Partisanship and congressional intelligence oversight: the case of the Russia inquiries, 2017-2020
Intelligence and National Security, 2023, Vincent Boucher et Frédérick Gagnon, 20 septembre 2023
Résumé
What patterns of behavior can we observe among the leading figures of US congressional intelligence committees’ Russia inquiries? We argue that current typologies to study the roles of legislators in intelligence oversight do not fully capture the impact of partisanship on overseers’ behavior. Revisiting Loch Johnson’s typology of ‘role definitions’ to account for the behaviour of these legislators, we define four types of congressional investigators to understand how partisanship affected legislators’ behavior during the congressional investigations on Russian interference. We conclude by showing how our role definitions could be used to study congressional intelligence oversight on other high-profile issues.
Auteurs
Vincent Boucher, chercheur en résidence à l’Observatoire sur les États-Unis de la Chaire Raoul-Dandurand en études stratégiques et diplomatiques et Frédérick Gagnon, titulaire de la Chaire Raoul-Dandurand en études stratégiques et diplomatiques
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