The Institutional Mobility of Minority Members of Congress

Abstract

This article examines the extent to which race and ethnicity affect mobility to leadership positions within Congress. The authors utilize survival analysis to examine the rate at which legislators attained committee leadership positions between the 101st and 108th Congresses. The results show that black legislators attain leadership positions faster than white legislators. This may be because of the tendency for black members of Congress (MCs) to sit on less prestigious committees than white MCs, which creates greater opportunity for institutional promotion. Ethnicity, on the other hand, does not matter to mobility as Latinos acquire leadership positions at the same rate as non-Latino legislators.

Incorporation is Not Enough: The Agenda Influence of Black Lawmakers in Congressional Committees

“…To assess this presumption, I present a series of three-way interactions (Table 2 in the online appendix) where race is operationalized through the dichotomous indicator that a bill's sponsor is a member of the CBC, issue area is captured by the indicator that a bill falls within the CBC agenda, and access and influence is determined by their position on and within particular committees using the benchmarks mentioned above. Scholars have argued that Black lawmakers have been funneled to less prestigious or narrow committees and may not have access to policy relevant committees (Griffin and Keane 2011; Rocca, Sanchez, and Morin 2011). If the incorporation hypotheses prove true, one would expect interactions to yield significant increases in the likelihood of a bill clearing the committee stage for Black members seeking change in targeted issue areas.…”

“…Although some progress has been made from periods of overt suppression of minority members in the institution (Canon 1995; Friedman 1996; Mixon and Pagels 2007; Mixon and Ressler 2001), Griffin and Keane (2011, 152) argue that “there is still some distance to go before assignments are race neutral.” These differences are even more noticeable when Democrats are in the minority. Even though minority members do not request placements on lower committees (Frisch and Kelly 2006), Griffin and Keane (2011) found that minority MC's consistently receive less valuable committee assignments (supported by Rocca, Sanchez, and Morin 2011) despite lobbying on the part of the CBC in hopes to advance members to more prestigious or policy-relevant committees (Congressional Black Caucus 2018). 1…”

Uma abordagem contextual das Comissões Parlamentares do Senado Federal brasileiro

“…Adiciona-se à premissa das vertentes cruzadas, o surgimento de outros fatores para os levantamentos das nomeações 5 , principalmente a questão racial. Representantes negros apresentaram maior atuação nas comissões (Gamble, 2007), indistinta à temática das matérias (projetos voltados aos direitos dos negros ou sem cunho racial) e ascenderam mais rapidamente às presidências das subcomissões em relação aos Representantes brancos e latinos, em parte decorrente das designações as comissões de menor prestígio (Rocca et al, 2011). Porém, mesmo que o princípio da senioridade tenha sido recorrentemente desrespeitado ao longo dos anos, interessa aos políticos permanecer nesses colegiados menos notórios para ao atingir o posto de chair ou ranking member, desfrutarem de maior número de assessores (Gamble, 2007), ou mesmo para atuar ao seu eleitorado quando representam mais questões identitárias em relação as socioeconômicas (Rocca et al, 2011).…”

What Drives U.S. Congressional Members’ Policy Attention on Twitter?

“…Elite actors have individual agendas, each with unique distribution of preference intensities (Rocca, Sanchez, and Morin 2011), and media communications reveal how lawmakers balance their attention among underlying goals and responsibilities. The complexity we expect across the system-wide policy agenda is similarly evident in a member's individual agenda where they strategically communicate policy information given the political environment and their own interests.…”

“…Traditional agenda‐setting studies among policy and media scholars typically assess institutions’ policy agendas, including how the media or governing systems influence issue salience (Baumgartner & Jones, 1993; Kingdon, 1989; McCombs & Shaw, 1972). However, individual lawmakers also practice agenda setting through their public statements, seeking to frame salient policy debates according to their own preference intensities (Rocca, Sanchez, & Morin, 2011). Lawmakers perpetuate policy debates by reinforcing or introducing a new policy image, influencing how issues are portrayed or characterized.…”