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Personal Roots of Representation /

Barry Burden challenges standard explanations of legislative preferences to emphasize the important role that personal influences play in representatives' voting behavior. This timely book is the first to examine the extent to which the very same values, experiences, and interests that shape co...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Burden, Barry C., 1971-
Format: Electronic eBook
Language:Inglés
Published: Princeton : Princeton University Press, 2007.
Series:Book collections on Project MUSE.
Subjects:
Online Access:Texto completo
Description
Summary:Barry Burden challenges standard explanations of legislative preferences to emphasize the important role that personal influences play in representatives' voting behavior. This timely book is the first to examine the extent to which the very same values, experiences, and interests that shape congressional members as individuals and guide their own life choices similarly shape their policymaking decisions. Burden takes a close look at legislative decision making in the areas of tobacco regulation, vouchers and school choice, and religion and bioethics. He finds that personal factors become more significant when legislators are acting proactively rather than reactively, grappling with specific policy issues, and defending rather than challenging the status quo. Marshaling both qualitative and quantitative evidence, Burden reveals that the personal roots of representatives' actions can be as influential as the usual suspects of partisanship and constituency--and that personal factors quite often have the greatest impact when the policymaking stakes are at their highest.
Physical Description:1 online resource (192 pages): illustrations
ISBN:9781400866939