Lobbying for Public Interests as a Democratic Social Leadership Factor for Reforming Legislation

The state, a priori, is not capable to voluntarily reform itself. In this case, there is a need for a civil society that will actively use the legal instrument of lobbying. The world experience is a good evidence for this. Currently, the further development of civil society and state–legal modernization should be carried out in parallel in Ukraine. Lobbying of public interests promotes a significant correction of the legal culture and the level of social activity of the population. We mean three tendencies: first, the gradual deprivation of illusion of the paternalistic understanding of the state and the formation of its perception as a “location of competitors”—concentration of interests of various groups, formed in society, which define the content of the state policy. Second, there is the approach of the perspective of overcoming legal nihilism and spreading the persuasion of the power of law in society. Third, practices of lobbying public interests promote the generation of social leaders of a democratic style and correlate with the increase in social activity of citizens. Our contribution to this field is to implement an approach of studying the concept of lobbying public interests as a form of social leadership of a democratic style by experts in the field of law. The emphasis has been paid on the role of lobbying public interests in reforming legislation within the historical and contemporary aspects. We use the world and national dimensions of this issue, in particular, employing the example of Ukraine. Review of lobbying public interests in the context of the theory of leadership would greatly contribute to further deepening and expanding relevant research discourse. Currently, the preference is given to the study of professional lobbying, which somewhat reduces the understanding of the relations of the legal impact of citizens on state agencies in order to consolidate own interests or the interests of third parties in the enacted laws. Our results can be the answer to certain questions that arise during discussions about the feasibility to legalize lobbying in Ukraine.