Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 The Unanswered Question of Legislative Perceptions
- 2 A Dyadic Theory of Subconstituency Representation
- 3 The Psychology of Constituency Representation
- 4 Subconstituents Relevant to Health Policy and Natural Resources Policy
- 5 Explaining Legislative Perceptions
- 6 The Effects of Legislative Perception on Participation
- 7 Reassembling the District as a Whole
- 8 Perception, Reform, and Representation in Congress
- Appendix A Sampling
- Appendix B Interviews
- Appendix C Measurement of Primary Independent Variables
- Appendix D Measurement of Legislative Participation
- Appendix E Instrumental Variables Model of Legislative Participation
- References
- Index
Appendix B - Interviews
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 The Unanswered Question of Legislative Perceptions
- 2 A Dyadic Theory of Subconstituency Representation
- 3 The Psychology of Constituency Representation
- 4 Subconstituents Relevant to Health Policy and Natural Resources Policy
- 5 Explaining Legislative Perceptions
- 6 The Effects of Legislative Perception on Participation
- 7 Reassembling the District as a Whole
- 8 Perception, Reform, and Representation in Congress
- Appendix A Sampling
- Appendix B Interviews
- Appendix C Measurement of Primary Independent Variables
- Appendix D Measurement of Legislative Participation
- Appendix E Instrumental Variables Model of Legislative Participation
- References
- Index
Summary
Eighty-one structured, personal interviews were conducted with legislative staff members on health policy and natural resources policy. Legislative staff members play an integral role in congressional offices as both policy experts and constituent liaisons (e.g., Evans 2002; Salisbury and Shepsle 1981). Staff members are responsible for gathering information about policy issues, providing legislators with relevant information, and representing the legislative office in meetings and informal negotiations. Staff members regularly juggle numerous issues simultaneously in an environment with abundant information from multiple sources and significant time pressure. In the course of fulfilling these duties, staff members make judgments about the interests of the district every day. Additionally, it is the staff members who are most knowledgeable about which constituents write letters to the member and who meet with constituents and interest group representatives. For all of these reasons, scholars have turned to legislative staff members as an invaluable source of information about congressional decision making (e.g., Evans 1991a, 1991b; Hall 1996; Kingdon 1984, 1989). Additionally, a half dozen members of Congress were interviewed on these same policies. These interviews confirm the findings based on interviews with staff members, and provide additional insights into how the legislative enterprise views the district. This appendix provides further details of these interviews, including the measurement of legislative perceptions and constituency contact.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Constituency Representation in CongressThe View from Capitol Hill, pp. 169 - 176Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010