Party Influence in Congress

Steven S. Smith is the Kate M. Gregg Professor of Social Sciences, Professor of Political Science, and the Director of the Murray Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government and Public Policy at Washington University in St Louis. He has taught at George Washington University, Northwestern University, and the University of Minnesota, where he was the Distinguished McKnight University Professor of Political Science and Law. He is the author or co-author of six books on congressional politicals, served as an editor of Legislative Studies Quarterly, and served on the editorial boards of the American Journal of Political Science, the Journal of Politics, and Congress and The Presidency.

"Party Influence in Congress is required reading for students of Congress, parties, and national institutions more generally. Smith critiques a generation of scholarship on the impact of political parties on legislative behavior and outcomes, identifying both the strengths and shortcomings of existing theory and empirical work on parties in the House and Senate. Smith pushes scholars to acknowledge the limits of stylized treatments of party influence, and to build theory that provides a better match of analytical rigor and empirical reality. Smith's theoretical perspective – coupled with historical and empirical nuance – definitely moves the study of Congress forward." Sarah Binder, Brookings Institution and George Washington University

• 1. Introduction; 2. The micro-foundations of theories of congressional parties; 3. The types and sources of party influences; 4. The search for direct party effects; 5. Recent theories of party influence: cartel and conditional party government theory; 6. Revisiting pivotal and party politics; 7. Reexamining the direct and indirect influence of party in the House and Senate; 8. More than a conclusion.