Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: Dynamics of Policy Expertise Acquisition and Electoral Performance in Japan and Taiwan

如果没有既定的委员会分配资历规则，立法者如何在立法机构获得政策专业知识？本研究旨在探讨个别立法者对政策专业知识的习得及其与立法者目标达成的关系，包括连任、事业发展、影响公共政策等。在美国国会，政策专业知识是通过连续指派给同一委员会获得的。由于实行了强有力的资历规则，委员会的任命通常会自动更新，因此，没有充分考虑到获得政策专门知识的过程及其与选举奖励的关系。类似于美国国会的严格资历制度在世界上并不普遍，议员们发展政策专长的动机因国家而异。不同的政治制度影响立法者成为政策领域专家的动机(S)。本研究通过对两个民主国家(日本和台湾)的立法机构的研究，为在与美国不同的制度背景下运作的立法者开发了一个政策专业知识获取模型，日本国会和台湾立法院提供了大量的制度变异，因此是理想的研究对象。首先，这些国家的国家内部和国家间选举制度的差异使我们能够评估在不同选举背景下获得的政策专门知识。关于日本国会，在1995年之前实行单一不可转让投票制(SNTV)的选举制度和自1995年以来实行的混合议员选举制度，使人们得以审查这两种不同制度提供的选举激励对政策专门知识获取的不同影响。此外，立法院允许在总统制下对立法院的立法行为进行调查(与日本的议会民主制形成对比)。直到2008年，立法院的大多数成员基本上都是通过SNTV选举产生的。立法院还规定了政党对委员会分配的控制权的变化。在大多数民主国家，委员会职位的分配是由政党控制的，文献几乎没有提供关于政党没有这种控制权时会发生什么的指导。2002年以前的立法院提供了难得的机会，在没有政党控制委员会分配的情况下审查委员会的职业生涯。这个项目的主要论点是立法者获得政策专业知识来实现几个目标，如连任、推进他们的政治生涯和影响政策。上述不同的制度背景反过来影响这些目标和政策专业知识的获得之间的联系。为了检验我们的一般理论模型的经验含义，我们考察了立法者的政策活动，他们与各自地区的政策需求的关系，以及立法者的职业轨迹。为该项目收集的数据集包括以下数据：立法者政策专长、选区的政策需求和现任候选人的选举表现。立法者的政策活动包括委员会分配、委员会辩论和发言、投票记录和法案提交。该项目的智力优势基于对政策专业知识获取过程的更深入了解。现有关于立法者政策专长的研究主要局限于美国国会，而对政策专长演变过程的研究还不够深入。美国现任者保留其委员会成员的强大权利，阻碍了对政策专业知识演变过程的认真考虑。这个项目通过对两个亚洲民主国家的研究来解决这些问题和其他问题。这项研究项目具有以下更广泛的影响。首先，也是最重要的是，它提供了关于何时以及在什么体制条件下通过立法者获得政策专门知识来提高公共政策质量的知识。其次，它提供了有关未得到充分研究的立法院的重要信息。第三，为这个项目创建的大型数据集将为未来对日本和台湾立法行为的各个方面感兴趣的学者提供宝贵的资源。

How do legislators acquire policy expertise in legislatures without a well-established seniority rule for committee assignments? This research project investigates the acquisition of policy expertise by individual legislators and its relation with the achievement of legislator goals such as reelection, career advancement, and influencing public policy. In the US Congress, policy expertise has been acquired through consecutive assignments to the same committee. Since a strong seniority rule has been in force, committee assignments are generally automatically renewed, and thus, the process of acquiring policy expertise and its relationship with electoral incentives has not been adequately considered. Strong seniority systems similar to that found in the US Congress are not universal in the world, and legislators' motivation for developing policy expertise varies across countries. Different political institutions influence legislators' motivations to be an expert in a policy area(s). Through the study of legislatures in two democratic countries (Japan and Taiwan), this research develops a model of policy expertise acquisition for legislators operating in an institutional context different from that found in the United States.The Japanese Diet and Taiwanese Legislative Yuan are ideal objects of study because they provide a great deal of institutional variation. First, intra and inter country electoral system variance in these countries allows us to assess policy expertise acquisition within different electoral contexts. In regard to the Japanese Diet, the employment a single-nontransferable-vote (SNTV) electoral system until 1995 and a mixed member electoral system since 1995 allows for the examination of the differential impact on policy expertise acquisition of the electoral incentives provided by these two distinct systems. In addition, the Legislative Yuan, where most members were until 2008 largely selected using SNTV, allows for the investigation of legislative behavior under SNTV in a presidential democracy (in contrast to Japan's parliamentary democracy). The Legislative Yuan also provides variation in party control of committee assignments. In most democracies, committee post allocations are under the control of parties, and the literature provides little guidance on what happens when parties have no such control. The Legislative Yuan before 2002 provides the rare chance to examine committee careers within a context of no party control over committee assignments.This project's principal argument is legislators acquire policy expertise to achieve several goals, such as reelection, advancing their political career, and influencing policy. The different institutional contexts described above in turn affect the connection between these goals and the acquisition of policy expertise.To test the empirical implications of our general theoretical model, we examine legislators' policy activities, their relation to the policy needs of their respective districts, and the legislators' career trajectory. The dataset assembled for this project consists of data on: legislator policy expertise, policy needs of an electoral district, and the electoral performance of incumbent candidates. Legislators' policy activities include committee assignments, debate in committee and on the floor, voting record, and bill introduction.The project's intellectual merit is based on its provision of a deeper understanding of the process of policy expertise acquisition. The extant research on legislator policy expertise has been limited primarily to the US Congress, and the process of evolving policy expertise is understudied. The strong right of US incumbents to retain their committee membership prevents serious consideration of the process of policy expertise evolution. This project addresses these and other issues via the study of two Asian democracies. This research project has the following broader impact. First and foremost, it provides knowledge about when and under what institutional conditions the quality of public policy is improved though the acquisition of policy expertise by legislators. Second, it supplies vital information on the understudied Legislative Yuan. Third, the large dataset created for this project will represent an invaluable resource for future scholars interested in a variety of aspects of legislative behavior in Japan and Taiwan.