Professor Krutz’s research probes questions of public policy agenda-setting in democratic political institutions (especially Congress). His research is highly varied in terms of institutional topics, but there is an intellectual core; he explores the inter-play between political institutional structure and public policy. His various projects relate to two sets of research questions. The first is “How do democratic political institutions process policy issues?” More specifically, why are some issues seriously considered while others fall by the wayside?
Projects on issue processing:
- a series of articles on “winnowing” in the U.S. House and Senate.
- a series of articles on the effect of institutional structure on environmental policy discussions in congressional committees and the federal bureaucracy
But that (issue processing) represents only half of theoretical picture. Institutions are not static. They are not ex ante bargains struck before the game begins. They evolve, and this evolution may affect the processing of policy issues. Therefore, a second question he studies is “how and why do institutions change the way in which they process issues?”
Projects on institutional change in the processing of issues:
- a book (with Jeff Peake) on the rise in the presidential use of executive agreements
- an article on the changing nature of the Senate confirmation process of presidential nominees for administrative and court positions
- a series of articles on devolution in the United Kingdom (with Rob Bohrer)
- a book on the evolution of the U.S. Senate Indian Affairs Committee
