Organizational Attributes of Legislatures: Structure, Rules, Norms, Resources

Although the behavioral approach in political science has profoundly affected the analysis of legislatures, focusing on individual level data to the seeming exclusion of organizational factors, recent research has recognized and documented the influence of organizational variables. This review essay describes research on organizational factors and considers how variables related to legislative structure and technology-formal features, rules and procedures, power and influence arrangements, physical setting, resources, and organizational technology-affect legislative operation and performance, public policy, the behavior of legislators, and relations with other branches of government and the public.