Political Parties Vs Interest Groups Essay

In modern day democracy, political parties and interest groups play important and increasingly larger roles within many countries’ governments. These organizations, however, don’t share many things in common besides this single fact. Political parties and interest groups are organizations that serve and seek different purposes within a country's political system. While political parties concern themselves with a wide range of issues, interest groups focus on a single matter. Additionally, interest groups are rather inflexible in their positions, a complete opposite to political parties. Political parties also exist mainly to gain power over governmental policy by winning elections; on the other hand, an interest group's primary goal is to support …show more content…
A political party’s final aim is to capture power over governmental policy by winning elections, accomplishing this by supporting their candidates through advertising and fundraising. On the other hand, interest groups do not try to obtain direct control of government, they simply aim to influence the public policy making process without attempting to take over directly the control and conduct of government. Unlike political parties, they do not have their members run for office. Being unconcerned with wanting to operate the government, they limit themselves to support candidates who promote their point of view.
Another large difference between a political party and an interest group is seen on what they concern themselves with. A political party works for the common good, concerning themselves with a wide spectrum of issues, unlike interest groups. Interest groups focus on specific issues and specific areas of politics concerning them, working solely for their own interests. Political parties also try to create and hold together broad coalitions, wanting to govern effectively over a range of issues. Interest groups do not care about broad coalitions. They only care about winning on their particular