Title Congress overwhelmed : the decline in congressional capacity and prospects for reform / edited by Timothy M. LaPira, Lee Drutman, and Kevin R. Kosar

Published Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 2020

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Description 1 online resource Contents Frontmatter -- Contents -- 1 Overwhelmed: An Introduction to Congress's Capacity Problem -- Part 1 The Foundations of Congressional Capacity -- 2 Capacity for What? Legislative Capacity Regimes in Congress and the Possibilities for Reform -- 3 The Decline in Congressional Capacity -- 4 How Congress Fell Behind the Executive Branch -- Part 2 Knowledge and Expertise in Congress -- 5 The Congressional Capacity Survey: Who Staff Are, How They Got There, What They Do, and Where They May Go -- 6 What Do Congressional Staff Actually Know? -- 7 How Committee Staffers Clear the Runway for Legislative Action in Congress -- 8 Legislative Branch Support Agencies: What They Are, What They Do, and Their Uneasy Position in Our System of Government -- Part 3 The Politics of Capacity in the Legislative Process -- 9 Still Muddling Along? Assessing the Hybrid Congressional Appropriations Process -- 10 Congress and the Capacity to Act: Overcoming Gridlock in the Senate's Amendment Process -- 11 The Issue Dynamics of Congressional Capacity -- 12 Congressional Capacity and Reauthorizations -- 13 How Experienced Legislative Staff Contribute to Effective Lawmaking -- 14 Capacity in a Centralized Congress -- 15 Congressional Capacity and Bipartisanship in Congress -- Part 4 Capacity and the Politics of Reform -- 16 Lessons from the History of Reform -- 17 Dodging Dead Cats: What Would It Take to Get Congress to Expand Capacity? -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- References -- List of Contributors -- Index Summary Congress today is falling short. Fewer bills, worse oversight, and more dysfunction. But why? In a new volume of essays, the contributors investigate an underappreciated reason Congress is struggling: it doesn't have the internal capacity to do what our constitutional system requires of it. Leading scholars chronicle the institutional decline of Congress and the decades-long neglect of its own internal investments in the knowledge and expertise necessary to perform as a first-rate legislature. Today's legislators and congressional committees have fewer--and less expert and experienced--staff than the executive branch or K Street. This leaves them at the mercy of lobbyists and the administrative bureaucracy. The essays in Congress Overwhelmed assess Congress's declining capacity and explore ways to upgrade it. Some provide broad historical scope. Others evaluate the current decay and investigate how Congress manages despite the obstacles. Collectively, they undertake the most comprehensive, sophisticated appraisal of congressional capacity to date, and they offer a new analytical frame for thinking about--and improving--our underperforming first branch of government Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index Notes Online resource; title from digital title page (viewed on February 11, 2021) Subject United States. Congress. United States. Congress -- Officials and employees. SUBJECT United States. Congress fast Subject POLITICAL SCIENCE -- General. Employees Politics and government SUBJECT United States -- Politics and government. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85140410 Subject United States Genre/Form proceedings (reports) Conference papers and proceedings Conference papers and proceedings. Actes de congrès. Form Electronic book Author LaPira, Timothy M., editor. Drutman, Lee, 1976- editor. Kosar, Kevin R., 1970- editor. ISBN 022670260X 9780226702605

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