Structure and Opportunity: Committee Jurisdiction and Issue Attention in Congress

Abstract

This article explores how the congressional committee system shapes the dynamics of issue attention. Consisting of what is referred to as a congressional opportunity structure, it describes how committee jurisdictions provide an important institutional context for the attention paid to new issues in congressional hearings. This is illustrated through an examination of congressional attention to biotechnology over a 30-year period. This article finds that committees with broader jurisdictions were more active in biotechnology than committees with a narrow policy remit. However, these institutional effects varied widely, even within a single policy domain. This variation suggests that issue attention depends on the degree of fit between issue characteristics and the congressional opportunity structure. More broadly, the findings here illustrate the virtues of public policy research in studies of Congress.I nstitutions play an important role in the dynamics of issue attention. Although the rise of new issues may be sparked by a variety of factors including unforeseen crises or events, shifts in public opinion, pressures from organized groups, and spikes in media attention, the policy agenda will also reflect the institutional context in which policymakers operate. This institutional context includes, among other things, the allocation of resources necessary for the investigation of new issues, the rules that guide when and how new topics may be brought up for consideration, and the boundaries that demarcate authority over particular issue domains.It is this last feature, the scope of jurisdictions and the clarity of institutional boundaries, that is the principal focus here. Building on recent work on agenda dynamics, this article explores how the multiple and overlapping structures of authority of the congressional committee system shape issue attention. Specifically, it examines how the character of committee jurisdictions creates a congressional opportunity structure that provides an important institutional context for the attention paid to new issues in congressional proceedings. This is illustrated through an examination of congressional hearings on biotechnology issues over a 30-year period.for a number of factors that might influence congressional attention, this article finds that committees with broader jurisdictions were more active in biotechnology issues than were committees with a narrow policy remit. However, these effects varied widely, with the most pronounced effects in the area of biomedical research, such as stem cells, cloning, and access to genetic information. By contrast, hearings on nonmedical applications of biotechnology, such as genetically modified foods and crops, appears concentrated in committees with narrower jurisdictions where the formal content of committee authority is more important than its scope in explaining congressional attention.Several implications follow from these findings. First, this article highlights the importance of policy domains as a unit of analysis for understa...

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