The Oxford Handbook of Legislative Studies

Shane Martin is Reader in Comparative Politics, University of Leicester.Thomas Saalfeld is Professor of Political Science at the University of Bamberg and the founding Director of the Bamberg Graduate School of Social Sciences.Kaare W. Strøm is Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the University of California, San Diego.

Legislatures are political bodies essential to democracy and the rule of law. They present social scientists with numerous intriguing puzzles, with far-reaching implications for our understanding of political institutions. Why, and how, have these ancient assemblies, established in pre-democratic times, survived the transition to mass democracies? How have they adapted? How do they structure such processes as budgeting, legislation, and executive oversight? How dotheir members get selected, and what consequences flow from differences in these rules? What roles do committees and political parties play in contemporary legislatures? What functions do legislatures perform in autocratic, semi-democratic or recently democratized societies? What explains thesimilarities and differences in legislative rules, powers and recruitment? What are the policy and other consequences of variation in how legislatures are organized and function?The 33 chapters in The Oxford Handbook of Legislative Studies, written by 47 of the most distinguished legislative scholars, provide a comprehensive and up-to-date description and assessment of the state of the art in legislative studies. Key themes explored include theoretical paradigms and methodological approaches to the study of legislatures, representation and legislative careers, internal organization, the role of parties within legislatures and the role of legislatures in policymaking and accountability. The Handbook also explores the emergence of parliaments in historical and contemporary contexts, including new democracies and trans-national institutions.

Legislatures are arguably the most important political institution in modern democracies. The Oxford Handbook of Legislative Studies, written by some of the most distinguished legislative scholars in political science, provides a comprehensive and up-to-date description and critical assessment of the state of the art in this key area.

1 Shane Martin, Thomas Saalfeld and Kaare W. Strom: Introduction; Part I: Theories; 2 Daniel Diermeier: Formal Models of Legislatures; 3 Heinrich Best and Lars Vogel: The Sociology of Legislatures and Legislators; 4 Amie Kreppel: Typologies and Classifications; Part II: Methods; 5 Royce Carroll and Keith Poole: Roll Call Analysis and the Study of Legislatures; 6 Jonathan B. Slapin and Sven-Oliver Proksch: Words as Data: Content Analysis in Legislative Studies; 7 Andre Bachtiger: Debate and Deliberation in Legislatures; 8 Stefanie Bailer: Interviews and Surveys in Legislative Research; 9 James N. Druckman, Thomas J. Leeper and Kevin J. Mullinix: The Experimental Study of Legislative Behavior; Part III: Representation and Legislative Careers; 10 Reuven Hazan: Candidate Selection: Implications and Challenges for Legislative Behavior; 11 Audrey Andre, Sam Depauw and Matthew S. Shugart: The Effect of Electoral Institutions on Legislative Behavior; 12 Michelle M. Taylor-Robinson: Gender and Legislatures; 13 Rudy B. Andeweg: Roles in Legislatures; 14 Thad Kousser and Scott A. MacKenzie: Legislative Careers; Part IV: Organisation and Rules; 15 Wolfgang C. Muller and Ulrich Sieberer: Procedure and Rules in Legislatures; 16 William B. Heller and Diana M. Branduse: The Politics of Bicameralism; 17 Shane Martin: Committees; Part V: Parties in the Legislature; 18 Thomas Saalfeld and Kaare W. Strom: Political Parties and Legislators; 19 Christopher Kam: Party Discipline; 20 Carol Mershon: Legislative Party Switching; 21 Lanny W. Martin and Georg Vanberg: Legislative Institutions and Coalition Government; Part VI: Policy Making and Oversight; 22 Bjorn-Erik Rasch: Institutional Foundations of Legislative Agenda Setting; 23 Sebastian M. Saiegh: Law Making; 24 Joachim Wehner: Legislatures and Public Finance; 25 Anne Skorkjaer Binderkrantz: Legislatures, Lobbying and Interest Groups; 26 Tapio Raunio: Legislatures and Foreign Policy; 27 Common Agencya Legislatures and Bureaucracies; Part VII: Expanding the Scope of Legislative Analysis; 28 Simon Hix and Bjorn Hoyland: Political Behaviour in the European Parliament; 29 William Downs: Sub-National Legislatures; 30 Brian F. Crisp and Constanza F. Schibber: The Study of Legislatures in Latin America; 31 Josephine T. Andrews: Legislatures in Central and Eastern Europe; 32 Paul Schuler and Edmund J. Malesky: Authoritarian Legislatures; 33 Gary W. Cox: Reluctant Democrats and their Legislatures