How Do Electoral Contexts Affect the Assignment of Committee Seats? The Case of Germany

Electoral systems affect the allocation of committee seats in legislatures. Distributive theories of legislative organization suggest that parties allow nominally elected legislators to pursue personal votes in legislative contexts by assigning them to electorally advantageous (district) committees. In contrast, in proportional closed party list systems, committee assignments are said to be more likely to serve as means for parties to specialize in policy matters. This paper tests this argument for the German case on the basis of a new and rich data set including statistical data for five legislative terms (1983, 1987, 1998, 2005, 2009) and an overall universe of 2.865 observations. The paper aims to contribute both to debates on legislative organization and to debates on the behavioral implications of electoral incentives. Particularly, the paper contributes to debates on the functioning of mixed systems in this regard.