Institutional Change, Discretion, and the Making of Modern Congress: An Economic Interpretation. (book reviews)

In the two decades since the publication of David Mayhew's The Electoral Connection (1974), the assumption that incumbent members of Congress seek to maximize their prospects for reelection has become as firmly ensconced in the field of political science as the concomitant assumption in economics that firms maximize profits. Neither are exactly true, of course; but both assumptions are congruent enough with casual observation (and simple enough) to serve as the basic building blocks for quite compelling models.

In Institutional Change, Discretion, and the Making of Modern ...

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