Customer Reviews

Legislative Entrepreneurship in the U.S. House of Representatives (Michigan Studies in Political Analysis)

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Wawro's book studies a critical, and often overlooked, part of the legislative process: why do members draft and push bills through the legislature? While this might sound like a question with an obvious answer, Wawro points out that legislative entrepreneurship is costly and risky behavior. So why do legislators bear the costs and risks to draft and press bills?

Wawro uses a combination of theoretical and empirical studies to test for four important possible factors which might lead legislators to become policy entrepreneurs: to gain support from their constitutents, to help campaign fundraising, to facilitate their position in the legislature, and partisan explanations. While I won't ruin the punchline for interested readers, I will promise that you'll be surprised at the answers which Wawro produces.

If you want to understand contemporary American politics, you'll want to read Wawro's excellent book.