A Public Affair
Term Limits are Popular, But What Would They Actually Do?
There are term limits on the President of the United States, but why aren’t similar conditions placed on Congress? On today’s show, guest host Douglas Alexander has a friendly debate about the likelihood and efficacy of congressional term limits with scholar Anthony Fowler. Congressional term limits are generally popular with US voters across the political spectrum, but Fowler says that if you look closely at the studies and academic literature, there isn’t a lot of evidence that term limits would be good or effective. In democratic elections, voters are able to choose their favorite candidate, and whoever is in office has an incentive to get reelected. Fowler argues that term limits would make these two aspects of electoral politics less effective. One argument for term limits is that they would restrict politicians’ likelihood of pandering to voters, says Fowler. Instead of term limits, Fowler recommends other kinds of reform, like changing the nature of legislative jobs so that more competent people will run for them. But Alexander asks, would imposing term limits make it possible for more diverse candidates to run for office to begin with? Fowler tracks political polarization and studies electoral incentives within political institutions. He works on the web series, the Democracy Reform Primer Series in which scholars break down issues like congressional term limits, filibuster reform, the electoral college, and more. Anthony Fowler is the Sydney A. Stein, Jr. Professor in the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago. His research applies econometric methods for causal inference to questions in political science, with particular emphasis on elections and political representation. Specific interests include unequal political participation, electoral accountability, political polarization, and the credibility of empirical research. He is the director of the Center for Effective Government, an editor-in-chief of the Quarterly Journal of Political Science, an author of Thinking Clearly with Data, and a host of Not Another Politics Podcast . Featured image of the House of Congress chamber from 2011 via Flickr . Did you enjoy this story? Your funding makes great, local journalism like this possible. Donate here The post Term Limits are Popular, But What Would They Actually Do? appeared first on WORT-FM 89.9 .
