Via email, Monkey Cage reader Thomas H. writes:
bq. Two recent articles have gotten me thinking back to how legislators make wise policy decisions. The “first article”:http://www.newsweek.com/2011/02/27/i-can-t-think.html from Newsweek discusses studies conducted using fMRI that find that the volume and frequency of information prevents us from making wise decisions because it gives us “information overload”. The second article is Ezra Klein’s “post”:http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2011/03/washington_is_bad_at_scheming.html which got me thinking about how information overload can affect the performance of Congress.
bq. Although I know members of Congress are driven oftentimes as much by reelection as they are by making good public policy, are there ways to restructure Congress so that it is more (dare I say) rational? Is it increased staffing? More committees or study groups?
A textbook answer to this question would frame it as a collective action problem: if members of Congress are primarily seeking reelection, how do you get them to invest in public goods like policy expertise? (See my “earlier post”:https://themonkeycage.org/2009/10/why_arent_senators_policy_entr.html for one take on why members might not have any individual interest in developing this expertise.) Thomas is right that committees are one such way. One influential book within political science, Keith Krehbiel’s “Information and Legislative Organization”:http://www.amazon.com/Information-Legislative-Organization-Michigan-Political/dp/0472064606, makes this case. The committee system is structured in ways that encourage members to commit time and effort to it: committees are powerful gatekeepers, committee positions are largely permanent, longer service tends to bring legislators greater power within committees, etc. Ideally, then, members could look to committees to provide information about policy alternatives.
Of course, it could be that members of Congress don’t feel that policy expertise is all that necessary to making good policy. In lieu of writing highly complex and technical legislation, they could write legislation that spells out broad objectives and then leaves it up to the executive branch to implement it via rule-making, etc. Obviously, there are trade-offs. On the one hand, this allows members to focus on consensual goals and avoid controversial specifics (“death panels,” or what have you). On the other hand, and obviously, presidents and bureaucrats are fickle agents of congressional majorities and could pursue policies that many members find objectionable.
This is just a quick stab. I’d be interested in hearing more answers to Thomas’s question in comments.