This book is of particular interest to Europeans because of its central notion of a legislature as an information processing body -- one that reviews economic and social information to make policy. Frantzich gives a lively insider's view of the impact of new information technology on how the United States Congress processes information. New organizational innovations, the resistance change encountered, how the planned introduction of new methods and technology was carried out, the new applications that emerged: these are among the topics Frantzich explores, drawing on interviews with fifty Congressmen. The new problems of access to the technology and the data banks and how these were and were not solved are discussed. The impact on efficiency, the role the new information system took in internal politics, the new nature of Congressional decision-making that developed: these are considered in the final chapter, as are questions of security, the impact on the political process as a whole and newproblems on the horizon.

This report represents the results of an extensive study by the Congressional Research Service of state legislature use of computers.