Elite
The power pyramid, usually headed by the economic elite.

Hunter, Floyd. 1953. Community Power Structure, A Study of Decision Makers. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

Pluralism
Multiple groups, of only partly overlapping membership, building around issues.

Polsby, Nelson W. 1960. How to Study Community Power: the Pluralist Alternative. Journal of Politics 22:474-484.

Non-decision-making
Agenda setting: keeping issues off the agenda or placing them on the agenda.

Bachrach, Peter, and Baratz, Morton S. 1962. Two Faces of Power. The American Political Science Review. December: 947-952.

Three Faces of Power
Note that the article above by Bachrach and Baratz suggests "two faces of power" in contrasting the influence non-decision-making (or agenda setting) with the two previously listed influences exercised in actually making the desion. A subsequent assessment suggested a third "face" which is to influence a decision-maker's values: "shaping, or determining his very wants" (e.g. the tobacco industry through advertising of an addictive product).

Lukes, Steven. 1994. Power: A Radical View. London: MacMillan.

Ecology of Games
The bankers, publishers, merchants, polticians, etc interacting when their individual "games" connect.

Long, Norton E. 1958. The Local Community as an Ecology of Games. American Journal of Sociology, 64:251-261.

Conservative/conforming bias of institutions
Including family, school, church, and most especially business.

Lindblom, Charles E., and Woodhouse, Edward J. 1993. The Policy-Making Process (3rd ed.). Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall.