Within the under-populated realm of scholarship on legislative committees, there have been numerous studies which have looked at the ability of legislative committees to achieve policy influence in the wider legislature. However, fewer have examined the ability for non-governmental organizations – particularly those with relative outsider status in the policymaking process – to influence the policy recommendations of committee members. As environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs) have often worked through legislative committees to try to influence policy, this dissertation examines how the characteristics of different legislative institutions work to facilitate or limit influence by representatives of ENGOs. This is done by comparing the interactions of ENGOs with legislative committees in Canada, the United States, and Russia – countries which respectively have parliamentary, presidential, and semi-presidential systems, and hold in common the derivation of a large portion of the country’s GDP from natural resource-based industries. The central research question for this study asks how the institutional organization of legislative committees affects the ability of ENGOs to achieve influence through engaging the committees, and how other factors interact with this to increase or decrease the potential for ENGO influence. A key finding that emerges out of this line of inquiry is that there is evidence that some conditions for influence in committees cannot be seen as extensions of the wider legislature but can rightly be seen as unique to the committees themselves or as manifesting in unique ways within them. / Dissertation / Candidate in Philosophy

All democratic organisations operate under a particular set of rules. Such procedures are implemented by the very individuals that create and maintain them, usually under a majority voting rule. This research project engages with the question of why and how members of parliament "abdicate" procedural power, focusing on the evolution of the rules of debate in the UK House of Commons. Working from newly collected data on the reform of Standing Orders of the House spanning 205 years (1811 - 2015), as well as records of over six million speeches, it provides a new perspective on procedural choice. Framing debate as a platform for speech-as-filibuster behaviour, I develop a formal model where the decision to support an anti-dilatory reform is primarily a function of polarisation. I show that legislators adopt restrictive rules when they are more likely to share policy preferences with colleagues within their party. The presence of shared views, then, motivates MPs to prioritise responsible use of the common resource of plenary time over individual policy influence. Both empirically and theoretically, my research offers new insights into the process of parliamentary reform in the absence of party discipline, and studies how the dynamics of procedural choice change as political parties enter the stage. Methodologically, it makes a contribution to the text-as-data field, exploring the use of novel machine-learning techniques in the measurement of political preferences.

An extensive literature examines how distributive (i.e., “pork barrel”) spending is allocated among congressional districts. Much of this research finds evidence that intra-chamber factors like ideology, party, and committee membership are the primary determinants of various forms of distributive spending. However, we know much less about how extra-chamber factors such as district-level demand and the economy impact the distribution of federal outlays. In this study, I find that district-level demand and variation in economic factors, in particular, income and unemployment, significantly predict the distribution of new bureaucratic awards in the 110th Congress. The results support the contention that districts get what they need, and this raises questions about the ability of members of powerful committees to steer awards selectively to their districts. It also provides evidence for the economic “law of increasing state activity,” by which districts with higher income levels receive a larger share of federal assistance.

This thesis presents a new approach to the long-standing question of how electoral rules influence the behaviour of legislators. It begins with the argument that fresh empirical advances can be made by moving beyond the pervasive but rigid assumption that all legislators want to be re-elected and, by extension, that every incumbent values this goal to the same degree. Rather, I propose that individual Members of Parliament (MPs) vary in the extent to which they personally desire or depend upon re-election. Following the principles of a difference-in-differences design, this observation allows me to devise a theoretical framework capable of testing whether MPs' vote-seeking behaviour differs within parliaments in a way that varies predictably across countries. Specifically, I propose that in electoral systems where party-centric behaviour increases re-election chances, MPs particularly invested in the goal of re-election should cater to the party to an even greater extent than their colleagues. Conversely, in systems where a personal vote can generate electoral gains, MPs most ambitious for re-election should engage in this type of vote-winning strategy to the greatest extent. I test this prediction across the UK House of Commons and the German Bundestag, and within Germany's mixed-member system. Newly-collected biographical data on over 1700 MPs is used to conduct the first systematic MP-level operationalisation of re-election ambition based on legislators' career backgrounds. Career politicians are thereby identified as those most ambitious for re-election. Using voting behaviour from 1.8 million vote choices in legislative roll-calls as a proxy for the degree to which an MP caters to the party or to his or her personal reputation, the quantitative multilevel analysis reveals strong evidence for the proposed behavioural pattern. The contribution made by this study is two-fold. First, it uncovers the interaction between electoral rules and individual re-election ambition as a new explanation for MP-level variation in legislative behaviour. Second, its research design overcomes shortcomings in previous empirical tests for the existing theory on how electoral rules impact MP behaviour (e.g. Carey and Shugart 1995), producing more robust evidence in support of this influential framework.

Submitted by Florian Augusto de Abreu Coutinho Madruga (florian.madruga@gmail.com) on 2016-01-21T18:04:38Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Final - Florian.pdf: 1833426 bytes, checksum: 08d6a5d66732d0a5b21cb37bbfd4cd1a (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by ÁUREA CORRÊA DA FONSECA CORRÊA DA FONSECA (aurea.fonseca@fgv.br) on 2016-01-25T18:32:01Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Final - Florian.pdf: 1833426 bytes, checksum: 08d6a5d66732d0a5b21cb37bbfd4cd1a (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Maria Almeida (maria.socorro@fgv.br) on 2016-01-26T19:06:31Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Final - Florian.pdf: 1833426 bytes, checksum: 08d6a5d66732d0a5b21cb37bbfd4cd1a (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-01-26T19:06:52Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Final - Florian.pdf: 1833426 bytes, checksum: 08d6a5d66732d0a5b21cb37bbfd4cd1a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-12-17 / After 2008, Brazil implemented a series of unprecedented actions in the field of defense policies since the country became a democratic nation once again. The publishing of the National Defense Strategy was a milestone in this process. This document allowed for reforms at the Ministry of Defense and the expansion of strategic projects to reequip the Armed Forces. For the first time, investments were higher than all expenditures stipulated in the national budget meant for defense. In addition, the military expanded their social services in the Amazon and participated more actively in public security actions in Brazilian cities. The main objective of this paper is to assess how this new conjuncture affected the parliamentary activities related to our national defense and military matters. In order to achieve this, a survey of all propositions made by congressional representatives and senators regarding this topic since 1999 – year in which the Ministry of Defense was created – was carried out. The results obtained show that defense policies continue having a secondary role at the National Congress. Despite the implementation of parliamentary fronts, subcommittees and the use of other innovative instruments that increased the visibility of this topic in both legislative houses, the number of legislative initiatives diminished in the last few years. On the other hand, control, monitoring and investigation institutions, such as the Public Prosecution Service (Ministério Público) and the Brazilian Audit Court (TCU), have been more active. Furthermore, we observed that the most active representatives come from states that have a higher number of military personnel when compared to the number of inhabitants. This suggests an electoral connection in the work related to defense issues. / A partir de 2008, o Brasil empreendeu um conjunto de ações na área de defesa nacional sem precedentes desde a redemocratização do país. A publicação da Estratégia Nacional de Defesa foi um marco nesse processo. O documento viabilizou reformas no Ministério da Defesa e a expansão de projetos estratégicos para reaparelhar as Forças Armadas. Pela primeira vez, os investimentos chegaram a superar os gastos com custeio no orçamento destinado à defesa. Além disso, os militares ampliaram os serviços sociais na Amazônia e participaram mais ativamente de ações de segurança pública nas metrópoles brasileiras. O objetivo deste estudo é avaliar como essa nova conjuntura impactou nas atividades parlamentares relacionadas à defesa nacional e aos assuntos militares. Para isso, foi feito um levantamento de todas as proposições de deputados federais e de senadores relacionadas ao tema desde 1999, ano de criação do Ministério da Defesa. Os resultados demonstram que a defesa nacional continua tendo um papel secundário no Congresso Nacional. Apesar da instalação de frentes parlamentares, subcomissões e o uso de outros instrumentos inéditos que conferiram visibilidade ao tema nas casas legislativas, a quantidade de iniciativas diminuiu nos últimos anos. Em contrapartida, instituições de controle, fiscalização e investigação, como o Ministério Público e o TCU, têm sido mais atuantes. No mais, observamos que os deputados mais ativos vêm de estados com maior quantidade de militares em proporção ao número de habitantes. Isso sugere uma conexão eleitoral na atuação nas questões de defesa.

A pesquisa enfoca a contribuição da Câmara Municipal na formulação de políticas públicas de educação no município de Porto Alegre, no período de 2001 a 2008, que abrange o último governo da coligação liderada pelo Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) e o primeiro governo da coligação liderada pelo Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro (PMDB). O processo da produção legal é analisado com apoio na abordagem do ciclo de políticas públicas, considerando três etapas: a justificação do problema, a agenda governamental e a tomada de decisão. O foco da análise recai sobre o teor dos projetos de lei, com a descrição das preferências dos vereadores em relação aos temas educacionais e das intervenções de atores diretos e indiretos nos processos de tramitação. Além disso, o estudo mostra como os atores usam os recursos disponíveis para afetar o processo de tramitação de proposições na esfera legislativa. Foram observadas semelhanças e diferenças na produção legislativa de cada legislatura, com base na elaboração de categorizações de temas, de justificativas e de argumentos, o que permitiu também reconstruir o movimento textual sofrido pelas disposições normativas sobre educação. A análise evidencia dissensos entre os atores no que diz respeito às propostas de lei e às estratégias de obstaculização impostas pelos diversos atores aos projetos. Discute também a função simbólica de parte das proposições legislativas no campo educacional e a contribuição do legislador no campo das condições da oferta educacional por meio da edição dos pedidos de providência. O debate sobre as competências do Legislativo local no campo educacional, delimitadas pelo ordenamento legal nacional e municipal, é central para problematizar a contribuição do Legislativo no campo de formulação de políticas públicas de educação, já que os vereadores sofrem limitações em seu poder de legislar nesse campo, decorrentes da relação com o Poder Executivo. O trabalho sugere a adoção de uma política colaborativa no jogo político, capaz de superar a luta partidária, bem como uma reforma da Lei Orgânica no que se refere às competências legislativas no campo educacional. Há um potencial represado de contribuição do Legislativo no ordenamento legal da educação, em função das proposições em condições de entrar na pauta que se encontram arquivadas, razão pela qual são sugeridas providências a tomar por parte das lideranças políticas com a finalidade de otimizar a produção legislativa. / The research focuses on the contribution of the City Council in the formulation of public policies for education in the city of Porto Alegre, from 2001 to 2008, covering the last government coalition led by the Workers Party (PT) and the first coalition government led by Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB). The process of legal production is analyzed based in the policy cycle approach, considering three stages: the justification of the problem, the government agenda and the decision making. The focus is on the bills‟ content, with the description of councilors‟ preferences related to educational issues and interventions of direct and indirect actors in the reviewing processes. Furthermore, the study shows how actors use available resources to affect the reviewing process of proposals in the legislative scope. Similarities and differences were observed in the legislative production of each legislature, based on the elaboration of theme categorizations, justifications and allegations, which also led to reconstruct the textual movement sustained by normative provisions on education. The analysis highlights disagreements among actors regarding to the bills and the hinder strategies imposed by various actors to projects. It also discusses the symbolic function of part of legislative proposals in the educational field and the contribution of councilmen in the conditions of educational offer by editing providences requests. The debate over the jurisdictions of the local legislatives in educational field, bounded national and municipal legal systems, is central to discuss the contribution of the legislature in formulating public policies in education since the councilmen are limited in their power to legislate in this field arising from the relationship with the executive power. The work suggests the adoption of a collaborative policy on the political game, able to overcome the party struggle, as well as a reform of the Organic Law with regard to the legislative competence in the educational field. There is a dammed contribution potential of the legislature in legal system of education, due to the propositions able to get on the agenda that are archived, and because of that providences are suggested to be taken by political leaderships in order to optimize legislative production.

A pesquisa enfoca a contribuição da Câmara Municipal na formulação de políticas públicas de educação no município de Porto Alegre, no período de 2001 a 2008, que abrange o último governo da coligação liderada pelo Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) e o primeiro governo da coligação liderada pelo Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro (PMDB). O processo da produção legal é analisado com apoio na abordagem do ciclo de políticas públicas, considerando três etapas: a justificação do problema, a agenda governamental e a tomada de decisão. O foco da análise recai sobre o teor dos projetos de lei, com a descrição das preferências dos vereadores em relação aos temas educacionais e das intervenções de atores diretos e indiretos nos processos de tramitação. Além disso, o estudo mostra como os atores usam os recursos disponíveis para afetar o processo de tramitação de proposições na esfera legislativa. Foram observadas semelhanças e diferenças na produção legislativa de cada legislatura, com base na elaboração de categorizações de temas, de justificativas e de argumentos, o que permitiu também reconstruir o movimento textual sofrido pelas disposições normativas sobre educação. A análise evidencia dissensos entre os atores no que diz respeito às propostas de lei e às estratégias de obstaculização impostas pelos diversos atores aos projetos. Discute também a função simbólica de parte das proposições legislativas no campo educacional e a contribuição do legislador no campo das condições da oferta educacional por meio da edição dos pedidos de providência. O debate sobre as competências do Legislativo local no campo educacional, delimitadas pelo ordenamento legal nacional e municipal, é central para problematizar a contribuição do Legislativo no campo de formulação de políticas públicas de educação, já que os vereadores sofrem limitações em seu poder de legislar nesse campo, decorrentes da relação com o Poder Executivo. O trabalho sugere a adoção de uma política colaborativa no jogo político, capaz de superar a luta partidária, bem como uma reforma da Lei Orgânica no que se refere às competências legislativas no campo educacional. Há um potencial represado de contribuição do Legislativo no ordenamento legal da educação, em função das proposições em condições de entrar na pauta que se encontram arquivadas, razão pela qual são sugeridas providências a tomar por parte das lideranças políticas com a finalidade de otimizar a produção legislativa. / The research focuses on the contribution of the City Council in the formulation of public policies for education in the city of Porto Alegre, from 2001 to 2008, covering the last government coalition led by the Workers Party (PT) and the first coalition government led by Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB). The process of legal production is analyzed based in the policy cycle approach, considering three stages: the justification of the problem, the government agenda and the decision making. The focus is on the bills‟ content, with the description of councilors‟ preferences related to educational issues and interventions of direct and indirect actors in the reviewing processes. Furthermore, the study shows how actors use available resources to affect the reviewing process of proposals in the legislative scope. Similarities and differences were observed in the legislative production of each legislature, based on the elaboration of theme categorizations, justifications and allegations, which also led to reconstruct the textual movement sustained by normative provisions on education. The analysis highlights disagreements among actors regarding to the bills and the hinder strategies imposed by various actors to projects. It also discusses the symbolic function of part of legislative proposals in the educational field and the contribution of councilmen in the conditions of educational offer by editing providences requests. The debate over the jurisdictions of the local legislatives in educational field, bounded national and municipal legal systems, is central to discuss the contribution of the legislature in formulating public policies in education since the councilmen are limited in their power to legislate in this field arising from the relationship with the executive power. The work suggests the adoption of a collaborative policy on the political game, able to overcome the party struggle, as well as a reform of the Organic Law with regard to the legislative competence in the educational field. There is a dammed contribution potential of the legislature in legal system of education, due to the propositions able to get on the agenda that are archived, and because of that providences are suggested to be taken by political leaderships in order to optimize legislative production.

A pesquisa enfoca a contribuição da Câmara Municipal na formulação de políticas públicas de educação no município de Porto Alegre, no período de 2001 a 2008, que abrange o último governo da coligação liderada pelo Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) e o primeiro governo da coligação liderada pelo Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro (PMDB). O processo da produção legal é analisado com apoio na abordagem do ciclo de políticas públicas, considerando três etapas: a justificação do problema, a agenda governamental e a tomada de decisão. O foco da análise recai sobre o teor dos projetos de lei, com a descrição das preferências dos vereadores em relação aos temas educacionais e das intervenções de atores diretos e indiretos nos processos de tramitação. Além disso, o estudo mostra como os atores usam os recursos disponíveis para afetar o processo de tramitação de proposições na esfera legislativa. Foram observadas semelhanças e diferenças na produção legislativa de cada legislatura, com base na elaboração de categorizações de temas, de justificativas e de argumentos, o que permitiu também reconstruir o movimento textual sofrido pelas disposições normativas sobre educação. A análise evidencia dissensos entre os atores no que diz respeito às propostas de lei e às estratégias de obstaculização impostas pelos diversos atores aos projetos. Discute também a função simbólica de parte das proposições legislativas no campo educacional e a contribuição do legislador no campo das condições da oferta educacional por meio da edição dos pedidos de providência. O debate sobre as competências do Legislativo local no campo educacional, delimitadas pelo ordenamento legal nacional e municipal, é central para problematizar a contribuição do Legislativo no campo de formulação de políticas públicas de educação, já que os vereadores sofrem limitações em seu poder de legislar nesse campo, decorrentes da relação com o Poder Executivo. O trabalho sugere a adoção de uma política colaborativa no jogo político, capaz de superar a luta partidária, bem como uma reforma da Lei Orgânica no que se refere às competências legislativas no campo educacional. Há um potencial represado de contribuição do Legislativo no ordenamento legal da educação, em função das proposições em condições de entrar na pauta que se encontram arquivadas, razão pela qual são sugeridas providências a tomar por parte das lideranças políticas com a finalidade de otimizar a produção legislativa. / The research focuses on the contribution of the City Council in the formulation of public policies for education in the city of Porto Alegre, from 2001 to 2008, covering the last government coalition led by the Workers Party (PT) and the first coalition government led by Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB). The process of legal production is analyzed based in the policy cycle approach, considering three stages: the justification of the problem, the government agenda and the decision making. The focus is on the bills‟ content, with the description of councilors‟ preferences related to educational issues and interventions of direct and indirect actors in the reviewing processes. Furthermore, the study shows how actors use available resources to affect the reviewing process of proposals in the legislative scope. Similarities and differences were observed in the legislative production of each legislature, based on the elaboration of theme categorizations, justifications and allegations, which also led to reconstruct the textual movement sustained by normative provisions on education. The analysis highlights disagreements among actors regarding to the bills and the hinder strategies imposed by various actors to projects. It also discusses the symbolic function of part of legislative proposals in the educational field and the contribution of councilmen in the conditions of educational offer by editing providences requests. The debate over the jurisdictions of the local legislatives in educational field, bounded national and municipal legal systems, is central to discuss the contribution of the legislature in formulating public policies in education since the councilmen are limited in their power to legislate in this field arising from the relationship with the executive power. The work suggests the adoption of a collaborative policy on the political game, able to overcome the party struggle, as well as a reform of the Organic Law with regard to the legislative competence in the educational field. There is a dammed contribution potential of the legislature in legal system of education, due to the propositions able to get on the agenda that are archived, and because of that providences are suggested to be taken by political leaderships in order to optimize legislative production.

In this dissertation I systematically examine African-American and Latino legislator behavior in a legislative setting. The project specifically examines whether and how minority legislators represent and influence African American and Latino policy interests during the legislative process. I perform an analysis of minority legislator participation rates on bills and develop an original measure of substantive representation using patterns in legislative speech of state representatives’ language during committee hearings. I build on existing theory in the representation literature and offer new hypotheses for expanding the scope of how substantive representation is defined and investigated, namely through an empirical investigation of the link between deliberation and descriptive representation. Second, I collect an original data set and develop an original measure of substantive representation to test these hypotheses with participation rates and a linguistic frame based content analysis approach of minority and non-minority representatives’ language on bills for racial perspectives during state legislative committee hearings on several policy issue areas including, but not limited to education, healthcare, and immigration. Third, I offer a critical test of hypotheses to test whether African American and Latino representatives’ (1) participate more when the legislation is deemed minority interest in comparison to their non-minority counterparts? (2) their behavior (or deliberation style) is different from non-minority legislators? (3) impact the deliberation style of non-minority legislators? The analysis draws on original data collected through committee hearing tapes and online video archives of Texas committee hearings in multiple policy areas, and the findings indicate that minority legislators do indeed provide a voice for minority constituents, providing more minority interest language on minority interest bills in comparison to their non-minority colleagues, especially when the legislation is threatening to minority populations. These results support the argument that minority legislators do indeed substantively represent minority constituents at levels greater than non-minority representatives during the legislative process.

In this dissertation I systematically examine African-American and Latino legislator behavior in a legislative setting. The project specifically examines whether and how minority legislators represent and influence African American and Latino policy interests during the legislative process. I perform an analysis of minority legislator participation rates on bills and develop an original measure of substantive representation using patterns in legislative speech of state representatives’ language during committee hearings. I build on existing theory in the representation literature and offer new hypotheses for expanding the scope of how substantive representation is defined and investigated, namely through an empirical investigation of the link between deliberation and descriptive representation. Second, I collect an original data set and develop an original measure of substantive representation to test these hypotheses with participation rates and a linguistic frame based content analysis approach of minority and non-minority representatives’ language on bills for racial perspectives during state legislative committee hearings on several policy issue areas including, but not limited to education, healthcare, and immigration. Third, I offer a critical test of hypotheses to test whether African American and Latino representatives’ (1) participate more when the legislation is deemed minority interest in comparison to their non-minority counterparts? (2) their behavior (or deliberation style) is different from non-minority legislators? (3) impact the deliberation style of non-minority legislators? The analysis draws on original data collected through committee hearing tapes and online video archives of Texas committee hearings in multiple policy areas, and the findings indicate that minority legislators do indeed provide a voice for minority constituents, providing more minority interest language on minority interest bills in comparison to their non-minority colleagues, especially when the legislation is threatening to minority populations. These results support the argument that minority legislators do indeed substantively represent minority constituents at levels greater than non-minority representatives during the legislative process.