Government & Politics Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2775
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Item Information Control: Leadership Power in the U.S. House of Representatives(2011) Curry, James Michael; Lee, Frances E; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Most congressional scholarship argues that legislative leaders--majority party leaders and committee chairs--are strongly constrained, weak agents of their rank-and-file. This study argues that information, and leaders' ability to control it, is a significant and independent source of power for leaders in the House of Representatives. Most rank-and-file members of Congress lack the time and resources necessary to track, study, or become deeply involved in legislating on most bills considered by the House. As a result, they rely on sources that can synthesize the information they need to decide whether or not to support the bill, offer an amendment, or take other actions. The party leadership and committee chairs, because of their staff and resource advantages, are important sources of information for the rank-and-file. However, legislative leaders often exploit their informational advantages to help their preferred legislation gain easy passage through the chamber. Along with the ability to perpetually collect information on rank-and-file preferences, and provide leadership-approved information about legislation, legislative leaders also have an arsenal of tools to limit the availability of information including withholding legislative language, scheduling votes on short notice, and using large and complex legislation as a vehicle. This information control puts leaders in the driver's seat, allowing them to lead the chamber by shaping the information driving the debate on a bill. Thirty interviews with members of Congress and congressional staff, along with a unique dataset of important legislation considered by the House of Representatives are used to support this theory. Leaders are found to employ information control tactics strategically, to aid the passage of their priority legislation and in response to the potential for significant influence from outside groups. The study, overall, suggests that legislative leaders in the House are more influential than they are typically perceived to be and that participation in congressional policymaking is often restricted.Item China's IT Leadership(2005-08-03) Duan, Qing; Wilson, Ernest J.; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)With the rapid expansion of China's information and communications technology (ICT) sector, there has emerged a strategic group of IT leaders. These IT leaders are characterized by their "amphibiousness". On the one hand, they have become bridges that introduce Western concepts of competition and decentralization to China. On the other, they do not want to challenge the state because they feel comfortable with their personal ties to promote their business interests. They belong to the "non-critical realm" of social elites and have not coalesced into a coherent and organized social force. Even though they may not represent an independently innovative force that would push for political change in China, they have become catalysts and have created part of the necessary conditions for political changes, for example enhancing institutional performance of the state and creating a forum for public debate and political participation of the grassroots. Therefore, they have a subtle political impact on state responsiveness and civic participation. By carefully contrasting the autonomous, parasitic, symbiotic, negotiating, and amphibious actor models, this study of IT leadership in China emphasizes the creative aspect of politics--their visions, craftsmanship, and courage for ICT diffusion in China. In contrast with the top-down or bottom-up paths of Communist transitions in East Central Europe, the Chinese path seems to be grounded in the middle. The conclusion of this dissertation is that in a time of uncertainty, a strategic group of IT leaders starts to inspire and lead this nation in new directions like a spark when China is in desperate need of a systematic and convincing rationale and vision for its progress in an era of great transformation.