Interest Groups and the United Nations (UN)

Some of the most exciting controversies about transnational interest group politics revolve around the United Nations (UN), a major incuba- tor of ideas and a hub in global governance. This article foregrounds interest groups in the UN as private voluntary organizations pursuing political advocacy. Anchored in political science, this def- inition views interest groups as a subset of “trans- national actors,” which are typically more broadly referred to as any type of individual or collective “non-state actor” that is transnationally active and neither a state nor composed of states. Interest- ingly, a growing number of comparative politicsand international relations scholars have highlighted the overlap between “interest groups” and “international non-governmental organiza- tions (INGOs),” as both types of organizations typically seek to balance self-interested advocacy and normative aims. Drawing from both interest group and INGO research, this article discusses three core topics: political opportunity struc- tures, interest group strategies, and effects of inter- est groups. It discusses some evidence from the UN, identifies knowledge gaps, and pro- blematizes imbalances in interest group involve- ment and effects in the UN. Understanding the academic debate in interest group and INGO research around these themes is timely and impor- tant amidst UN reform debates on the occasion of the organization’s 75th anniversary in 2020