3. CINCO FUERZAS DE PORTER
3.1. Análisis De Las 5 Fuerzas De Porter Para La Empresa Restaurante El
DSG structured their services and activities to foster the development of policy expertise for their leaders (and members). While political scientists often assume that the committee system promotes the development of policy specialization in Congress (Adler and Lapinski 1997; Cox and McCubbins 1993, 2005; Krehbiel 1991), liberals confronted an institutional environment that limited their ability to cast knowledgeable votes, or to learn about policy issues outside of their committee work. In order to advance the leadership hierarchy, DSG was designed to promote a broader base of policy knowledge.
As I discussed in chapter four, members were exclusively dependent on committees to obtain legislative information from the mid-1950s through the 1990s. The leadership provided very little information about legislation (and what it did provide was supplied through
committees). These biased information networks reinforced power and informational
asymmetries between junior liberals and southern conservatives. One former DSG staffer said that Dixiecrats viewed information sharing negatively, remarking that chairs believed “the less that’s known out there, the better.”18 DSG challenged these informational biases by “getting that
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information out and more broadly and from a less restrictive source.” DSG’s various
publications outlined the legislative schedule, and provided critical procedural information (terms of consideration on the floor), policy information (bill content) and political intelligence (position of key groups, the leadership, the White House, and so forth on the bill; major arguments for and against; major points of contention). Collectively, these research services subsidized the cost for members and their staff to become knowledgeable about any policy.20
In addition to the research services, DSG challenged committee biases in policy information through their task force system. During most congresses throughout their tenure in the House, DSG organized a series of task forces around specific policy areas to support the development of their member’s policy expertise and leadership (pre-dating many of the
leadership-led efforts to replace committee action with party task forces on legislation) (Sinclair 1985, 2011). These policy areas reflected Democratic priorities, the interests of members themselves, and areas where the committee of jurisdiction (including the Rules Committee) provided a blockade to consideration of key policy problems. Task forces were responsible for holding educational hearings on particular subjects, meeting with experts, arranging membership meetings of interest to members, monitoring committee activity on issues within the task force’s responsibilities, developing legislation or amendments where appropriate, and preparing reports and other materials to present the findings and recommendations of the task force.21 The task forces functioned like an alternative committee system, providing opportunities for members to assume policy leadership roles and become knowledgeable about policy areas outside of their committee work.
19 November 4th, 2015 interview with a former DSG staffer.
20 See chapter 7 for a discussion of the policy implications of the research services.
21 Guidelines for DSG Task Forces, 1983. DSG papers, Part II, box 6, folder 3. It should be noted that not
every task force was as engaged and active, both in their own activities and in challenging committee decision-making (Mann, Stevens and Miller 1974).
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leadership roles for junior members in a few ways. Seniority norms ensured that these members were unable to head subcommittees, or even to participate in the consideration of legislation and policy issues in committees. Junior liberals, in particular, were frequently instructed by their conservative chairs to sit down and not speak during committee meetings and hearings. One top DSG staffer interviewed recalled how Foley would always tell other members on the Agriculture Committee stories about his early experiences on the committee: Foley told them that “the committee chairmen wouldn’t even let you talk. He [former Agriculture Chairman Poage] wouldn’t even want to allow the members to say anything as a freshman. He would say, ‘maybe if you are re-elected, then maybe you can something….For all I know, you got elected by accident. Maybe if you come back again, you can say something.’”22 Armed Services
Committee Chairman F. Edward Hebert’s (LA) infamous reference to the new members of the 94th Congress as “boys and girls” was merely one in a long line of indignities hurled at junior liberals by their senior conservative colleagues (Yang 1992).
Today, freshman members still participate less in committee proceedings than other members (Hall 1998), and opportunities to assume formal and informal policy leadership positions are rare (French 2016). Emphasis on the committee system as the mechanism through which members specialize in policy limits the opportunities available to members to gain experience and influence legislation outside of their committee work.23 There are, of course, a limited number of majority party positions on any committee, and many junior members are dissatisfied with their initial committee assignment. Junior members often receive assignments
22 Other junior members during this period have shared similar accounts, including Rep. Dave Obey’s (D-
WI) recollections of being told to “sit down and shut up” by chairmen. Remarks, September 16th, 2015,
Congressional Reform Symposium, Capital Visitor’s Center, Washington, D.C.
23 In part, this is because committee work generally occurs on the same days and times each week (allowing
for regular party meetings, district work time, and floor schedules). Members with more than one committee assignment often find it difficult to participate equally across their committee assignments.
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more difficult for these members to pursue their policy or electoral goals in the House as a result (Fenno 1973; Kellerman and Shepsle 2009; Rohde and Shepsle 1973).
DSG’s task force system challenged these biases by providing opportunities for members to engage with policy areas outside of their committee. Table 5.1 presents data on the
membership make-up of DSG task forces in the 87th, 89th, and 91st Congresses. Of the 22 task forces analyzed, only 5 drew a majority of their membership from members who served on the corresponding committee of jurisdiction. In other words, the majority of liberal members served on DSG task forces with a different policy focus than their committee work. Records of requests by members to serve on a specific committee are only available for the 91st Congress, but the same trends can be observed there as well. The majority of members requested to serve on a task force with a different policy focus than their own committee assignment(s). Only on the
Economic & Tax Policy, Health & Welfare, and Education task forces did a majority of requesting members also serve on the corresponding committee of jurisdiction.
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Rep. Shirley Chisholm. Rep. Shirley Chisholm’s (D-NY) experiences as a freshman in
1969 are representative of how DSG challenged the policy limitations posed by the committee system. When Chisholm was first elected to the House to represent New York City’s 12th district in 1968, she was placed on the Agriculture Committee (and later Veteran’s Affairs)– an
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background in education (and which some Democrats viewed as racially discriminatory). The formal structure of the House made it difficult for Chisholm to directly participate in policy debates related to her own and her constituent’s interests. Moreover, her urban constituents were less likely to care about any policy achievements she secured through the Agriculture and Veteran’s Affairs committees. Chisholm eventually secured a position on Education & Labor (viewed by many as a ‘carrot’ from Hale Boggs for her vote in his heavily contested majority leader race), but before she did, she gained experience serving on DSG’s Education task force. It provided an outlet for her expertise in education, enabling her to remain informed and involved in education policy prior to her eventual assignment to Education & Labor, as well as providing some tangible evidence of her advocacy on behalf of her constituent’s interests in an important policy area. These are critical components of the credit claiming and position taking activities thought to be important for members’ electoral goals (Mayhew 1974), as well as their policy goals (Hammond 1989).
It is not possible to evaluate the counterfactual scenario, or to administer knowledge tests to members to determine whether their knowledge of a given policy area increased after service
24 In a February 2, 1971 DSG membership meeting, Rep. Herman Badillo (NY) invoked Rep. Chisholm’s
experiences in his request for DSG’s support in protesting his committee assignments. His remarks illustrate both the electoral and representational challenges for individual members of relying exclusively on committee work to develop policy expertise: “Freshman Badillo outlined his case against his assignment to the Agriculture Committee. He argued that the committee ratios on his first three choices (Education & Labor, Banking & Currency, and Interstate and Foreign Commerce) were not correct, that he could be put on any of these without bumping another Democrat. His major contention was that that assignment to
Agriculture could only be viewed as an insult to Puerto Ricans and New Yorkers in light of the same treatment that was given to Rep. Chisholm as a freshman. Rep. Gibbons spoke of the geographical
imbalance of putting him on Education and Labor. Rep. Dellums said that geographic criteria should be irrelevant in making assignments, that a person’s ability and interests are more important. Rep. Burton moved that the DSG go on record to request the Caucus to add more seats to both Armed Services and Education & Labor to accommodate Rep. Abzug and Badillo respectively. During the debate on the motion, Rep. Udall announced that a deal could probably be arranged with Tino Roncalio who had been placed on Education & Labor and was not pleased with the assignment. Following this, Fraser suggested that Burton amend his motion to place the DSG on record to help get desirable assignment for those freshman who were unhappy. That was done” (emphasis added). DSG Meeting Minutes, DSG papers, Part II, box 6, folder 8.
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themselves interested in participating in policy development outside of their own committee, but DSG provided members with the opportunity to do so. In short, DSG subsidized the cost of developing policy expertise on a wider array of policy issues – challenging the participation biases inherent to the formal structures of the House.