defence analysis and planning required during the nuclear age. Whether this
form of high-technology espionage is as effective against low-technology
threats such as international terrorism can be doubted. The allied intervention
in Afghanistan in 2002 clearly suffered from a lack of traditional ‘human
intelligence’.
Intelligence-gathering is not necessarily a hostile act, because the balance of
power, and the credibility of deterrent forces, paradoxically requires that
potential enemies should know quite a lot about each other’s capacity. The
end of thecold warhas not led, as might be expected, to a massive reduction
in the work of such agencies, but rather to a change of focus, with terrorism
and drug-related crime, along with industrial espionage, taking over from the
traditional military intelligence focus.
Interest Groups
Interest groups are associations formed to promote a sectional interest in the
political system. Thustrade unions, professional associations, employers’
organizations and motoring organizations are usually referred to as interest
groups. The term has a degree of overlap withpressure groupsand voluntary
organizations, although it is frequently restricted to groups which have
organized to promote, advance or defend some common interest—most often
of an occupational kind.
A variety of tactics may be used to pursue the aims of the group. Thus trade
unionists may threaten to withdraw their labour and to strike, while profes-
sional groups typically try to advance their cause by more indirect methods,
such as contact with government bureaucrats, propaganda and publicity.
Interest groups have been seen by such 20th-century writers asBentleyand
David B. Truman as a key element in understanding the political system, and
interest groups are often described in terms of the motor or input side of
government. Many interest groups therefore develop close, even formal, ties
with political parties. Thus Britain’s trade unions and the Labour Party are
constitutionally linked—although in that case the unions existed prior to the
Labour Party and were responsible for its establishment. Similarly, close links
may exist between interest groups and the bureaucracy or the executive
generally. In the USA the ‘military–industrial complex’ has shown, with its
Pentagon links, a high level of political co-operation and interaction, as has the
National Union of Farmers with the Department of Agriculture.
Interest groups with fewer overt powers of sanction or persuasion often
resort to such direct action as mass rallies, marches and demonstrations;
intensive publicity and lobbying may also be used to advance their cause. In
most Western societies a whole new profession of political lobbyists has grown
up to facilitate interest group contact with either parliamentarians, members of
Interest Groups