ABSTRACT
Lobbying organizations often decide to take a particular issue to the country—as Americans would say, “beyond the Washington Beltway.” In practical terms, this very often involves persuading an organization’s members or supporters at large to themselves lobby politicians by contacting them to urge that they support or oppose a policy proposal (known as grass roots lobbying). Thus, interest groups seek to market their policy preferences firstly internally within their own organization, and then externally when the group’s members themselves communicate with politicians. As one academic puts it:
Although there is no real formal definition of the tactic, popular and scholarly accounts alike consider grass roots or outside lobbying to be any type of action that attempts to influence inside-the-beltway inhabitants by influencing the attitudes or behavior of outside-the-beltway inhabitants. (Goldstein 1999, p. 3)
