Defined by some as:
1. The well-being of the general public; the commonwealth.
2. The attention of the people with respect to events.
3. Values generally thought to be shared by the public at large.
The concept of 'public interest' is closely related to Jean-Jacques Rousseau's central political concept of 'general will', which refers to the desire or interest of a people as a whole - General will is what the body politic (community of citizens) would unanimously do if they were selecting general laws and were choosing/voting with full information, good reasoning, unclouded judgment (bias and emotion can cloud judgment), public spirit, and attempting to discern the common good.
People have argued against this (using words such as 'metaphysical' and 'pluralist') but this is as close as I can get to a good definition!
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