ABSTRACT
Pressure groups ‘mediate’, as do political parties, on behalf of the people but in their case it is between groups or sections of society and the government. They do not attempt to win control of government in the way parties do. Rather, they are organised groups in society that seek both to defend and to promote their own interests by influencing specific policies. Elections occur every five years in Britain, providing individual representation, but pressure groups, it can be argued, sustain their functional representation between elections.
