bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Policy and Priority in the Budgetary Process
Authors: Natchez Peter B. , Bupp Irvin C.
Published: May 2006

Recent quantitative studies vastly understate the political conflicts and policy choices that are embedded in the budgetary process. The reason for this lies in the way these quantitative studies have organized budgetary data. Thus far the units of analysis have been federal agencies, the administrative categories of government. The “striking regularities” that have been reported reflect—quite accurately—the great stability of the administrative structure of government. However, these categories do not describe the intense competition between programs and policies that takes place within the framework. We argue, further, that the entire metaphor of an inert bureaucratic machine doing this year essentially what it did last year is erroneous. Rather, priority setting in the federal bureaucracy more resembles the market situation of nineteenth century capitalism where aggressive “policy entrepreneurs,” unequal in talent and resources, struggle to build and sustain support for their programs. The competition between policies is both reflected in and promoted by the budgetary process. By shifting the units of analysis to programs and transforming these data so that programs of different size are commensurate, we develop an index that reflects the relative growth and decay of programs as they compete for budgetary resources.
Urbanization and Political Participation: The Case of Japan
Authors: Richardson Bradley M.
Published: May 2006

Research has shown that place of residence (urban-rural) has an ambiguous influence on political participation. Japan is one of several major nations in which rural people participate politically more than their urban counterparts. An analysis of urban-rural political attitudes in Japan shows some of the roots of the tendencies in participation. While urban residents are more psychologically involved in national politics, they also tend toward greater pessimism and have lower feelings of the vote being a duty than do their rural counterparts. In contrast, rural voters are highly dutiful in orientation, as well as being strongly involved in local politics and more concerned than urban residents about having their political needs represented. A Coleman effect parameter analysis of the urban-rural attitudes and political participation shows that the attitudes do in fact account for differences in political participation in local politics. But the attitudinal tendencies are less important for national political participation, and it is possible that the older social influence interpretation of Japanese urban-rural differences is most applicable to sectoral trends in this case.
Inequality, Social Comparison, and Relative Deprivation
Authors: Panning William H.
Published: May 2006

In this article I present a formal model of relative deprivation and demonstrate its implications concerning the relationship between inequality and political instability. The model, which is based on assumptions similar to those of Nagel (1974), implies that the relationship of instability to inequality can be either curvilinear, as Nagel found, or linear, as Russett (1964) found, although under different conditions. In both cases the model implies that reducing inequality reduces the level of relative deprivation, thereby enhancing the prospect for political stability. However, changes in the tendency of individuals to compare their lot with that of others can also substantially affect the level of relative deprivation in a society.
Neo-Pluralism: A Class Analysis of Pluralism I and Pluralism II
Authors: Manley John F.
Published: May 2006

This article is a critique of contemporary pluralist theory as found largely in the work of Robert A. Dahl and Charles E. Lindblom. Two different forms of pluralism are distinguished and compared critically with Marxist class analysis. Pluralism, it is argued, fails to account for the reality of political and economic inequality in the United States. As a theory, pluralism is also marked by increasing tension between the underlying values and the performance of American polyarchy. The overall result is that pluralism's utility as a description and explanation of the American political economy is called into serious doubt, and a case is made for the explanatory superiority of class analysis.
Voting through the Looking Glass
Authors: Goodin Robert E.
Published: May 2006

Political candidates embody possibilities as well as preferences. To some extent, their possibilities vary systematically and inversely with their preferences. Political systems often have built-in “stops” preventing left-wing candidates from doing things too far to the left of their declared positions and vice versa. The preferences of right-wing candidates make them unlikely to want to pursue policies on the far left, but at least the opportunity to do so is available to them in a way that may be denied to left-wingers themselves. Taking differential possibilities into account, it might prove instrumentaily rational to vote perversely for the right-wing candidate if you really want left-wing results and vice versa. This article sketches conditions under which that proposition will hold true, shows those conditions are empirically plausible, and suggests that politicians themselves are alive to these possibilities. This awareness should make us much more cautious in reading any policy-specific mandates into electoral outcomes. It may even make us doubt the model of instrumental rationality itself.
Rawls's Theory of Justice
Authors: Chapman John W.
Published: May 2006

John Rawls's theory of justice is best understood as an attempt to adapt Rousseau's theory of the general will to the modern liberal democratic state. Central to the theory is a belief in the rationality of human nature and dynamics. In a well-ordered society men's natural sentiments will prove to be both unified and stable, and they will not permit morally arbitrary advantages to influence their social arrangements. Rawls's theory offers a rational accommodation of freedom and equality. His philosophical perspective opens him to the charge that his theory slights the historical dimension of human justice. His conception of human personality is somewhat ambiguous. There is incongruity between his ethical theory and the realities of democratic politics. Nevertheless, Rawls's formulation of the moral and political principles of liberalism is a major achievement and entirely worthy of his intellectual ancestry
Political Processes and Public Expenditures: A Re-examination Based on Theories of Representative Government
Authors: Godwin R. Kenneth , Shepard W. Bruce
Published: May 2006

Studies attempting to predict public expenditures using political variables have generally incorrectly assumed that political, like socioeconomic, variables function as determinants of policy levels and types. If one assumes, however, that the function of the political process in representative government is to translate citizens' demands for various levels of services as accurately as possible, then political variables must be conceptualized as mediating in character. In the absence of knowledge of whether public services are being oversupplied or undersupplied in relation to citizen demands, the effects of political variables can therefore, be better tested by moving beyond single-equation regression models.

An alternative method for examining impacts of political variables is presented by integrating them with conventional theories of political representation. This leads to a concept of “translation error,” and ways of examining relationships between this concept and political variables are explicated. Finally, the greater theoretical utility of this reformulation for the study of public policy is examined, and empirical studies which indicate its validity are cited.
Explaining Party Cohesion in Congress: The Case of Shared Policy Attitudes
Authors: Norpoth Helmut
Published: May 2006

Partisanship has often been noted as one of the most conspicuous factors in legislative voting in the U.S. Congress. This paper attempts to trace party voting to shared policy goals. After the mean attitudes of congressmen belonging to the same party were ascertained for a number of policy domains, the effect of mean party attitudes on roll-call voting was estimated by regression analysis, taking into account the deviation of individual congressmen from their respective mean party attitudes. The results demonstrate that in all three policy domains examined, i.e., social welfare, civil rights, and foreign policy, shared party attitudes leave a strong imprint on individual roll-call decisions. The voting decisions of congressmen, in fact, are found to owe more to the shared party attitudes than to their own individual attitudes. The paper also explores the communication process through which shared policy attitudes are translated within Congress into partisan roll-call votes and points to a way of reconciling the “predispositional” and the “interactional” approach to legislative decision making.
Mobilized and Proletarian Diasporas
Authors: Armstrong John A.
Published: May 2006

Using an exchange model, this article examines two ethnic groups, mobilized and proletarian diasporas, in a broad range of modernizing polities. The salient dimensions of myth, communications networks, and role differentiation permit one to distinguish these groups analytically over a long time period, and to subdivide the mobilized diasporas into archetypal diasporas and situational diasporas. The latter are politically detached elements of a great society, whereas the “homeland” of the archetypal diaspora is symbolically significant as a major component of the diaspora's sacral myth. Because internal resentments and the pressures of the international environment tend to undermine the value of a diaspora to the dominant elite of a slowly and unevenly modernizing multiethnic polity, these polities (Russia and the Ottoman Empire are examined closely) exhibit a succession of mobilized diasporas. Rapidly modernizing polities, on the other hand, tolerate mobilized diasporas, but turn increasingly for their unskilled, transient labor to groups which are more distant culturally and in physical appearance from the dominant ethnic group, and which, therefore, are increasingly disadvantaged and restive.
Generational Change and the Decline of Party Identification in America: 1952–1974
Authors: Abramson Paul R.
Published: May 2006

A large and growing proportion of Americans claims to be neither Republican nor Democratic, and partisan independence is most wide-spread among young adults. A time-series cohort analysis of eleven surveys conducted by the Survey Research Center of the University of Michigan between 1952 and 1974 strongly suggests that the low level of partisan identification among young adults results largely from fundamental differences between their socialization and that of their elders. The overall decline in party identification results largely from generational change. High levels of partisan identification persist among persons who entered the electorate before World War II, but among those who entered the electorate more recently levels of identification are low. The analysis strongly suggests that overall levels of party identification will continue to decline, and permits examination of one process by which party loyalties among mass electorates gradually are transformed.
Local Autonomy in China During the Cultural Revolution: The Theoretical Uses of an Atypical Case
Authors: White Lynn T.
Published: May 2006

This article explores the extent to which Shanghai City, and its subordinate units, have been politically independent of higher authorities in the Chinese government. Evidence from the ‘fifties and early’ sixties suggests increasing managerial and cultural independence at the city level. Evidence from the early Cultural Revolution however suggests conceptual problems in the connection of usual notions of “autonomy” with substantive issue areas, and in their connection with local and central patterns of factions. The slow reconstruction of a local Party hierarchy in Shanghai was paralleled by a decentralization of some commercial and industrial decisions. Shanghai's role as a model in Party rebuilding increased the fully national role of the city's top leadership. Analysis of autonomy, power, or dependence in administrative units is affected when strong local leaders acquire national ambitions. Suggestions are made about the characteristics of an organization these words might describe.
Social Mobilization and the Russification of Soviet Nationalities
Authors: Silver Brian
Published: May 2006

This paper examines certain major demographic bases of ethnic identity change among the mass populations of the non-Russian nationalities of the USSR. Ethnic identity is defined here as an individual's affective attachment to certain core symbols of his nationality group: the group name and its historic language. The hypotheses tested concern the impact of social mobilization, contact with Russians, and traditional religion on ethnic identity change. The levels of Russification of 46 indigenous nationalities whose official national homelands have Autonomous Oblast status or higher are examined on the basis of 1959 Soviet census materials. By use of regression analysis it is shown that: (a) social mobilization is strongly conducive to the Russification of non-Russian nationalities residing in their official areas; (b) exposure to Russians is conducive to the Russification of both mobilized and unmobilized local populations, but the Russification effect of exposure to Russians is much smaller for the unmobilized than for the mobilized populations; (c) even where exposure to Russians is extensive and enduring, both socially mobilized and unmobilized Muslim ethnic groups are much less likely to be Russified than non-Muslims; it is proposed that a Muslim ethnic ideology mediates between the dynamic demographic influences on Russification and the actual manifestation of Russification.
The Theory of Political Ambiguity
Authors: Page Benjamin I.
Published: May 2006

The ambiguity of politicians' words and actions is sometimes attributed to rational seeking of support or votes. Such an explanation must clearly specify the preferences and decision processes among constituents and the calculations by politicians which make ambiguity seem attractive.

The leading effort of this sort is Shepsle's lottery theory, in which politicians take probabilistic stands on issues in order to appeal to risk acceptant, expected-utility-maximizing voters. But the lottery theory suffers from several difficulties. Its predictions are not strong; it can at best account for only certain kinds of observed ambiguous behavior; its main condition for the prediction of ambiguity—risk acceptance among constituents—may not be met; and the expected utility model of risky decision making is not well supported by available evidence.

An emphasis allocation theory is suggested as an alternative. According to it, ambiguity involves an effort to reduce the salience of conflictual matters (such as specific policy alternatives) in the evaluation of politicians, so that attention will be paid to consensual appeals (peace, prosperity, honesty in government).
The Influence of Parents on the Political Attitudes of Adolescents
Authors: Tedin Kent L.
Published: May 2006

The purpose of this paper is to specify the conditions in which parents influence the party identification and certain issue attitudes of their adolescent children (recent high school graduates). The nature and extent of the parent-adolescent attitude correspondence is first established. Next, parental as opposed to environmental explanations for this correspondence are considered. Finally, the effects on parental influence of family interaction, political interest, issue salience to the parent, and accuracy of the adolescent's perception of the parental attitude are analyzed. Issue salience and perceptual accuracy are found to have strong effects; the other variables have lesser or no effect. When issue salience and perceptual accuracy are held constant in a multivariate equation, the beta weights indicating the influence of the parent attitude on the attitude of the adolescent are very similar for all issues and party identification. It is concluded that idiosyncratic variations in successful parent-child attitude transmission can be explained by a general equation.
Levels of Sociocultural Development Among Soviet Nationalities: A Partial Test of the Equalization Hypothesis
Authors: Silver Brian
Published: May 2006

Recent studies of regional economic development of the Soviet Union have suggested that since 1958, Soviet union republics have become less equal in their levels of industrialization, share of investments, and living standards. This paper assesses the degree to which equality of social and cultural development characterizes Soviet ethnic groups and union republics. Drawing aggregate data chiefly from the 1926, 1959, and 1970 Soviet censuses, the analysis shows that: (1) relative variation (inequality) in the sociocultural development of Soviet nationalities has declined continuously and markedly over time on measures of education and occupational structure, but that large inter-nationality disparities remain in the development of skilled manpower; (2) inter-nationality variation in family role structures has been slower to decline than differences in education and appears to follow a curvilinear pattern: for a time during the Soviet era, inter-nationality differencesincreasedbut have been followed recently by significant declines. Furthermore, it is shown that (3) on the average the sociocultural development of union republic populations well exceeds the development of the indigenous nationalities in these republics.
Collective Choice, Separation of Issues and Vote Trading
Authors: Schwartz Thomas
Published: May 2006

In legislatures and committees, a number of issues are voted on separately, leading to an outcome consisting of positions on each of these issues. I investigate the effects this separation of issues has on collective choices, assuming a very abstract collective choice model, whose assumptions are presupposed by many less abstract models, notably spatial models. Assuming the model, if there exists an undominated outcome (one to which no winning coalition prefers any other feasible outcome), it must be chosen in the absence of vote trading, although vote trading can (perversely) lead to a very different outcome. But vote trading does not necessarily lead to a “voting paradox” situation, contrary to several recent papers. The model enables us to define a natural solution concept for the case where every feasible outcome is dominated. Variations on this concept are explored. The effects of weakening the model are investigated.
The Supreme Court and National Policy Making
Authors: Casper Jonathan D.
Published: May 2006

The role of the Supreme Court of the United States in national policy making has long been a subject of debate among students of the American legal system and of democratic theory. Both the relative influence of the Court vis-à-vis other political institutions and the implications of judicial review for principles of majority rule and democracy have been central to this discussion. Perhaps the most influential account of the role of the Court offered in recent years is Robert A. Dahl's 1957 article, “Decision-Making in a Democracy: The Role of the Supreme Court in National Policy-Making.” Dahl argues that the Court, like other political institutions, is a member of the stable ruling coalitions that dominate American politics, and that its decisions are generally supportive of the policies emerging from other political institutions.

Consideration of the way Dahl interprets his own evidence, of Court decisions since 1957, and of other relevant evidence that is excluded from his analysis (particularly the activities of the Court in statutory construction and in cases arising out of states and localities) suggests that the Court participates more significantly in national policy making than Dahl's argument admits.
Procedural Norms and Tolerance: A Reassessment
Authors: Lawrence David G.
Published: May 2006

This paper is both a criticism and extension of a small existing literature on procedural norms and tolerance which has been influential in several interpretations of American politics but which suffers from both conceptual and empirical shortcomings.

The existing literature concludes that tolerance is not widely distributed in the American mass public: unpopular groups such as Communists or atheists would not be allowed political activity by most Americans despite supposed acceptance by all of the principle of minority rights. The literature suggests that hostile attitudes towards the issue or group involved prevents application of the tolerant general norm in specific instances.

By failing to adequately measure or control for either issue orientation or general norms, however, the existing literature risks misrepresenting the actual extent and character of tolerance. This study discusses the weaknesses of the existing literature, describes how such weaknesses can be eliminated, and reports data which modify and expand the findings of past research for an updated set of issues, groups, and political acts.
Human Dignity, Human Rights, and Political Regimes
Authors: Howard Rhoda E. , Donnelly Jack
Published: May 2006

It is often argued that internationally recognized human rights are common to all cultural traditions and adaptable to a great variety of social structures and political regimes. Such arguments confuse human rights with human dignity. All societies possess conceptions of human dignity, but the conception of human dignity underlying international human rights standards requires a particular type of “liberal” regime. This conclusion is reached through a comparison of the social structures of ideal type liberal, minimal, traditional, communist, corporatist and developmental regimes and their impact on autonomy, equality, privacy, social conflict, and the definition of societal membership.
On the Possibility of Faithfully Representative Committees
Authors: Feld Scott L. , Grofman Bernard
Published: May 2006

By faithful representation we mean the delegation of decision making to a relatively small committee that, using a weighted voting rule, will for each pair of alternatives make sincere choices identical to those that would be made by the society as a whole, and with the same vote margins. We show that for any society, no matter how large, faithful representation is possible by a committee with no more than m(m − 1)/2 members, where m is the number of alternatives. We also show that for any society, no matter how nonideological the bulk of its electorate, social preferences can be faithfully represented by a committee whose members all have singlepeaked or single-troughed preferences. Thus, all societies can be faithfully represented by a committee whose members see the world in unidimensional terms—that is, representatives can share a coherent ideological perspective even though the electorates they represent lack such a perspective. We further show that the usual mechanisms of proportional representation and the modified form of proportional representation recently proposed by Chamberlin and Courant (1983) do not guarantee faithful representation, and we discuss mechanisms that may provide faithful representation, even in a context in which new alternatives can arise.
Institutional Structure and the Logic of Ongoing Collective Action
Authors: Bendor Jonathan , Mookherjee Dilip
Published: May 2006

Work by Axelrod, Hardin, and Taylor indicates that problems of repeated collective action may lessen if people use decentralized strategies of reciprocity to induce mutual cooperation. Hobbes's centralized solution may thus be overrated. We investigate these issues by representing ongoing collective action as an n-person repeated prisoner's dilemma. The results show that decentralized conditional cooperation can ease iterated collective action dilemmas—if all playersperfectlymonitor the relation between individual choices and group payoffs. Once monitoring uncertainty is introduced, such strategies degrade rapidly in value, and centrally administered selective incentives become relatively more valuable. Most importantly, we build on a suggestion of Herbert Simon by showing that a hierarchical structure, with reciprocity used in subunits and selective incentives centrally administered, combines the advantages of the decentralized and centralized solutions. This hierarchical form is more stable than the decentralized structure and often secures more cooperation than the centralized structure. Generally, the model shows that the logic of repeated decision making has significant implications for the institutional forms of collective action.
Agendas and the Control of Political Outcomes
Authors: Ordeshook Peter C. , Schwartz Thomas
Published: May 2006

A considerable theoretical literature argues that if everyone votes sincerely, then an agenda setter has near dictatorial influence on final outcomes, whereas if everyone votes strategically, then an agenda setter's power is considerably reduced. This literature assumes that all feasible agendas are of a special type called amendment agendas. But actual legislative and committee agendas—notably those found in Congress—often are not of this type. Once we expand the domain of feasible agendas to include all types allowed by common parliamentary practice, the influence of agendas on legislative outcomes expands, even with strategic voting. Besides showing with counterexamples that previous results do not extend to a more realistic domain of agendas, we prove some theorems that specify the limits (such as they are) of an agenda setter's power.
Regulatory Enforcement in a Federalist System
Authors: Scholz John T. , Wei Feng Heng
Published: May 2006

Federal agencies integrate federal, state, and local political demands at the operational level of service delivery. They balance conflicting political demands and task requirements as they attempt to develop feasible enforcement routines capable of attracting support and resources in multiple arenas without undermining central support for budgetary resources and statutory authority. Our regression analysis of annual enforcement data from 1976 through 1983 for all 50 states indicates that even the relatively isolated enforcement procedures of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration respond significantly to state-level political and task differences. Enforcement activities responded most consistently to daily enforcement contacts with interest groups. State differences in task conditions—particularly workplace accident and unemployment rates—also elicited instrumental responses, while differences in the party and ideology of elected officials elicited more symbolic actions. State agencies, with their smaller size and greater flexibility, were even more responsive than the federal agency to political and task differences. This integrative function of bureaucracy needs further attention in democratic theory.
Citizenship and the Right to Leave
Authors: Whelan Frederick G.
Published: May 2006

The right to leave one's country, in conjunction with the right to change one's nationality, both of which are proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), are examined in historical and philosophical perspective and with special reference to their implications for a theory of citizenship. These rights are novel elements in enumerations of fundamental rights, at variance with traditional conceptions of state sovereignty and with the practice of many slates, past and present. They are also rights which have not frequently been defended, and have often been denied, by political and legal philosophers, many of whom have defended stronger ties of allegiance and obligations between the citizen and the state than is evidently implied by the human rights doctrine. These rights are clearly grounded in basic liberal values of individual liberty and voluntarism; however, they represent extensions of these values beyond what was usually acknowledged in the classical liberal tradition.
The Structure of Class Conflict in Democratic Capitalist Societies
Authors: Przeworski Adam , Wallerstein Michael
Published: May 2006

The article presents a theory of class conflict between workers and capitalists who pursue their material interests under a form of societal organization that combines private ownership of instruments of production with representative political institutions. There exist economic and political conditions under which both classes would simultaneously choose courses of action that constitute a class compromise: workers consent to the institution of profit and capitalists to democratic institutions through which workers can effectively press claims for material gains. When these conditions hold and a compromise is in force, the role of the state consists in institutionalizing, coordinating, and enforcing the terms of a compromise that represents the preferences of workers as well as capitalists.
Rules of the Game in Britain: Can the Politicians Be Trusted?
Authors: Searing Donald D.
Published: May 2006

Politicians do not endorse rules of the game as reliably as is implied by traditional constitutional commentaries or by modern democratic theory. Interviews with Members of Parliament and candidates demonstrate that their views are deeply and systematically divided between alternative constitutional interpretations constructed upon foundations of party-political bias. Thus, attitudes towards nearly all rules of the game are powerfully shaped by political values such as authority and equality, values that differentiate views within as well as between the Conservative and labour parties. Similarly, patterns of support seem much affected by a disposition to boost norms that aid one's own party, depending on whether it is in Government or Opposition, and to downgrade norms that might aid political opponents. The article considers implications of these results for the viability of Britain's unwritten Constitution and for theories about the foundations of representative government.
Baby Books and Ballots: The Impact of Congressional Mail on Constituent Opinion
Authors: Cover Albert D. , Brumberg Bruce S.
Published: May 2006

Studies have shown that members of the U.S. Congress attempt to exploit many of the perquisites of office for their electoral advantage, but the actual impact of this exploitation has never been clear. Thus a potentially significant part of the advantage of incumbency has been subject to more speculation than analysis. This study develops a simple model that can be used to determine the electoral significance of perquisite use by officeholders. It begins by examining a particular perquisite, the franking privilege, to determine how it affects incumbent saliency and reputation among constituents. Within the context of an appropriate research design, the study finds that the distribution of government pamphlets does boost an incumbent's saliency while also creating a more positive evaluation of the incumbent. The saliency and evaluation effects erode over time, but this erosion can be mitigated through follow-up mailings. These results are incorporated into a model that is used to predict the electoral consequences of perquisite use. The model suggests that perquisites have their greatest impact in constituencies with a relatively small proportion of voters who identify with the incumbent's party.
Nationalization of the American Electorate
Authors: Claggett William , Flanigan William , Zingale Nancy
Published: May 2006

The conceptual meaning of and the empirical evidence for the nationalization of the American electorate is explored. Two conceptually distinct dimensions of nationalization are identified: nationlization in terms of a convergence in the level of partisan support across geographical subunits of the electorate, and nationalization in terms of a uniformity of response by geographical units to political forces. Empirical estimates for both types of nationalization are derived for the American electorate for the period from 1842 to 1970. Unlike previous scholars, we find no trend toward increasing nationalization of the vote. Possible reasons for this lack of nationalization of the vote are suggested.
Political and Mathematical Perspectives on Educational Equity
Authors: Miller Trudi C.
Published: May 2006

A selective review of the literature on equal educational opportunity supports an argument for explicit use of normative models in research. The argument has two parts. First, we show that confusion over the Coleman Report (1966) was due to a mismatch between the implied reform objective and the statistical approach. The objective was to reduce black/white differences in educational achievement, but the statistics explained individual differences in achievement. Second, we partly develop and apply a normative dynamic model of the objectives of school integration over time. Normative dynamic models could be used in conjunction with behavioral data to operationalize theoretical concepts such as accountability, symbolic politics and non-decisions.
The Costs of Major Wars: The Phoenix Factor
Authors: Organski A.F.K. , Kugler Jacek
Published: May 2006

A major unexplored area in the field of international politics is the consequences of major war for members of the international system in terms of power lost or gained. This paper explores these shifts of power among neutrals, winners, and losers as a result of these wars, using a sample of 32 cases and time series analysis. The findings register unexpected but systematic patterns after major conflicts; while winners and neutrals are affected marginally by the conflict, losers' powers are at first eroded. Over the long run (15–20 years), though, the effects of the loss dissipate; losers accelerate their recovery and soon resume antebellum status. It is this phenomenon that the authors call the phoenix factor.
National Elite and Local Politician in Taiwan
Authors: Lerman Arthur J.
Published: May 2006

In Taiwan, a national elite socialized to measure the behavior of others (but not its own behavior) against extremely high standards of morality finds itself offended by the apparently immoral behavior of local electoral politicians. With reference to similar situations in other developing countries, this article describes how the attitudes of Taiwan's national elite toward the political morality of others developed and why the electoral politicians act in a manner offensive to the elite's attitudes. As a postscript, the article discusses why the national elite has checked its desire to do away with Taiwan's offensive fledgling electoral system and expanded its scope instead.
Spatial Voting Models for the French Fifth Republic
Authors: Rosenthal Howard , Sen Subrata
Published: May 2006

In this study formal spatial models are applied to cross-sectional analysis of district results on the second ballot of French legislative elections. A model of probabilistic spatial voting better accounts for the data than either standard “ecological” models or a model of deterministic spatial voting. There are three substantive findings concerning voter behavior. First, the adjustment of voters to external information can be largely viewed as a shift in the spatial (Left-Right) distribution of voters. This shift, plus decisions by parties and candidates as to which districts parties will contest, determines the first ballot outcome. In arriving at second ballot choices, voters then appear to utilize decision rules that have a substantial degree of temporal stability. A second and related finding is that the second ballot can be reasonably accounted for by a single Left-Right dimension. Third, in those districts with three or more candidates on the second ballot, there may be substantial strategic voting with voters switching from candidates close to their ideal points but unlikely to win to more distant candidates who are more likely to win. The existence of strategic voting is suggested by the finding that models based solely on spatial preferences perform well for two-candidate districts, but less well for three- or four-candidate districts.
Public Goods, Private Interests, and Representation
Authors: Jackson John E. , King David C.
Published: May 2006

We estimate a model of House members' roll call voting decisions embodying some hypotheses about representation, including estimates of the influence of district opinion on broad collective issues relative to personal economic interests, of the effect of electoral security on constituency responsiveness, and of the difference in constituency and party voting among Republicans and Democrats. This model is estimated with votes taken during deliberations on the 1978 Tax Reform Act, important because it was a significant change from the tax reforms passed in the late 1960s and 1970s, marked the first appearance of the Kemp-Roth proposed tax cut, and represented a concerted effort by Republicans to make tax policy a broad national issue. Findings indicate that constituent preferences for redistribution are important influences on representatives' decisions and that Republicans exhibited a greater degree of party voting than the Democrats while the Democrats better represented their constituent's preferences.
Leadership Effects in Parliamentary Elections in Australia and Britain
Authors: Bean Clive , Mughan Anthony
Published: May 2006

Political party leaders are an increasingly influential electoral force in contemporary liberal democracies. We test the hypothesis that their appeal is idiosyncratic, that is, that their electoral effect is a function of the leadership qualities voters perceive individual candidates as possessing. Thus, the less similar their personality profiles, the more the characteristics influencing the vote should differ from one leader to another. A comparison of Australia and Britain finds the opposite to be the case. Despite the divergent profiles of party leaders, the precise characteristics influencing the vote are remarkably similar in the two countries. This does not mean, however, that variation in the distribution of these characteristics is unimportant. It can affect the balance of the party vote and may even have been the difference between victory and defeat for the Australian Labor party in the closely fought 1987 election.
Worker Insurgency, Radical Organization, and New Deal Labor Legislation
Authors: Goldfield Michael
Published: May 2006

Debates over the reasons for the passage of class legislation during the New Deal era have been of continuing interest to social scientists. Of special importance has been the problem of explaining the passage of the 1935 National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), often considered the most significant and radical bill of the period. In this article, I examine the influence of worker insurgency and radical organization on the passage and final form of the NLRA. I argue that other analytic approaches fail to take into account the importance of this influence and the degree to which it constrained and structured the responses of key political actors. I conclude that the theories that downplay the importance of worker insurgency and radical organization are both wrong in the particulars and suspect as general theories; this applies especially to the perspective that emphasizes the autonomy of the state from societal forces.
The Political Economy of State Medicaid Policy
Authors: Barrilleaux Charles J. , Miller Mark E.
Published: May 2006

We develop and test a market-based model to explain variations in states' welfare medicine policy decisions. The empirical results support the model of state policy outputs, indicating that states' spending efforts for welfare medicine are most sensitive to the supply of services within their borders. We learn in addition that spending effort declines with demand for services, indicating that the states spending the highest proportions of total personal income for the program are those who need it most and can afford it least. Measures of political system development affect spending effort positively and significantly, suggesting that ideology, diversity of interests, and administrative professionalism increase states' welfare efforts.
Presidential Prenomination Preferences and Candidate Evaluations
Authors: Kenney Patrick J. , Rice Tom W.
Published: May 2006

Recent research has altered our understanding of how voters select a candidate in U.S. presidential elections. Scholars have demonstrated empirically that issues, candidate personalities, candidate evaluations, and party identification interact in a dynamic simultaneous fashion to determine vote choice. Other researchers have shown that prenomination candidate preferences play an integral role in structuring the general election vote. We join together these two important trends to introduce and test a revised model of vote choice, using 1980 NES panel data. The results reconfirm that candidate selection is part of a dynamic simultaneous process and reveal for the first time that prenomination preferences are woven tightly into this causal web.
The Etiology of Partisan Competition
Authors: Patterson Samuel C. , Caldeira Gregory A.
Published: May 2006

In this inquiry, we focus upon the question, “Why are political parties more competitive in some states than they are in others?” We have measured partisan competition as the closeness between the two major political parties in the results of state-level elections, and we have chosen to analyze elections in American states in the 1970s. To account for variations among the states on the dimension of partisan competitiveness, we formulate and present four discrete lines of reasoning—including socio-demographics, urbanization, diversity, and the strength of party organizations. We test each of these avenues of explanation in turn, always taking into account the watershed between North and South in partisan competition. The results vindicate the utility of our general approach, although we do find that each of the four modes of explanation is wanting in some respect. In a full-blown multivariate context, we report that educational levels and urbanization do influence variations among states in partisan competition. Equally compelling and perhaps more interesting, the strength and activism of local party organizations in the states profoundly affect political competitiveness, even when we take stark regional differences into consideration.
The New Institutionalism: Organizational Factors in Political Life
Authors: March James G. , Olsen Johan P.
Published: May 2006

Contemporary theories of politics tend to portray politics as a reflection of society, political phenomena as the aggregate consequences of individual behavior, action as the result of choices based on calculated self-interest, history as efficient in reaching unique and appropriate outcomes, and decision making and the allocation of resources as the central foci of political life. Some recent theoretical thought in political science, however, blends elements of these theoretical styles into an older concern with institutions. This new institutionalism emphasizes the relative autonomy of political institutions, possibilities for inefficiency in history, and the importance of symbolic action to an understanding of politics. Such ideas have a reasonable empirical basis, but they are not characterized by powerful theoretical forms. Some directions for theoretical research may, however, be identified in institutionalist conceptions of political order.
Liberalism, Civic Humanism, and the Case of Adam Smith
Authors: Harpham Edward J.
Published: May 2006

In this article, I examine critically Donald Winch's interpretation of the politics of Adam Smith. I explain how Winch wrests Smith's political thought out of the larger vision of commercial society that is found in his moral, political, and economic writings, and how Winch misreads Smith's understanding of particular political problems such as the dehumanized workforce and the standing army. I also show how Winch's civic humanist reading of Smith's political thought fails to appreciate Smith's liberal conceptualizations of corruption and public-mindedness in a modern commercial society. Finally, I suggest that our failure to understand the politics of Adam Smith does not lie in our liberal interpretation of his work, as Winch claims, but in our understanding of what constitutes liberal political discourse.
Political Parties, Public Opinion, and State Policy in the United States
Authors: Erikson Robert S. , Wright Gerald C. , McIver John P.
Published: May 2006

When comparing states in the United States, one finds little correlation between state opinion and party control of the state legislature or between party control and state policy. Although these low correlations seeming to indicate that partisan politics is irrelevant to the representation process, the opposite is true. State opinion influences the ideological positions of state parties, and parties' responsiveness to state opinion helps to determine their electoral success. Moreover, parties move toward the center once in office. For these reasons, state electoral politics is largely responsible for the correlation between state opinion and state policy.
Personal Influence, Collective Rationality, and Mass Political Action
Authors: Finkel Steven E. , Muller Edward N. , Opp Karl-Dieter
Published: May 2006

We propose two models to explain why individuals participate in collective political action—a personal influence model and a collective rationality model. Each model overcomes the free-rider problem posed by conventional rational choice theory and left unresolved in previous research. The models are tested for legal and illegal protest behaviors, using data from a national sample and two samples of protest-prone communities in the Federal Republic of Germany. The personal influence model is supported for both forms of participation, while the collective rationality model is supported for legal protest. We discuss implications of the results for grievance and rational choice theories of collective political action.
Principal-Agent Models of Political Control of Bureaucracy
Authors: Cook Brian J. , Wood B. Dan
Published: May 2006

In the March 1988 issue of thisReview, B. Dan Wood invoked a principal-agent perspective to establish the importance of democratic hierarchies in shaping the outputs of public bureaucracies. He tested the model with air pollution enforcements of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) between 1977 and 1985. His results suggested some limitations on bureaucracies' responsiveness to elected political institutions, consistent with a principal-agent perspective with emphasis on the agent. Brian J. Cook challenges features of the design and empirical testing of Wood's hierarchical model. He questions the accuracy of Wood's characterization of the extent of EPA autonomy and power. Cook argues that a proper model requires recognition of the multiple principal nature of the U.S. system, and he advocates consideration of the normative foundations of principal-agent theory. Wood responds to both the substantive and methodological issues raised and suggests an eclectic approach in future research.