perverse twist: the efficient invisible hand of competition operates differently in
the polity. me universal pursuit of political advantage leads to such pcrvcrse
results as import quotas, fuel allocations,' legalized monopolies, licenses, and
fixed prices, all of which ate designed to redistribute rents from unorganized
groups (consumm and taxpayers) to organized interests. One extraordinarily
important implication is that the better a polity performs its task of representing
the economic interests of organized groups, the worse it may be at managing its
economy. But, like David Truman (1952) and Madison before him, Olson seems
to argue that less social harm will be done and more good accomplished if interest
groups are larger and more encompassing. This result comes about not because
the incentives that face a large encompassing group are radically different
from those that confront narrowly based interest groups, but because it is harder