| Abstract: | Students of politics have identified a variety of actors whoappear to influence the federal bureaucracy's implementationof public policy, including Congress, the president, and interestgroups. These lines of research, however, have often portrayedinterest groups as actors with indirect influence (who, forexample, work through or with Congress), rather than assessingthe direct influence of interest groups on bureaucratic policyoutputs. I conduct a test of direct interest group influenceby analyzing an original data set composed of 1,444 interestgroup comments in reaction to forty federal agency rules. Ifind, contrary to the expectations of the extant literature,that the formal participation of interest groups during rulemakingcan, and often does, alter the content of policy within the"fourth branch" of government. I conclude that those who voicetheir preferences during the notice and comment period rulemakingare often able to change government policy outputs to bettermatch their preferences. |
