silences and Civic Muscle," 6.
32. As Terry Moe has noted, this approach was more common several decades ago: a few of the groundbreaking examinations of the internal politics of political groups include the analyses of political parties by Robert Michels and Moishe Ostrogorski and of unions by Seymour Martin Lipset, M.A. Trow and J.S. Coleman. These authors debated the extent to which political organizations enhanced democratic representation, especially given the tendency for elites to control processes and outcomes in such groups. Terry M. Moe, The Organization of Interests: Incentives and the Internal Dynamics of Political Interest Groups (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980).
33. Bosso, "Rethinking the Concept of Membership."
34. Bosso, "Rethinking the Concept of Membership," 4.
35. See also Jeffrey Berry, "An Agenda for Research on Interest Groups," in Representing Interests and Interest Group Representation, ed. William Crotty, Mildred A. Schwartz and John C. Green (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1994), 12-20.
36. Others who have pointed out the dearth of research on the internal politics of interest groups include Lawrence Rothenberg, Linking Citizens to Government: Interest Group Politics at Common Cause (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 4-7;
37. R. Douglas Arnold, "Overfilled and Underfilled Fields in American Politics," Political Science Quarterly 97 (Spring 1982): 91-103;
38. Allan J. Cigler, "Interest Groups: A Subfield in Search of an Identity" in Political Science: Looking to the Future: American Institutions, ed. W. Crotty (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1991), 99-135;
39. Baumgartner and Leech, Basic Interests.
40. Jane J. Mansbridge, Why We Lost the ERA (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986).
41. Recent examples include: Suzanne Staggenborg, The Pro-Choice Movement: Organizations and Activism in the Abortion Conflict (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991);
42. Gretchen Arnold, "Dilemmas of Feminist Coalitions," in Feminist Organizations: Harvest of the New Women's Movement, ed. Myra Marx Ferree and Patricia Yancey Martin (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 1995), 276-90;
43. Frederick D. Miller, "The End of SDS and the Emergence of Weatherman: Demise Through Success," in Waves of Protest: Social Movements Since the 1960s, ed. Jo Freeman and Victoria Johnson (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, Inc., 1999), 303-24.
44. Jeffrey Berry, Lobbying for the People (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977);
45. Kay Lehman Schlozman and John Tierney Organized Interests in American Democracy (New York: Harper and Row, 1986);
46. Anne N. Costain and W Douglas Costain, "Strategy and Tactics of the Women's Movement in the United States: the Role of Political Parties," in The Women's Movements of the United States and Western Europe, ed. Mary Fainsod Katzenstein and Carol Mueller (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987), 196-214;
47. Andrew McFarland, Common Cause: Lobbying in the Public Interest (Chatham, NJ: Chatham House, 1976, 1984).
48. More recently, see Maryann Barakso, Governing NOW: Grassroots Activism In the National Organization for Women (Cornell, NY: Cornell University Press, 2004);
49. Dara Strolovitch, "Closer to a Pluralist Heaven? Women's, Racial Minority, and Economic Justice Advocacy Groups and the Politics of Representation" (Ph.D. diss., Yale University, 2002);
50. Heidi Swarts, "Moving without a Movement: Organized Churches and Neighborhoods in American Politics," (Ph.D. diss., Cornell University, 2001);
51. Anna Greenberg, "The Church and the Revitalization of Political Community," Political Science Quarterly 115 (Fall 2000): 377-94;
52. Michael A. Jones-Correa and David L. Leal, "Political Participation: Does Religion Matter?" Political Research Quarterly 54 (December 2001): 751-70.
53. All primary documents, unless noted otherwise, are archived at the Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe, National Organization for Women Collection.
54. Among the scholars who discuss unorganized interests, latent groups and latent members are James Q. Wilson, Political Organizations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995);
55. E.E. Schattschneider, The Semisovereign People: A Realist's View of Democracy in America (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1960);
56. Mancur Olson, The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1965);
57. Moe, The Organization of Interests;
58. Arthur T. Denzau and Michael C. Munger, "Legislators and Interest Groups: How Unorganized Groups Get Represented," American Political Science Review 80 (March 1986): 89-106.
59. One founder noted to another that at NOW's October 1966 organizing conference "[i]t seemed to me a high priority matter was membership recruitment. But no serious discussion of that took place." Letter to Kathryn Clarenbach from Alice S. Rossi, 9 November 1966. See also "Report on Informal Meeting of NOW Members from Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin," 21 January 1967.
60. Barakso, Governing NOW.
61. See, for example, an editorial by NOW activist Dolores Alexander, "The Women's Movement: A Unique Revolution Demanding a Unique Ideology for NOW," NOW ACTS, 1969.
62. Douglas McAdam, "The Framing Function of Social Movement Tactics: Strategic Dramaturgy in the American Civil Rights Movement," in Comparative Perspectives on Social Movements: Political Opportunities, Mobilizing Structures, and Cultural Framings, ed. Douglas McAdam, John D. McCarthy and Mayer N. Zald (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996): 338-55.
63. See also David A. Snow, E. Burke Rochford, Steven K. Worden, and Robert D. Benford, "Frame Alignment Processes, Micromobilization, and Movement Participation," American Sociological Review 51 (July 1986): 464-81;
64. David Snow and Robert D. Benford, "Ideology Frame Resonance and Participant Mobilization," in From Structure to Action: Comparing Social Movement Culture Across Cultures, ed. Bert Klandermans, Hans Kriesi and Sidney Harrow (Greenwich, CT JAI, 1988, 1992), 197-217.
65. Barakso, Governing NOW
66. Barakso, "Mobilizing and Sustaining Grassroots Activism," ch. 3.
67. Barakso, "Mobilizing and Sustaining Grassroots Activism," ch. 3.
68. Jo Freeman, "The Tyranny of Structurelessness," reprinted in Berkeley Journal of Sociology 17 (1972-1973): 151-64.
69. Thomas B. Edsall, "Ireland Wins Bitter Battle for NOW Post; Challenger Alleged Racism and Elitism," Washington Post, 4 July 1993.
70. See also the statements of opposing slates in "Teams Come Forward for the 1993 Election," National NOW Times, June 1993.
71. Quoted in Memphis NOW chapter newsletter, The Memphis Flyer, 10 July 1997.
72. David S. Broder and Kenneth J. Cooper, "Revolt Brewing for NOW Election," Washington Post, 20 June 1993. Approximately 3,000 delegates are allocated among the nine regions. Generally between 400 and 1,200 delegates actually vote at National Conferences.
73. Maryann Barakso, "Membership Influence in Large Voluntary Associations," (paper prepared for delivery at the Annual Meeting of the Southern Political Science Association, GA, 6-9 November 2002), 13.
74. The following discussion is drawn largely from Barakso, Governing NOW, ch. 8.
75. Barakso, "Mobilizing and Sustaining Grassroots Activism," 231.
76. Bosso argues that members may function only as "organizational wallpaper" in environmental groups today Bosso, "Rethinking the Concept of Membership," 13.
77. Although Ayala refers here to "nonpolitical organizations" such as the religious institutions described in Verba, Schlozman and Brady's Voice and Equality, there is no good theoretical reason to assume that this statement does not apply to the skills transmitted through politically oriented voluntary associations.
78. Louis J. Ayala, "Trained for Democracy: The Differing Effects of Voluntary and Involuntary Organizations on Political Participation" Political Research Quarterly 53 (March 2002): 99-115.
79. For more on the transference of civic skills and civic education through organizations see, for example, Charles Payne, I've Got the Light of Freedom: The Organizing Tradition of the Mississippi Freedom Struggle (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995);
80. Roberta S. Sigel, Political Learning in Adulthood (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1989) and Robert Putnam, Presidential Address to American Political Science Association, MA, 29 August 2002.
81. Verba, Schlozman and Brady, Voice and Equality, 353.
82. See also Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba, The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations (Boston, MA: Brown and Co., 1963).
83. Paxton, "Social Capital and Democracy," 255.
84. Sara Evans and Harry C. Boyte, Free Spaces: The Source of Democratic Change in America (New York: Harper and Row, 1986);
85. Dana R. Villa, "Postmodernism and the Public Sphere," American Political Science Review 86 (September 1992): 712-21.
86. Several scholars argue that "face-to-face" encounters are among the most significant means of enhancing citizens' social and political engagement: Robert Lake and R. Robert Huckfeldt, "Social Capital, Social Networks, and Political Participation," Political Psychology 19 (1998): 567-83;
87. R. Robert Huckfeldt and John Sprague, Citizens, Politics and Social Communication: Information and Influence in an Election Campaign (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995);
88. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival;
89. Benjamin Barber Strong Democracy: Participatory Politics for a New Age (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984).
90. Jane Mansbridge, "Self-interest and Political Transformation," in Reconsidering the Democratic Public, ed. George Maces and Russell L. Harrison (University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1993).
91. Benjamin Barber, A Place for Us: How to Make Society Civil and Democracy Strong (New York: Hill and Wang, 1998), 85.
92. M.S. Granovetter, "The Strength of Weak Ties," American Journal of Sociology 78 (May 1973): 1360-80.
93. Putnam distinguishes between "bridging" social capital that reaches across sociopolitical cleavages and the perhaps less beneficial "bonding" social capital that is characterized by close-knit, insular ties. Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival, 22.
94. Schier, By Invitation Only.
95. Verta Taylor, "Social Movement Continuity: The Women's Movement in Abeyance," American Sociological Review 54 (May-September 1989): 761-75.
96. See bell hooks, Ain't I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism (Boston: South End Press, 1981)
97. and hooks, Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (Boston: South End Press, 1984).
98. Belinda Robnett, How Long, How Long: African American Women in the Struggle for Civil Rights (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997),
99. Bill Turque, "The Struggle Within the Struggle," Newsweek, September 5, 1994.
100. For a dissenting view on the NAACP see Jacqueline Jones, Labor of Love, Labor of Sorrow: Black Women, Work and the Family from Slavery to the Present (New York: Vintage Press, 1986).
101. Barakso, "Membership Influence," 19.
102. Barakso, "Membership Influence."