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Much effort is focused on the importance of civility in legislative discourse and debate. Civility is intended to create an environment of respect and collaboration, but the electoral process and legislative political posturing often work contrary to the maintenance and reinforcement of this norm. What is it about these processes which enhances or hinders civility and bipartisan collaboration? The Legislative Service Project examines individuals involved in the Washington State Legislative process and seeks to determine how changes to this process have affected legislative civility. Participants include legislative interns from the last ten years, legislative staff, members of the media, lobbyists and legislators who served during the 1990 to 2009 legislative sessions. Participant responses provide insight into the legislative process, changes affecting this process, and provide considerable insight into the dynamics of legislative civility and bipartisanship from the student intern, staff, media, lobbyist and legislator's perspective. The ultimate goal of the Legislative Service Project is to improve the current Washington State legislative process and better prepare the next generation of leaders for public service. ; Benjamin, Francis et al. (2010, March 26). Civility in the Washington State Legislature: Causes Underlying a Decline Over Time. Poster presented at the Washington State University Academic Showcase, Pullman, WA.

The many political communities of Latino America -- Viva Kennedy and the nationalization of "Latin American" politics -- Civil rights and the recognition of a "national minority" -- Becoming Spanish-speaking, becoming Spanish origin -- Mastering the "Spanish-speaking concept" -- Liberal Democrats and the meanings of "unidos" -- The "brown mafia" and middle-class Spanish-speaking politics in 1972 -- The "impossible dream" of the Hispanic Republican movement -- Securing representation in a multicultural democracy -- Latino liberalism in an era of limits -- The "New Hispanic conservatives".

"To examine state-level gridlock and hyper-partisanship in the United States, researchers conducted a nationwide survey of registered lobbyists and public agency legislative liaison officers. In Outside Looking In, scholars interpret the survey results, presenting unique perspectives on civil discourse in state legislatures, and revealing both regional and national insights"--

AbstractThis article examines the relationship between legislative civility and legislative productivity in US state legislatures. The research employs data from the National Survey of State Legislative Lobbyists and from the State Policy Innovation and Diffusion (SPID) database. The former dataset is used to generate an overall civility index for each state as developed by Kettler et al. The SPID database allows one to measure the legislative productivity of a state legislature. Employing these data, negative binomial and Poisson regression models reveal that state legislatures rated as more civil by their own lobbyists produced significantly more pieces of noteworthy legislation than those legislative bodies rated as less civil. These results suggest that the quality of internal legislative dynamics matters for legislative productivity.

This study examines the linkage between state citizen civility and the extent to which similar levels of civility are expressed in their state legislatures. Specifically, we explore whether the perceived level of citizen incivility and sociability in a state predicts the level of legislative incivility in that same state. Our results indicate that while there seems to be an overall linkage between citizen civility and sociability and legislative civility in each state, some states are notable outliers that deviate from this overall pattern. We explore possible intervening effects on this linkage that can account for outliers to this relationship, including institutional arrangements and political culture.