Strategizing influence in legislative lobbying : context, targets, and tactics /

Gordon Fisher (Univ. of Nevada, Reno) develops and tests a model to explain lobbying behavior and strategic choices. She builds on an in-depth review of interest group research to develop this model, focusing on resources, context, lobbying targets, and tactics. She surveyed registered lobbyists in California, asking them to rank various group tactics, targets, and contexts, and to draw connections among these variables, allowing her to more accurately measure the complexities of lobbying choices. She supplemented these survey results with in-depth interviews with 30 registered lobbyists, allowing her to follow up on survey questions and gain a more thorough understanding of the context shaping lobbyist decision-making. Gordon Fisher provides a sophisticated, complex analysis, concluding that simple cost-benefit analysis may only explain decision making for less complex, low visibility contexts. As targets and visibility increase, lobbyists are more likely to make choices based on additional variables, such as the value of targeting friends versus enemies, and the issue's political and policy dimensions. The author provides important insights about strategic choices in lobbying, and makes significant steps toward building a more comprehensive model of lobbying behavior. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty. --Melinda A. Mueller, Eastern Illinois University