Tag: election, political parties and pressure groups

In 1984, the Karnataka government set up a company called Karnataka Pulpwood Limited. About 30,000 hectares of land was given virtually free to this company for 40 years. Much of this land was used by local farmers as grazing land for their cattle. However the company began to plant eucalyptus trees on this land, which could be used for making paper pulp. In 1987, a movement called Kittiko-Hachchiko (meaning, pluck and plant) started a non-violent protest, where people plucked the eucalyptus plants and planted saplings of trees that were useful to the people.

Usually interest groups seek to promote the interests of a particular section or group of society. Trade unions, business associations and professional (lawyers, doctors, teachers, etc.) bodies are some examples of this type. They are sectional because they represent a section of society: workers, employees, businesspersons, industrialists, followers of a religion, caste group, etc. Their principal concern is the betterment and well-being of their members, not society in general.

The Green Belt Movement (GBM) was started in the year 1977 by Professor Wangari Maathai in Kenya. It was launched with the support of National Council of Women of Kenya (NCWK), to cater the needs of rural Kenyan women who addressed the issue that the rivers were drying, they had meager food supply and had to walk a long distance to get firewood for fuel and fencing. The Green Belt Movement has planted 30 million trees across Kenya.

Sometimes political parties grow out of movements. For example, when the Assam movement led by students against the ‘foreigners’ came to an end, it led to the formation of the Asom Gana Parishad. The roots of parties like the DMK and the AIADMK in Tamil Nadu can be traced to a long-drawn social reform movement during the 1930s and 1940s.

Mass mobilisation is a process which engages and motivates several people, partners and allies to participate and join at national and local level to create awareness of a demand or to achieve a particular goal. The restoration of democracy in Nepal or the Bolivia's Water war are the best example of resolution of dispute by making demands and pressure by mass organisations directly participating to work towards achieving goal.

West Java is located in Indonesia. In 2004, landless farmers from West Java, travelled to Jakarta, the capital city. They came with their families to demand land reforms and to insist on the return of their farms.

Movement begins when mass public conscience realise that they are being deprived or not treated fairly or circumstances such exists that need to be changed or unchanged. Any movement's success depends upon the area of influence , the mass participation without which it would confine and cannot raise the demand in order to be fulfilled. This is why movements have loose organisations and informal decision making process. 

Pressure groups are organisations that attempt to influence government policies. But unlike political parties, pressure groups do not aim to directly control or share political power. These organisations are formed when people with common occupation, interest, aspirations or opinions come together in order to achieve a common objective.

Pressure groups and movements exert influence on politics in a variety of ways:  They try to gain public support and sympathy for their goals and their activities by carrying out information campaigns, organising meetings, filing petitions, etc. Most of these groups try to influence the media into giving more attention to these issues. They often organise protest activity like strikes or disrupting government programmes.