ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to distinguish between organizational characteristics and resources, and to discuss their relative places in the "pecking order" of interest group literature. It seeks to link these to the strategic decisions groups make, deriving as many links as possible from a propositional inventory of the major interest group literature. The chapter shows that while some resources do affect some strategic decisions, by and large organizational characteristics assume much more importance. In common usage, "strategy" means the broad plan of attack, while "tactics" mean the ways that plan is carried out. Resources are simply a good deal easier to define, operationalize, and work with than organizational characteristics; political scientists have not generally displayed much enthusiasm for plunging into the labyrinth of organization theory. A variety of organizational characteristics appear likely to affect issue specificity and rigidity, all of them components of either the organizational base or decisional structure.
