Age Group_Uncategorized
Age Group_Uncategorized
amendment
appropriations
authority
automatic-update
B01=Kevin R Kosar
B01=Lee Drutman
B01=Timothy M Lapira
bipartisanship
bureaucracy
capacity
Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=JPA
Category=JPHC
centralization
committees
congress
COP=United States
Delivery_Delivery within 10-20 working days
eq_bestseller
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
executive branch
expertise
government
gridlock
history
IL
issues
Language_English
law
lawmaking
legal
legislators
legislature
lobbyists
nonfiction
PA=Available
political science
politics
Price_€50 to €100
PS=Active
reauthorizations
reform
softlaunch
staff
staffers
support agencies
training
Product details
- ISBN 9780226702438
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 05 Feb 2021
- Publisher: The University of Chicago Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
- Language: English
Secure
checkout
Fast Shipping
Easy returns
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.
Timothy M. LaPira is associate professor of political science at James Madison University. He is coauthor, with Herschel F. Thomas, of Revolving Door Lobbying. Lee Drutman is a senior fellow in the Political Reform Program at the New America Foundation think tank. He is the author of The Business of America Is Lobbying. Kevin R. Kosar is vice president of policy at the R Street Institute think tank in Washington, DC, where he directs its Alcohol Policy Program. He is the author of Moonshine and Whiskey, both published by Reaktion Books.
