Winner of the Alan Rosenthal Prize & the Louis Brownlow Book Award

Backdoor Lawmaking reveals how members of the US Congress use the federal bureaucracy as a backdoor for policymaking. Lawmakers pressure agencies to make policy changes in order to avoid obstacles in the legislative process. The book uses records obtained under the Freedom of Information Act in qualitative and quantitative analyses to show how members of Congress are incorporating agency regulations into a broader strategy of policymaking that spans branches of government and which lawmakers are most effective at using this approach. Lawmakers use agency regulations as a substitute for legislative action, pressure agencies to delay and block the implementation of law until new legislation is passed, and work with agencies to draft legislation. The bureaucracy also offers lawmakers a discreet way to represent controversial interests outside of the formal constraints of Congress. The book considers the implications of its findings for democratic accountability and representation and assesses the normative tradeoffs: Inter-branch policymaking allows members of Congress to evade accountability and to bypass the lawmaking process established in the US Constitution. Yet, it may be critical for preserving democratic norms given the growth of administrative lawmaking. 

Backdoor Lawmaking: Evading Obstacles in the US Congress. 2023. Oxford University Press.

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/backdoor-lawmaking-9780197670491?cc=us&lang=en&