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The Folkways of the United States Senate: Conformity to Group Norms and Legislative Effectiveness

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  • Matthews, Donald R.

Abstract

The Senate of the United States, we are told, is a “club.†The image, while hopelessly imprecise and occasionally quite misleading, does have at least one advantage: it underscores the fact that there are unwritten but generally accepted and informally enforced norms of conduct in the chamber. These folkways influence the behavior of senators to a degree and in directions not yet fully understood. “There is great pressure for conformity in the Senate,†one member (mercifully varying the simile) has recently said. “It's just like living in a small town.†And, as in small-town life, so too in the Senate there are occasional careers to be made out of deliberate nonconformity, sometimes only skin-deep, but sometimes quite thorough-going.

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  • Matthews, Donald R., 1959. "The Folkways of the United States Senate: Conformity to Group Norms and Legislative Effectiveness," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 53(4), pages 1064-1089, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:apsrev:v:53:y:1959:i:04:p:1064-1089_07
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    Cited by:

    1. Kathleen Bawn & Gregory Koger, 2008. "Effort, Intensity and Position Taking," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 20(1), pages 67-92, January.
    2. Ekor, Maxwell & Katz, Menachem & Iweala, Ola, 2014. "Estimating Legislative Effectiveness in Nigeria," MPRA Paper 107696, University Library of Munich, Germany.

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