Innovations in the study of elite behavior:the role of information in representation and decision-making

The study of elite behavior grew remarkably in the last decades. We discuss the main tools that allowed this growth—survey, experiments, audit studies, text-as-data methods—and describe how they advanced our understanding of elite decision-making. However, recent scholarship has often disregarded the role of institutions. We posit that the next innovations in this field will bring institutions back into the study of elite behavior. We illustrate our argument through the literature on information and decision-making.