Congressional Responsiveness to Constituents

Why Congressional Responsiveness Should Not Be Increased

Several factors are considered by congress members when they decide whether or not to participate in matters of foreign and defense policy. Burgin has shown that these factors include personal interest in the policy, committee assignment, style, status, and party. The factor that weighs most heavily with members, however, is the interest supportive constituents show in a particular policy.

Burgin has shown that this interest is the driving force in many members decisions to participate. This was done through a series of interviews with members and their staff about why and when a member would choose to become involved with a matter of foreign policy. Several independent variables, including the factors listed above, were given as reasons for a member’s participation in foreign policy; each factor was then assigned a number depending on how important it was in making the decision. These numbers ranged from +2, (a primary incentive) to -2, (a primary disincentive.) (Burgin, p. 77).

When this data is put into a complicated equation, Burgin found that, by and far, the interest of supportive constituents was the most important factor in deciding whether or not to participate. (The higher the t-score for a variable, the more important it was to the decision by the member to get involved; the interest of supportive constituents had a t-score of 20.87; the next highest t-score belonged to personal policy interests, with 7.92.) (Burgin, p. 78).

Clearly, then, the interest shown by supportive constituents plays a very large part in the decision to become involved with matters of foreign policy. Burgin, however, states that the responsiveness of members to their constituents’ interests is "not complete, it is not always or necessarily meaningful, and it is not exactly uniform." (Burgin, p. 85).