Legislation IDENTIFIERS *Interest Groups

This paper presents findings of a study that examined the formation and development of a coalition of business leaders and its impact on state education policy. The coalition, called the Corporations for the Improvement of Educational Quality (CIEQ) , was developed in a large midwestern state. The paper uses and assesses the efficacy of five interest group theories: Truman's (1951) order and disturbance theory, Olson's (1965) byproduct theory; Salisbury's (1969) exchange theory; Sabatier's (1992) commitment theory; and MacFarland's (1987, 1992) countervailing power theory. The study asked the following research questions: (1) How and why has this group of business leaders joined together to form CIEQ? (2) How did CIEQ select and get its agenda? (3) How has CIEQ maintaihed and supplemented its members'aip and agenda? and (4) Who has benefitted from the efforts of CIEQ and what benefits did they receive? Dat