bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Political Science and Political Fiction
Authors: Davidson James F.
Published: May 2006

C. P. Snow, in his Rede Lecture on the scientific and literary worlds as separate cultures, lists four groups needed by a country if it is to “come out top” in the scientific revolution. First, as many top scientists as it can produce; second, a larger group trained for supporting research and high class design; third, educated supporting technicians; and “fourthly and last, politicians, administrators, an entire community, who know enough science to have a sense of what the scientists are talking about.”

It seems increasingly clear that the growing army of “political” scientists—meaning natural scientists in politics—is more likely to be aided by students of politics prepared to understand the effects of science in political terms than by most of the recent efforts to understand politics in scientific terms. When one looks over the journals in political science, and in related areas of public opinion and social psychology, searching for significant conclusions in articles where much time has been spent on the elaboration of method, it is difficult to avoid V. O. Key's conclusion “that a considerable proportion of the literature commonly classified under the heading of ‘political behavior’ has no real bearing on politics, or at least that its relevance has not been made clear.”
Political Science and Political Education
Authors: Jacobson Norman
Published: May 2006

Much of this essay falls within the realm of speculative thought. Since it is in the nature of speculation that one's words may appear immodest and his conclusions often eccentric, I shall state my arguments at the outset without pausing to elaborate them. The arguments themselves are quite simple. Each of them will reappear later on clothed, I hope, in more attractive dress.

Two varieties of political thought contended for the allegiance of the American people at the founding of the new nation. The two seem irreconcilable in certain crucial respects.

One was notable for its expression of friendship and brotherhood, for its insistence upon individual spontaneity and uniqueness, and for its disdain for material concerns; it was intuitive and unsystematic in temper. The other displayed a preoccupation with social order, procedural rationality, and the material bases of political association and division; it was abstract and systematic in temper.

The exponents of the latter point of view, having put their opponents to rout, assumed the responsibility for organizing the government and politics of the country. They enacted their psychological, social, economic, and political theories into fundamental law, then erected insititutions designed to train generations of citizens to prefer certain goods and conduct over all others.
Trends in American Political Science: Some Analytical Notes
Authors: Somit Albert , Tanenhaus Joseph
Published: May 2006

The following notes deal with three aspects of American political science in which the trends, we believe, will be of particular interest to members of the profession. The findings presented here have been taken from a much broader study of the discipline currently in process. Given the present spatial exigencies, we have made some arbitrary decisions in selecting the topics to be dealt with here. It may be desirable, therefore, to indicate the scope of the larger investigation and the relationship of this paper to the parent study.

We had originally planned to base our analysis of trends in American political science primarily upon the biographical and professional data contained in the 1948, 1953 and 1961 editions of the Directory of the American Political Science Association. While the data in these volumes were both useful and suggestive, we soon realized that this information alone was not sufficient for our purposes. We became increasingly convinced that any meaningful discussion of the state of the discipline required a reliable knowledge of the attitudes and views of the profession on a number of current issues and problems. Lacking this type of information, the authors of recent studies of American political science have been forced to treat their personal beliefs as reasonably representative of the membership at large; to speculate, however shrewdly, as to divisions of opinions in the discipline; or simply to ignore the topic altogether.
The Supreme Court and “The Moment of Truth”
Authors: Swisher Carl Brent
Published: May 2006

This annual ceremony of our non-partisan Association is being held at a time when most political scientists are preoccupied with the events of a fateful national election. To avoid any implications of partisanship, it seems best on this occasion to eschew politics in the conventional sense and to concentrate on institutional analysis not applicable to the current conflict. This discussion will therefore deal with the Supreme Court and with the Court primarily as an institution, rather than with problems of changing personnel or the political implications of particular decisions. It will assume that institutions are important in terms of their intrinsic nature and that the kind of institution to be used for a particular governmental task depends largely on the kind of task to be performed, with room for exceptions in exceptional circumstances. So it is that the Court will be presented not in isolation but as a part of the judicial system at whose apex it stands, and will be discussed in terms of the assumptions which lie back of and dictate its rituals, routines and procedures, and which have a great deal to do with determining its efficacy for the tasks allocated to it.

Because analysis of hallowed institutions and ritualized performance is often incorrectly identified with the expression of hostility or disrespect, with only deference permitted on the part of him who would leave the ritual or the institution with the stature it had when he approached it, let me emphasize that the purpose here is not to attack or to disparage but to analyze and to encourage further analysis, with creative ends in view.
Congressional Committee Members as Independent Agency Overseers: A Case Study
Authors: Scher Seymour
Published: May 2006

This paper is concerned with the behavior of members of a Congressional committee in their role as overseers of an independent regulatory commission. Congressional committees seem periodically to become aware of the presence of the regulatory agencies and after a more or less spectacular examination of one or another of them, allow them to slip back to an undisturbed and unnoticed routine. Their status as “independent” agencies leaves to Congress the formal responsibility both for checking on the fulfillment of their legislative mandates and for preserving them from domination by their clientele and the President. Too little notice has been taken, however, of the nature of the control of these regulatory agencies emanating from Congress.

This study results from an examination of the House Education and Labor Committee as it reviewed the performance of the National Labor Relations Board in 1953. My sources are the public hearings of the Committee in the 83d Congress and interviews with Committee members over a two-year period thereafter.
Feudal Aspects of National Socialism
Authors: Koehl Robert
Published: May 2006

Attempts to establish a “morphology of civilizations” seem to continue in spite of dire warnings from scholars. Indeed, while rejecting Toynbee and Sorokin with one hand, many a scholar has beckoned with the other to adventurous young men to leave the barren tracts of specialization and re-enter the broad panoramic fields of Weltgeschichte. Current interest in “comparative feudal institutions” illustrates the case in point.

The notion that “feudalism” is a “form of society,” especially a “stage in development,” can be traced back to Marxist historiography, and from there back to eighteenth century French thinkers. But instead of becoming thoroughly discredited, the notion has recently led to new thinking on the subject which may turn out to be fruitful. In Feudalism in History for example, Rushton Coulborn, has combined eight separate papers on feudalism in various parts of the world by different historians, with his own critical and synthetic studies. Though he fails to find even one “fully developed” feudal society according to his own definition—a not unexpected result—his study contains an amazing amount of suggestive analysis.

His suggestions are particularly valuable in the construction of “working models” or “ideal types” as research tools. Even when we remain safely within our own “fields,” if we are to go beyond highly specialized fact-gathering and at the same time avoid “presentisi subjectivism,” we will need such tools.
Safeguards for Academic Freedom at Princeton
Authors: Stein Harold
Published: May 2006

In the long development of democracy, legal safeguards for individuals are usually established only in times of crisis or after grave dissatisfaction with the procedure employed in a particular case. Fortunately, in either instance, when the safeguard is given legal sanction, it is likely to continue in effect so that a cumulative body of protections is established. And in some rather unusual cases, civil rights and liberties broadly construed are guaranteed by an act of prescience: our Bill of Rights is an admirable example of the value of forethought.

During the past half century, Princeton University has established a substantial corpus of rules to protect academic freedom, twice because of dissatisfaction with the treatment of individual cases, once in response to crisis, once as an act of conscious foresight. The following brief report is submitted in the hope that some of Princeton's developments may serve as useful suggestions to its sister universities.

Princeton University has been singularly though certainly not entirely free of periods of crisis and of important and distressing academic freedom cases for the last half century. Its tradition of academic freedom goes at least as far back as the latter years of the 19th Century, but its first formal adoption of a rule did not come until 1918.

The year 1918 was a year of crisis. Across the face of the land, our universities and colleges reacted in a variety of ways, most frequently in the form of resolutions or rules that rested on a demand for full support of the prosecution of the war and that frequently led to exclusions and dismissals from faculty and student body. Princeton, too, was moved in this way and on June 5, 1918 the Faculty adopted such a resolution. Fortunately, Princeton also demonstrated another response to the crisis, of a very different character, and with permanent rather than ephemeral effect.
Measurement of Latin American Political Change
Authors: Fitzgibbon Russell H. , Johnson Kenneth F.
Published: May 2006

Social scientists are finding an increasingly useful and stimulating tool in the application of statistical techniques to their problems. As in the employment of any new tool, both the utility and the limitations of this one must be learned. It seems beyond reasonable doubt, however, that quantification of data in the social sciences will become a more widely used and rewarding procedure as time goes on.

Prudence dictates that stress be laid on its limitations. The enthusiasm with which a new tool—toy, some would say—is adopted should not blind the user to dangers which may be implicit in its overuse. One cannot squeeze more juice from an orange than the orange contains, no matter how modern the squeezer. Care must be exercised, too, lest the bitter essence of the rind become mixed with the nourishing juice of the fruit itself.

The present analysis is an attempt, in not too complex a fashion, to make use of such techniques to organize and validate data which might otherwise permit only the broadest sort of generalizations by way of conclusion, conclusions unsatisfactory roughly in proportion to their breadth. The senior author of this article has for more than a decade and a half been interested in the problem of objective measurement of certain aspects of political change in Latin America with particular respect to the sum total of phenomena falling under the rubric of “democracy.” On four occasions, 1945, 1950, 1955, and 1960, he conducted a survey among groups of specialists on Latin America to elicit evaluations which then, with the help of such statistical procedures as seemed useful, were summarized and analyzed.
The Outsider in the Senate: An Alternative Role
Authors: Huitt Ralph K.
Published: May 2006

The growing concern of students of politics with the social structure of official bodies and the behavior expected of their members promises to make the Senate of the United States a prime target of research. Two recent books make notable contributions and suggest the trend. One is William S. White's Citadel: The Story of the U.S. Senate, an “insider's” impressions based on years of close observation; and the other is Donald R. Mathews' U.S. Senators and Their World, the work of a political scientist. One (though not the only) concern of both books is the system of norms for behavior of members of the Senate. Although reached through different routes (White's largely inferred from observed behavior, Matthews' principally from interviews) their statements of Senate norms and the way they work have much in common. The norms (or “folkways,” as Matthews calls them) are viewed as cultural “oughts” upon which there is a high degree of consensus. The members who conform most closely to the norms are, generally speaking, the most influential and effective members. This general view is almost certainly correct, as it would be for any stable human group; in this the Senate is not unique (as White sometimes seems to suggest it is) but typical.

But what about the senator who does not conform? What is his place in the Senate and what happens to him there? This study will explore these questions through a case study of such a senator. But first it may be useful to try to restate the relevant parts of the analysis of White and Matthews (without holding them in any way responsible for the restatement) in terms of role theory, which will provide the conceptual framework for the analysis of the senator's experience.
Social and Economic Factors and Negro Voter Registration in the South
Authors: Matthews Donald R. , Prothro James W.
Published: May 2006

The vote is widely considered the southern Negro's most important weapon in his struggle for full citizenship and social and economic equality. It is argued that “political rights pave the way to all others.” Once Negroes in the South vote in substantial numbers, white politicians will prove responsive to the desires of the Negro community. Also, federal action on voting will be met with less resistance from the white South—and southerners in Congress—than action involving schools, jobs, or housing.

Such, at least, seems to have been the reasoning behind the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960, both of which deal primarily with the right to vote. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and his predecessor, Herbert Brownell, are both reported to believe that the vote provides the southern Negro with his most effective means of advancing toward equality, and recent actions of the Justice Department seem to reflect this view. Many Negro leaders share this belief in the over-riding importance of the vote. Hundreds of Negro registration drives have been held in southern cities and counties since 1957. Martin Luther King, usually considered an advocate of non-violent direct action, recently remarked that the most significant step Negroes can take is in the “direction of the voting booths.” The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, historically identified with courtroom attacks on segregation, is now enthusiastically committed to a “battle of the ballots.” In March, 1962, the Southern Regional Council announced receipt of foundation grants of $325,000 to initiate a major program to increase Negro voter registration in the South. The Congress of Racial Equality, the NAACP, the National Urban League, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee are among the organizations now participating in the actual registration drives.
Causality and Time in Political Process: A Speculation
Authors: Jacobson Norman
Published: May 2006

“All philosophers, of every school, imagine that causation is one of the fundamental axioms of science, yet, oddly enough, in advanced science … the word ‘cause’ never occurs …. The Law of Causality, I believe, like much that passes among philosophers, is a relic of a by-gone age, surviving like the monarchy, only because it is erroneously supposed to do no harm.”—Bertrand Russell (1928)

Causality is an invention of the formal reason, a product of philosophers and scientists. As an idea, however, “cause” finds its basis in ordinary experience. Objects move. How? By being acted upon by other objects or by human agency; exert a pull here, create an effect there. In the world of experience unrefined by science or philosophy, it sometimes seems as if every thing is connected in some way with every other thing, all are parts in a cosmic puppet show. A simple string model appears natural and true and is a prototype of common-sense notions of causality. Even in science, at least until recently, such notions were given expression as well. The string model, for instance, was to be found equally in the simplest interpretations of Newtonian mechanics as in the implicit theories of the carpenter, the plumber, or the agriculturist. Particles exist and forces act between them as causes, producing change. The very idea of force introduces a feeling of compulsion and the causal connection between events seems a physical necessity, reinforcing the lessons taught by every-day experience.
Communism, Nationalism and the Growth of the Communist Community of Nations After World War II
Authors: Shoup Paul
Published: May 2006

In the apocalyptic visions of Marx, the world revolution which was to destroy capitalist society was also to sweep away the entire system of nation-states, and in its place to substitute a world proletarian society, a new supra-national community ruled over by the victorious working class.

Of all the prophecies of early Marxism, none proved more ill-founded than this belief in an international socialist order. The revolution, when it came, was confined to Russia. Only after the victories of the Soviet armies in World War II did it become possible to extend Communist rule beyond the borders of the Soviet Union. After less than two decades, this new international Communist community of nations has become divided into blocs of quarrelling states, and the goal of international Communism seems still distant. The Communists, like other universalistic movements of the past, have apparently proved incapable of surmounting the limits of the nation-state system they set out to destroy. Why?
Political Factors And Negro Voter Registration In The South
Authors: Matthews Donald R. , Prothro James W.
Published: May 2006

A recent Herblock cartoon in the Washington Post depicts three bare-footed backwoodsmen. The oldest and most tattered of them (labeled “poll tax”) lies wounded, his head propped against a boulder, his rifle abandoned near his side. As the other rifle-bearing rustics-identified as “literacy tests” and “scare tactics”- bend sorrowfully over him the older man says, “I think them Feds got me, boys, but I know you'll carry on.” Perhaps it is premature to anticipate the ratification of the anti-poll tax amendment proposed by the 87th Congress as the newest addition to the federal constitution. No doubt the cartoonist is correct, however, in picturing both “literacy tests” and “scare tactics” as less vulnerable to federal government attack. These presumed barriers to equal participation by Negroes in the politics of the South may “carry on” for some time to come.
Some Ambiguities in the Notion of Power
Authors: Riker William H.
Published: May 2006

The notion of power is often said to be central to the analysis of politics. But while that analysis is a very ancient activity, the conceptual clarification of the notion of power has been undertaken only in the past generation. The reason for this discrepancy I leave to the historians of political ideas. In this introduction I merely observe that the clarification has not proceeded as far as is needed, so that we are still not at all sure of what we are talking about when we use the term. Nevertheless there is light ahead, owing especially to some formal definitions that have been offered in recent years by Shapley and Shubik, March, Dahl, Cartwright, and Karlsson. By reason of the formality of these definitions the issues of meaning have been more sharply delineated than was previously possible. Hence we have reached the point, I believe, where we may confront definitions with each other and specify precisely how they differ. In so doing we may be able to resolve some of the ambiguities remaining in the concept of power. In that hope this essay is written.
Consensus and Ideology in American Politics
Authors: McClosky Herbert
Published: May 2006

The belief that consensus is a prerequisite of democracy has, since deTocqueville, so often been taken for granted that it is refreshing to find the notion now being challenged. Prothro and Grigg, for example, have questioned whether agreement on “fundamentals” actually exists among the electorate, and have furnished data which indicate that it may not. Dahl, reviewing his study of community decision-makers, has inferred that political stability does not depend upon widespread belief in the superiority of democratic norms and procedures, but only upon theiracceptance. From the findings turned up by Stouffer, and by Prothro and Grigg, he further conjectures that agreement on democratic norms is greater among the politically active and aware—the “political stratum” as he calls them—than among the voters in general. V. O. Key, going a step further, suggests that the viability of a democracy may depend less upon popular opinion than upon the activities and values of an “aristocratic” strain whose members are set off from the mass by their political influence, their attention to public affairs, and their active role as society's policy makers. “If so, any assessment of the vitality of a democratic system should rest on an examination of the outlook, the sense of purpose, and the beliefs of this sector of society.”
Probabilism and the Number of Units Affected: Measuring Influence Concentration
Authors: Russett Bruce M.
Published: May 2006

In suggesting a basis for operational indices of the concentration of power Steven Brams' creative article “Measuring the Concentration of Power in Political Systems” (see pp. 461–475) has performed an important service to the discipline in opening up a neglected area. It is very surprising that despite all the past efforts to devise summary measures of power bases (e.g., income or military strength) so little effort has gone into summary indices for rigorously gauging their dispersion or the absence of dispersion. Having acknowledged Brams' piece as an extremely valuable stimulus for further thought, I would like now to exercise a scientific prerogative to propose a variation in the approach that should, for some theoretical purposes, prove even more useful. As Brams notes appropriately, it is indeed true that the best index “for any particular study will depend on the nature and purposes of the study.”

All the versions of Brams' PC index are directed toward measuring the collective exercise of influence between different levels of decision-makers. This approach reflects an essentially deterministic point of view: the influence from any level on a mutual influence set or sets is determined by the exercise of influence on only one of its members. For example, if a has power over b, and b is in a mutual influence set with c, then c's actions vis-à-vis b are completely determined by a. As far as the PC index is concerned, this is no different from the case of a's directly influencing b and directly influencing c when b and c are not in an influence relationship. But if one takes a probabilistic viewpoint of indeterminacy, of a's predominance but less than complete control over b and c when they are in a mutual influence relationship, the relations among units at a subordinate level become interesting.
The Minority Party and Policy-Making in the House of Representatives
Authors: Jones Charles O.
Published: May 2006

Considerable attention has recently been focused on political oppositions in democracies. A recent book examines oppositions in various western countries and a journal called Government and Opposition was founded in 1965. The significance of the role of an opposition in democracies does not have to be stressed. It is generally accepted.

What of the role of the opposition in the United States? Robert A. Dahl notes that one must use the plural when speaking of opposition in this country since, “a distinctive, persistent, unified structural opposition scarcely exists in the United States … it is nearly always impossible to refer precisely to “the” opposition, for the coalition that opposes the government on one matter may fall apart, or even govern, on another.”

While it is true that “the” opposition is not institutionalized as a definite cohesive, persistent, distinctive group in American politics, it is also true that there has usually been an identifiable minority party in Congress. Though it does not always oppose the majority, and cannot be expected to be synonymous with “the” opposition very often, it does persist. Despite handsome invitations to disband—in the form of successive defeats at the polls—a sizeable number of congressmen, senators, and congressional candidates continue to call themselves Republicans and to organize as such in Congress.
The Muslim League in South India since Independence: A Study in Minority Group Political Strategies
Authors: Wright Theodore P.
Published: May 2006

How can a religious minority organize most effectively to protect its interests without weakening the distinction between religion and politics by which advocates of a secular state justify equal treatment for the minority? As in Europe earlier in the century, this problem is again acute in some of the so-called “New Nations” of Asia and Africa where national integration is far from complete and religion is still the primary mode of self-identification among many of its communicants. If a minority faith is geographically concentrated so as to constitute a majority in certain extensive areas, it is likely to seek independence, merger with an adjacent state of the same religion, or at least provincial autonomy if its members believe that their religious identity is threatened by assimilation.

Of the great world religions, Islam provides the most difficult case of adjustment to minority status by separation of religion from the state. The leaders of the Muslim minority of British India finally set the objective of separate national independence in 1940 after they had concluded that they could not rely upon constitutional guarantees to safeguard their rights against the Hindu majority. But the creation of Pakistan in 1947 left a substantial though scattered Muslim population of some forty million in the Indian Republic, ten percent of the latter's people. Suspected by many Hindus of further divisive intentions, how was this group to act within the framework of parliamentary and at least ostensibly secular democracy?
Political Attitudes and the Local Community
Authors: Putnam Robert D.
Published: May 2006

Politicians and political scientists alike have long recognized the impact of the local political environment on the attitudes and behavior of community residents. V.O. Key demonstrated in a variety of contexts the striking persistence of distinctive community political traditions. The extensive discussion of the “suburban conversion” hypothesis has turned in part on the question of the influence of the local community on partisan attitudes. A number of studies of voting behavior have shown that majority views in a community have a disproportionate advantage in gaining and holding adherents. There is, in short, good reason to suspect that the local community has a significant influence on social attitudes and political behavior. Why is this so? How does the Republican “atmosphere” in Elmira affect the votes of individual Elmirans? How are community political traditions maintained through decades of changing community composition? Why does the minority party in a community fail to mobilize many of the voters who are predisposed toward it? What explanation of these sorts of community influence seems most adequate?—this is the question to be examined in this paper.
Current Political Thought and Practice in Ghana
Authors: Bretton Henry L.
Published: May 2006

On March 6, 1957, the Gold Coast, now called “Ghana,” attained fully responsible status within the British Commonwealth. African nationalists, Pan-Africanists and their supporters in other parts of the world hailed the event as a milestone on the road to complete emancipation of the Africans, as proof that the “dark continent” had come of age and that all of its people were now fully capable of governing themselves.

This study of several key factors in the development of political thought and practice in the former colony was undertaken with a view toward an assessment of the stability and soundness of the country's new political institutions and practices. In a more general sense, it may be regarded as a commentary on the process of institutional transfer from colonial (European) to African political control. Since the formal structure within which the transfer took place is classifiable, nominally at least, as parliamentary-democratic, the evaluation may also serve as a commentary on contemporary performance of what, to reflect its second-hand nature, may be termed “colonial-parliamentary democracy.”
The Market for Strategic Ideas in Britain: The “Sandys Era”
Authors: Martin Laurence W.
Published: May 2006

Britain and the United States have long taken an intense mutual interest in the methods by which they arrive at a defense policy and the two countries have frequently borrowed from each other's experience. In the last few years the British scene has been worthy of special attention because Britain has faced, in a peculiarly acute form, the universal military problem of limited resources and extensive commitments. Recently Conservative governments have tried to resolve this dilemma by plunging heavily for certain strategies and weapons: as a Minister of Defence told the Commons, “We have to pick the winners out of the stable.”

To set a crude financial ceiling and leave the selection of strategy and design of forces wholly to bargaining among the services is frequently regarded as an invitation to aimlessness. An obvious and tempting remedy is to compel the services to conform to a single, coherent and supposedly economical strategic doctrine. This solution carries its own risks of neglecting important aspects of the total problem and of discouraging flexible response to experience. Such a risk is especially serious in a field, such as military policy in peacetime, where there can rarely be conclusive practical tests of policy. Thus the more one searches for comprehensive strategic answers, the more important it is to enquire whether strategic ideas are debated in a market wide and open enough to offer every possible assurance of conceiving and evaluating alternatives. The recent course of British policy is of interest in this respect.
Positive Liberty, 1880–1914
Authors: Nicholls David
Published: May 2006

It would not, I think, be entirely misleading to suggest that doctrines of laissez faire and attacks upon reasoned state intervention in political and social life have tended to emanate from two extremes in social philosophy—ultra individualism and an extreme organicism. In the first case, and we may take Locke as an example, society is made up of a heap of individuals who came together to form the state for the limited purpose of the protection of property. Man is not seen as a part of a larger whole, influenced by the structure of that whole, but as an isolated individual; thus any state interference beyond the protection of property is viewed as a restriction of individual liberty. On the other hand are thinkers who regard society as such a complicated and delicate organism that they can only—and governments should only—sit back and gasp at the complexity of it all. Any attempt to improve one aspect will affect the balance of the whole in ways impossible to predict. It is difficult to point to a pure instance of this opinion, but this is the impression left with the reader after perusing such works as Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France, Hegel's Philosophy of Right, Bradley's Ethical Studies and the works of some more modern conservatives. All that governments can be expected to do is to prevent the worst collisions and any attempt to pursue a positive policy is doomed to failure.
Public Opinion and the War in Vietnam
Authors: Verba Sidney , Brody Richard A. , Parker Edwin B. , Nie Norman H. , Polsby Nelson W. , Ekman Paul , Black Gordon S.
Published: May 2006

Foreign policy seems to command more public attention than domestic policy and yet—insofar as it has been, researched—public opinion on foreign policy seems to have less impact on governmental decisions than does opinion in most other issue areas. There are at least two reasons, one normative and one empirical, why public opinion can be regarded as pertinent to some foreign policy questions—especially those associated with “life and death.” Normatively, it is desirable for political leaders in a democracy to commit national resources in ways generally approved by the populace. Large scale military commtiments should, if at all possible, meet with the approval of public opinion. Empirically, if they do not, experience has shown there are circumstances in which public disapproval of the course of foreign policy may be registered in national elections. Specifically, our one recent experience with a situation of partial mobilization and a limited but large-scale and indefinite commitment to military action in Korea did in time produce a distribution of opinion that suggested the war was very unpopular. And though its precise impact on the 1952 presidential election is difficult to assess there is little doubt that the Korean issue contributed significantly to the Eisenhower landslide.

Among the questions raised by the Korean experience is whether the American public will easily tolerate the prosecution of long drawn-out wars of partial mobilization. Therefore, it is not surprising that another such war, in Vietnam, has stimulated a concern with public opinion.
Corruption and Political Development: A Cost-Benefit Analysis
Authors: Nye J. S.
Published: May 2006

“Private Vices by the dextrous Management of a skillful Politician may be turned into Publick Benefits.”

—Bernard Mandeville, 1714

Corruption, some say, is endemic in all governments. Yet it has received remarkably little attention from students of government. Not only is the study of corruption prone to moralism, but it involves one of those aspects of government in which the interests of the politician and the political scientist are likely to conflict. It would probably be rather difficult to obtain (by honest means) a visa to a developing country which is to be the subject of a corruption study.

One of the first charges levelled at the previous regime by the leaders of the coup in the less developed country is “corruption.” And generally the charge is accurate. One type of reaction to this among observers is highly moralistic and tends to see corruption as evil. “Throughout the fabric of public life in newly independent States,” we are told in a recent work on the subject, “runs the scarlet thread of bribery and corruption …” which is like a weed suffocating better plants. Another description of new states informs us that “corruption and nepotism rot good intentions and retard progressive policies.”

Others have reacted against this moralistic approach and warn us that we must beware of basing our beliefs about the cause of coups on post-coup rationalizations, and also of judging the social consequences of an act from the motives of the individuals performing it. Under some circumstances Mandeville is right that private vice can cause public benefit.
Representational Role Types: A Research Note
Authors: Meller Norman
Published: May 2006

As part of their state legislative research project, Professors Wahlke, Eulau, Buchanan, and Ferguson subjected Edmund Burke's classical phrasing of the dilemma of representation to an empirical examination. Burke postulated the style of representation in terms of either-or: the legislator is either a mere spokesman for his constituents or he represents them as he believes best. The 4-state survey findings did not bear Burke out; rather, they disclosed a trichotomy, three major representational role types, with a classification of “Politico” appearing along with “Delegate” and “Trustee.” The Politico expresses an overlap of both orientations, so that representative types can be conceived of along a continuum, rather than constituting two polar positions, with the Politico placed toward the mid-point. In numerical frequency, as well, the Politico type was also found to fall between the other two. Left to be determined is the universality of the 4-state formulation of representational roles.

Over the last decade I have periodically observed the evolution of legislatures functioning in the American-administered regions of the Pacific. Here are to be found a number of under-developed societies, or to employ a more informative description, distinctive cultures in transitional status adapting introduced political forms to customary political practices. These traditional practices are fundamentally premised upon the resolving of differences through the reaching of consensus for taking political action.
Public-Regardingness as a Value Premise in Voting Behavior
Authors: Wilson James Q. , Banfield Edward C.
Published: May 2006

Our concern here is with the nature of the individual's attachment to the body politic and, more particularly, with the value premises underlying the choices made by certain classes of voters. Our hypothesis is that some classes of voters (provisionally defined as “subcultures” constituted on ethnic and income lines) are more disposed than others to rest their choices on some conception of “the public interest” or the “welfare of the community.” To say the same thing in another way, the voting behavior of some classes tends to be more public-regarding and less private- (self- or family-) regarding than that of others. To test this hypothesis it is necessary to examine voting behavior in situations where one can say that a certain vote could not have been private-regarding. Local bond and other expenditure referenda present such situations: it is sometimes possible to say that a vote in favor of a particular expenditure proposal is incompatible with a certain voter's self-interest narrowly conceived. If the voter nevertheless casts such a vote and if there is evidence that his vote was not in some sense irrational or accidental, then it must be presumed that his action was based on some conception of “the public interest.”
A Theory of the Calculus of Voting
Authors: Riker William H. , Ordeshook Peter C.
Published: May 2006

Much recent theorizing about the utility of voting concludes that voting is an irrational act in that it usually costs more to vote than one can expect to get in return.1 This conclusion is doubtless disconcerting ideologically to democrats; but ideological embarrassment is not our interest here. Rather we are concerned with an apparent paradox in the theory. The writers who constructed these analyses were engaged in an endeavor to explain political behavior with a calculus of rational choice; yet they were led by their argument to the conclusion that voting, the fundamental political act, is typically irrational. We find this conflict between purpose and conclusion bizarre but not nearly so bizarre as a non-explanatory theory: The function of theory is to explain behavior and it is certainly no explanation to assign a sizeable part of politics to the mysterious and inexplicable world of the irrational.2 This essay is, therefore, an effort to reinterpret the voting calculus so that it can fit comfortably into a rationalistic theory of political behavior. We describe a calculus of voting from which one infers that it is reasonable for those who vote to do so and also that it is equally reasonable for those who do not vote not to do so. Furthermore we present empirical evidence that citizens actually behave as if they employed this calculus.3
Communism and Economic Development
Authors: Benjamin Roger W. , Kautsky John H.
Published: May 2006

One of the major efforts of students of comparative politics in recent years has been directed at establishing, more or less systematically, relationships between economic development and political change. Much of the literature in this area, perhaps because of its stated or unstated value and policy orientation, has been concerned with the conditions and the prospects for democracy. In the present article, we attempt to correlate economic development with another phenomenon of political change, that of Communism and, more specifically, the strength of Communist parties.

We begin with the hypothesis that the relationship between economic development and Communist party strength is curvilinear. In underdeveloped countries—and these included all Communist-ruled countries at the time the Communist party came to power except East Germany and the Czech sections of Czechoslovakia—Communist parties may be regarded as merely one variety of the modernizing movements that evolved in these countries in response to the impact of Western industrialism.
The Institutionalization of the U.S. House of Representatives
Authors: Polsby Nelson W.
Published: May 2006

Most people who study politics are in general agreement, it seems to me, on at least two propositions. First, we agree that for a political system to be viable, for it to succeed in performing tasks of authoritative resource allocation, problem solving, conflict settlement, and so on, in behalf of a population of any substantial size, it must be institutionalized. That is to say, organizations must be created and sustained that are specialized to political activity. Otherwise, the political system is likely to be unstable, weak, and incapable of servicing the demands or protecting the interests of its constituent groups. Secondly, it is generally agreed that for a political system to be in some sense free and democratic, means must be found for institutionalizing representativeness with all the diversity that this implies, and for legitimizing yet at the same time containing political opposition within the system.
Image of a President: Some Insights into the Political Views of School Children*
Authors: Sigel Roberta S.
Published: May 2006

The map of the child's political world is slowly beginning to be filled in. The areas best filled in so far are his view of certain government officials (President, judges, policemen, etc.) and his understanding (or lack of understanding) of the operation of specific political institutions (legislatures, parties, etc.). Of all persons in government none is as well known as the President of the United States. Even at an early age children know his name and even his party affiliation. Best documented so far is the nature of the child's affection for the President. Apparently he enjoys the child's deep respect, admiration, loyalty, and even love. Some scholars have gone so far as to imply that he symbolizes nation, leadership, and father all in one. This being the case, it seems imperative that we ask: Is the President merely a symbol of leadership who will be loved irrespective of the political stands he takes, or is he seen as a genuine political figure who stands for specific political principles, legislation, etc.?
Political Ethos and the Structure of City Government
Authors: Wolfinger Raymond E. , Osgood Field John
Published: May 2006

For years specialists in local politics have deplored the anecdotal quality of literature in the field and have called for theoretically-based comparative research. One of the most stimulating and ambitious attempts in this direction is Edward C. Banfield and James Q. Wilson's theory of “public-regardingness” and “private-regardingness,” which states that much of what Americans think about the political world can be subsumed under one or the other of these conflicting orientations and that the prevalence of one ethos over the other influences the style, structure, and outcome of local politics. Banfield and Wilson attribute these two ethics to different elements in the population and hypothesize that a number of political forms and policies are manifestations of each ethos. We intend to examine the associations between these hypothesized consequences and the demographic characteristics that are said to be the bases of the two ethics.
Violence in Pre-Modern Societies: Rural Colombia
Authors: Weinert Richard S.
Published: May 2006

Violence is a common phenomenon in developing polities which has received little attention. Clearly a Peronist riot in Buenos Aires, a land invasion in Lima, and a massacre in rural Colombia are all different. Yet we have no typology which relates types of violence to stages or patterns of economic or social development. We know little of the causes, incidence or functions of different forms of violence. This article is an effort to understand one type of violence which can occur in societies in transition.

Violence in Colombia has traditionally accompanied transfers of power at the national level. This can account for its outbreak in 1946, when the Conservative Party replaced the Liberals. It cannot account for the intensity or duration of rural violence for two decades. This article focuses primarily on the violence from 1946 to 1953, and explains its intensification and duration as the defense of a traditional sacred order against secular modernizing tendencies undermining that order. We shall discuss violence since 1953 in the concluding section.
Nondecisions and the Study of Local Politics
Authors: Wolfinger Raymond E.
Published: May 2006

The widely cited concept of nondecisions is particularly prominent in criticisms of “pluralist” research on local politics. But no scholars, including those who introduced the notion of nondecisions, have done empirical research explicitly on this topic. The lack of research on nondecisions reflects the concept's weaknesses as a guide to field research: (1) It involves a number of unrealistic assumptions about political life. (2) It requires data that are difficult to gather or wholly unobtainable. (3) Even the data that can be collected do not provide a basis for sensible conclusions about the distribution of political power.

The impracticability of research on nondecisions is not a serious setback for political science, however, for most of its specific component ideas, such as the policy consequences of different governmental forms or the impact of political socialization, are being studied without reference to the notion of nondecisions. Judged by its utility for empirical research, then, the idea of nondecisions appears to be superfluous. The same might be said of the notion of “power structures.”