Congress and the Politics of Problem Solving

E Scott Adler author John D Wilkerson author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Cambridge University Press

Published:14th Jan '13

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Congress and the Politics of Problem Solving cover

This book argues that voters' willingness to hold lawmakers accountable produces insights into legislative organization, behavior and output.

This book shows how voters' willingness to hold lawmakers accountable for their collective problem-solving abilities can produce insights into legislative organization, behavior and output. Problem-solving motivations explain why bipartisanship is a common pattern of congressional behavior and offer the best explanation for legislative issue attention and policy change.How do issues end up on the agenda? Why do lawmakers routinely invest in program oversight and broad policy development? What considerations drive legislative policy change? For many, Congress is an institution consumed by partisan bickering and gridlock. Yet the institution's long history of addressing significant societal problems - even in recent years - seems to contradict this view. Congress and the Politics of Problem Solving argues that the willingness of many voters to hold elected officials accountable for societal conditions is central to appreciating why Congress responds to problems despite the many reasons mustered for why it cannot. The authors show that, across decades of policy making, problem-solving motivations explain why bipartisanship is a common pattern of congressional behavior and offer the best explanation for legislative issue attention and policy change.

'In the end, I hope and expect that Adler and Wilkerson's challenging study will be widely read. A book that forces us to think hard about how we approach the study of Congress does not come along very often.' Paul J. Quirk, Congress and the Presidency

ISBN: 9781107670310

Dimensions: 226mm x 152mm x 23mm

Weight: 360g

262 pages