Although this is the basic ideology of the Pluralist Political Theory, other pluralists have picked up criticism and answered the criticism by segmenting the Pluralism Theory and therefore creating sub-theories that give better answers to their critics. One such theorist is Kelso who addresses some of the criticism made. Kelso talks about three types of pluralism: Laissez-faire Pluralism, Corporate Pluralism and Public Pluralism (Kelso, 1978, pp. 5 -6).
Laissez-faire pluralism is how Kelso defines the "classical" pluralist theory as expressed by Robert Dahl and others. He rejects the idea that political system is dominated by single ruling elite and defines this pluralism to be direct - by the bargaining of ideas through interest groups, or indirect - by the mechanism of elections. Kelso then talks about Dahl's study of New Haven politics, which he takes as the classic example of the laissez-faire model. He writes that the process of bargaining and negotiating, enabled diverse groups to have control over the political process and make sure that their agendas will be seen to. Kelso then addresses the case of one group to acquiring too much power, which will reduce the diversity of ideas and the possibility of other groups to be represented. In such case, Kelso argues, opposed forces are going to become active and unite their forces in order to limit the power of that one powerful group. Kelso also argues that the power of all parties is limited due to the fact that decisions are made through negotiating, which means that even political elites have to make concessions in order to achieve what they want, and by that, other groups in society achieve their goals (Kelso, 1978 pp. 13 - 19).
As we can see in this description of Pluralism, pluralist theorists believe that no one group or person holds the power in society. They believe that power is exercised by all simply by the existence of diversity of ideas and through the process of opposing political powers negotiating between themselves to achieve their goals.
