American Enterprise Institute

The American Enterprise Institute’s Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies research division was founded in 2019 to strengthen the health and integrity of America’s core institutions — both our political institutions and those upstream of politics that are essential to the flourishing of a free society. Its scholars are working to inspire the revitalization of these governing institutions, enabling them to effectively meet the demands of the 21st century, restore genuine representation, and reconnect the public with a better-functioning democracy that can move beyond hyperpartisan divides. This work is essential to restore public trust in American democracy in an age when too many have lost faith in America’s future.

The ongoing debate about the state of Congress and its members, and about what reforms, if any, would benefit the institution and the American people, needs to be informed by scholarly perspectives from across the political and methodological spectrum. We are especially interested in understanding how conservative and libertarian scholars viewing Congress and its members through constitutional and institutional lenses understand the current dynamics and potential paths forward. This project grant to the American Enterprise Institute is designed to support a workshop and subsequent edited volume in which scholars well positioned to offer these diverse and essential perspectives will present their thinking.