The Conditional Value of Legislators’ Effectiveness

• In Event: Rethinking the Roles of Individual Candidates and Their Attributes

Abstract

The ability to write and pass legislation – referred to as legislative effectiveness – is a specific facet of competence, and as such, may be assumed to be a generally desirable trait. But while both theory and empirics seemingly support this idea that legislative effectiveness should be widely appreciated, this project advances the argument that its value is conditional on the desirability of the policies that the politician will likely deliver. The clear policy representation delivered by a proximate copartisan should make effectiveness less important, while more distant copartisans will have more to gain (lose) from proving themselves to be (in)effective. In contrast, the further an opposing politician is from the voter, the less likely that voter should be to reward that politician for being able to effectively deliver those distant policies. In addition to observational and pilot data that offer preliminary support, I will also present results from an experiment fielded by TESS. Most broadly, this project will speak to work on interpersonal dynamics, More specifically, it will contribute evidence of an important caveat to the literatures on vote choice and legislative accountability, both in the U.S. and abroad.

Author

• Elizabeth N. Simas, Texas A&M University