Customer Reviews

Legislative Leviathan: Party Government in the House (California Series on Social Choice and Political Economy, Vol 23)

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A significant chunk of the recent work on political parties in Congress begins with this book. Its going to be one of those classics that every political scientist eventually cites, and so its one that every political scientist shown probably own. The book review is a pretty good summary of the argument. The theory and the empirical studies are a bit loose, and the conclusions are overdrawn in places, but the idea is (was) sufficiently novel that it represents a serious innovation in contemporary thinking about political parties and congressional organization. Whatever you might think about the book's argument that parties are a legislative cartel, this theory is the foundation for what will surely become an enormous literature in political science.

This book is really aimed at pushing the procedural cartel theory of political parties, which basically argues that parties are organized in order to monopolize the rules of the legislature, not exclusively to win votes or pass substantive bills. The authors use a mix of game theoretic models and anecdotes to drive their point. Definitely a contribution to the Congress literature.