The Atlantic – Joshua Foust: Lobbying for Dictators: The Real Reason It’s Scandalous
Source: The Atlantic, 12/6/2011
Fellow Joshua Foust writes about the challenges faced by lobbyists in a democracy.
“…But it’s easy to misdirect outrage. This lobbying firm appears to have been doing its job — and lobbying firms work for a lot of sketchy groups, not just reporters posing as Uzbek government agents. The real scandal is that a lobbying firm can sell high-level government access to a well-monied client. That the client in this case happens to be an odious regime reviled for its human rights abuses is, in a sense, almost immaterial.
In the U.S., there are lobbyist, public relations, and even law firms for anyone: shady gangsters, evil corporations, corrupt tyrants, churches, NGOs, human rights activists and labor unions, farmers, and whatever else might come along. The effect of these high-powered firms is generally acknowledged but rarely discussed in explicit detail.
So, yes, it is obnoxious of Bell Pottinger to gleefully sell access to an abusive government. But that is, at best, a symptom of a much bigger issue — the very existence, position, power, and accepted presence of these sorts of firms on all manner of topics. Lobbying doesn’t suddenly turn benign just because the client is good — it is still distorting the ideal democratic society the anti-lobbyists seem to want…”
Click here to read the rest at The Atlantic…
