How Citizens Influence The Government Flashcards
Insider pressure groups (influences)
Carry out campaigns in an organised professional way
Represent professional bodies like medicine and seen as experts
Insider pressure groups (doesn’t influence)
If they fall out of favour they aren’t listened to
Work with committees but in 2011 only 4% of recs were followed and only a 3rd of those resulted in significant change
Insider pressure groups bma case study
2015 urge for sugar tax, chair of BMA said poor diet was responsible for 70,000 deaths and £6 billion NHS funds annually
Introduced in 2018 and 50% of manufacturers reduced sugar in their drinks
2016 gov wants to increase Jr doctors hours but not pay so BMA fights them and strikes
agreement struck as a result BMA falls out of favour and the scientific advisory group for emergencies that advises the government contains not one BMA member
Outsider pressure groups (how they influence the gov)
More extreme approach = more media attention and gov may change if pressure is big enough
Outsider pressure groups (doesn’t influence the gov)
Methods sometimes become Violent and destructive and leads to arrests
Negative relationship with gov, unlikely to be consulted
Not all attention is good attention, may turn public against them
Extinction rebellion case study
2019 Greta Thunburg met party leaders and Micheal Gove conceded that the government wasn’t doing nearly enough
Pledged to reduce greenhouse gasses by 50% by 2025 and 80% by 2050
ER wanted government to go further and reduce emissions to net zero by 2025 and glued themselves to airports to protest
9pm curfew had to be imposed on London
Joining a political party (influences)
Members vote for leaders 2022 liz truss won with 57%
Members donate money, spending capped at 30,000 per constituency
Joining a political party (doesn’t influence)
Costs £45.60 a year to join the Tory party and £12 for SNP, smaller parties have to lower fees and therefore won’t make as much
Joining a trade union (influences)
2022/23 EIS strike over teacher pay, gov had to negotiate to stop disruption
Works if Job is paid for by the gov or would impact a lot of the population
Joining a trade union (doesn’t influence)
Trade union act requires that 50% of members vote to strike and more than 80% have to be in favour
2018 public and commercial services union voted for a strike but only 41% of members voted so didn’t go ahead
Social media campaign (influences)
Used in elections to get voters
More awareness for issues
Social media campaigns (doesn’t influence)
High levels of fake news
Abuse to politicians not listened to
Tesco employee used social media to push a petition to make a law against abuse against retail workers but government said it was unnecessary
