How Are Politicians Informed? Witness Testimony and Information Provision

• In Event: Policy Preferences, Conflict, and Legislative Speech

Abstract

How are politicians informed and who do politicians seek information from? Congressional committee hearings have played a crucial role in how members of Congress acquire technical information, make decisions, and coordinate with key stakeholders. We examine the information flow between members of Congress and witnesses from external groups. To do so, we construct a novel dataset that represents the most comprehensive data collection to date on congressional committee hearings and witnesses across a 60-year time period spanning 1960-2018. Across 72,851 hearings and 755,948 witnesses who testified in Congress, we investigate who members of Congress invite to provide information, the quantity and quality of information presented by these witnesses using hearing transcripts in recent Congresses, and the implications of this information flow during the committee stage. Further, we demonstrate how changes in the internal capacity of Congress, namely the downsizing of congressional staff and the elimination of the Office of Technology Assessment in 1995, drive committees to change their behavior in how much – and from whom – they seek external information.

Authors

• Pamela Ban, University of California, San Diego

• Ju Yeon Park, University of Essex

• Hye Young You, New York University