Local Content and Congressional Politics: Interest-Group Theory and Foreign-Policy Implications

Abstract

This study analyzes congressmen's voting behavior with regard to the ‘Fair Practices in Automotive Product Act (HR 5133)’, commonly known as the local content legislation, which was introduced to the 97th US Congress. Among other things, we conducted a quantitative analysis involving four independent variables: congressmen's party affiliation, their closeness to labor, the unemployment rate in their home states, and their seniority in Congress. As a result, congressmen's closeness to labor was found to be more important than their party affiliation, or the other two variables, in explaining their vote on local content. On further investigation, we have arrived at a new understanding of congressional politics, namely that labor's trade impact is possibly maximized on measures unlikely to become law, and that congressmen often support such measures to send signals to domestic constituencies and to foreign governments. The study goes on to discuss the negative implications of such congressional ‘signalling’ for US—Japanese relations, thereby underscoring the need to examine congressional politics in the context of alliance politics and the declining US hegemony in an interdependent world.