Two decades ago, Virginia Gray and David Lowery coauthored The Population Ecology of Interest Representation (1996). In this important book, they broke new ground by applying the population ecology model, more commonly used in conservation biology, to the study of interest groups in the American states. Building upon that seminal work, Gray and Lowery, with the addition of Darren Halpin, have edited a new, comprehensive volume, The Organization Ecology of Interest Communities, which includes several of the world’s leading interest-group scholars. Covering 14 chapters, this volume reviews the origins and development of the organization ecology approach (a theoretical framework that aims to explain how social, economic, and political conditions give rise to the birth, growth, diversity, and mortality of organizations over time) and assesses its contribution to the literature on the study of interest representation in the United States and Europe. As the editors themselves explain in the opening pages, their purpose is to “highlight how the theory has changed and been elaborated on since it was originally introduced in the mid-1990s [in order] to draw attention to significant gaps in empirical research that merit further examination [and] to give voice to broader assessments of the research program” (pp. 1–2).

The volume’s early chapters, from Antony J. Nownes (Chap. 2), Joost Berkhout (Chap. 3), and Jan Beyers and Marcel Hanegraaff (Chap. 4), provide an overview of organizational demography research, with Nownes focused on the United States, Berkhout on Europe, and Beyers and Hanegraaff on transnational settings. These three chapters do an excellent job of giving the reader the necessary background on the literature. The authors make clear what the current state of the organization ecology research program is, what its current empirical and theoretical challenges are, and the direction in which this research needs to be headed. In particular, Berkhout offers one of the volume’s deepest reflections on the future of organizational demography research. He notes the trend toward large multilevel, multinational, and cross-sectional data sets, but thoughtfully cautions that the “main challenge is to design population ecological research in such a fashion that it retains its theoretical validity but broad enough to include variation on several demand, supply and mediating factors at multiple levels of observation” (p. 54).

In the subsequent chapters, the authors address a number of additional thought-provoking issues concerning the application of the organization ecology approach to interest representation. Thomas Holyoke, in Chapter 5, draws attention to the challenges of trying to integrate different theoretical and empirical perspectives into organization ecology research, concluding, somewhat pessimistically: “It is exciting to think about the integration of macro- and micro-level theories and models, but actually testing the hypotheses such integration would generate will be extremely difficult” (p. 94).

Going further, Burdett Loomis offers the most critical assessment of the organization ecology approach in Chapter 13. While acknowledging that the application of population ecology (PE) as a theoretical framework for interest groups has “greatly enhanced” (p. 258) our understanding of them, he also concludes that PE has had “at most a modest impact” (p. 249). More specifically, Loomis is critical of the theory’s use of metaphor and “population-based issues.” In questioning how to enumerate populations, he asks if “the relevant population on a given issue relates to a set of policies (agriculture, gay rights, defense spending), how exactly do we account for its numbers? Is it everyone who is involved, who are all competing within a given constituency?” (p. 253).

Of course, the volume does more than present criticisms of the organization ecology approach. Instead, the general theme in most of the other chapters is to examine the potential, possibilities, and promise of the organization ecology research program. Chapter 7, authored by Christopher Witko, which focuses on what case studies can teach us about the ways that interest groups develop and attempt to survive, is especially strong. Witko’s writing style is engaging, as he sprinkles in some clever headings (e.g., “Life’s a niche and then you die?”), and the content in the chapter is substantive, with a comprehensive overview of the literature covering groups such as Common Cause, the AFL-CIO, and the Tea Party to explain how “aggregate factors translate into change at the group-level” (p. 131).

In Chapter 9, Kay Lehman Schlozman and her coauthors present data on the human and financial resources of various groups over a three-decade period from 1981 to 2011. They provide several important findings, notably that there are more organizations utilizing more human and financial resources than ever before. Yet, as their analysis also reveals, these changes have not created a level playing field for all interests. Business groups, for example, dominate lobbying, at least when measured by total expenditures. The authors find that “corporations and trade and other business associations account for 74 percent of all dollars spent lobbying” in 2011, an increase from 54% in 1981 (pp. 173–74). They also note the rise in group representation by institutions, such as state and local governments, hospitals, and universities. Taken together, their results force any reader to think long and hard about the implications that these developments have for larger debates about pluralism, representation, and inequalities of political voice.

Near the very end of the volume, Lowery, Halpin, and Gray do an admirable job of defending the organization ecology approach in a short and respectful rebuttal against the arguments that Loomis raises in his chapter. Taken together, the diversity of viewpoints offered, along with the multifaceted presentation of the material from scholars across the globe, is ultimately one of the real triumphs of this volume.

Yet, while the editors succeed in providing a needed update on the state of the organization ecology research program, the one substantive criticism is its failure to resolve a few old concerns about the utility of the organization ecology framework. Of note, some critics of the approach have argued that organization ecology scholarship places too much emphasis on external factors to explain organizational failure, while ignoring important internal group factors (see Kamel Mellahi and Adrian Wilkinson, “Organizational Failure: A Critique of Recent Research and a Proposed Integrative Framework,” International Journal of Management Reviews, 5/6(1), 2004). This important concern is largely missing.

In addition, academic debates about the organization ecology approach are now several decades old, and there are instances throughout the volume that simply rehash those previous scholarly discussions, albeit with new and updated research. Certainly, reviewing earlier work is unavoidable in a work of this type, in which the purpose is to “reconsider the contributions and further prospects of the [organization ecology] research program” (p. 1). Nonetheless, the volume as a whole, with only some chapters as exceptions, does a better job of summarizing the current state of the organization ecology research program than it does of offering any truly groundbreaking observations.

Still, the strengths of The Operation Ecology of Interest Communities far outweigh its weaknesses. A volume of this type was needed in the academic literature, and Lowery, Halpin, and Gray have succeeded in bringing together a collection of contributions that one could rightfully call the definitive reference on the organization ecology research program. Much like The Population Ecology of Interest Representation from two decades ago, this volume belongs on the bookshelf of any serious scholar who studies interest groups.