bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Gram-Negative and Gram-Positive Antibacterial Properties of the Whole Plant Extract of Willow Herb (Epilobium angustifolium)
Authors: Bartfay Wally J. , Bartfay Emma , Johnson Julia Green
Published: January 2011

The emergence of new pathogens and the increase in the number of multidrug-resistant strains in well-established pathogens during the past decade represent a growing public health concern globally. With the current lack of research and development of new antibiotics by large pharmaceutical companies due to poor financial returns, new alternatives need to be explored including natural herbal or plant-based extracts with reported antibacterial properties. Willow herb ( Epilobium angustifolium) preparations have been used in traditional aboriginal and folk medicine preparations externally as an antiphlogistic to treat prostate and gastrointestinal disorders and as an antiseptic to treat infected wounds. The authors hypothesized that a whole plant extract of willow herb would exhibit antimicrobial properties on a variety of both Gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria in culture. The authors found that, in comparison to growth controls, willow herb extract significantly inhibited the growth of Micrococcus luteus ( p < .01), Staphylococcus aureus ( p < .05), Escherichia coli ( p < .001), and Pseudomonas aeruginosa ( p < .001). They also found that willow herb extract inhibited the growth of bacteria in culture more effectively than vancomycin ( p < .05) or tetracycline ( p < .004). These results provide preliminary support for the traditional folkloric claim that the plant willow herb possesses antibacterial properties against a variety of gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria. Given that whole plant extract was utilized for this study, further investigations are warranted to determine which specific part of the plant (i.e., leaves, stem, roots, and flowers) possess the antibacterial properties.
Exploring multiple responses to a chaos narrative
Authors: Smith Brett , Sparkes Andrew C.
Published: January 2011

Narratives do things. This performative aspect of narrative includes calling on people for a response. This article explores the responses we have witnessed to a chaos narrative told to us by a disabled man that we then shared with different audiences over time. The following four types of response were identified: depression-therapy restitution stories; breakthrough restitution stories; social model stories; and solace stories. Each kind of response is focused on in detail, and their potentials and limitations are considered. The article does not promote one response over another, or seek the last word on the four responses, as the intention is to generate dialogue rather than to finalize. Future possibilities regarding narrative research and responding to stories are also considered.
Information behaviour of parents of children admitted to a neonatal intensive care unit: Constructing a conceptual framework
Authors: De Rouck Sofie , Leys Mark
Published: January 2011

This article explores the concepts ‘information behaviour’ and ‘illness trajectory’ at the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). On the basis of literature review and exploratory interviews with neonatologists and head nurses of Belgian NICUs a conceptual framework is presented. The ‘information behaviour’ of parents of infants admitted to a NICU is analytically divided into five dimensions: ways of getting information; interpersonal information sources; time-related issues; location of information transfer; and content of information. The conceptual framework equally takes the ‘illness trajectory’ into account. Following Corbin and Strauss the illness trajectory at a NICU is analysed in three sub-trajectories: disease course; healthcare trajectory; and sickness trajectory. By combining the respective categories of information behaviour and illness trajectory, an analytical tool is presented under the form of a classification matrix for scrutinizing the mediating role of the illness trajectory on the information behaviour of parents of infants admitted to a NICU.
On the meanings and experiences of living and dying in an Australian hospice
Authors: Broom Alex , Cavenagh John
Published: January 2011

Drawing on qualitative interviews with patients near death, in this article we explore people’s experiences of living and dying in a hospice in-patient unit. The results illustrate the tensions and complexities of entering into the hospice environment and how its character (i.e. people, interactions and spaces) shapes experiences near death.The results illustrate the hospice in-patient unit as playing a vitally important role in supporting the end of life, but also, the unique challenges this environment presents to individual well-being. Key themes emergent from the interviews were: loss of self and identity nostalgia; liminality and the home/help dialectic; and the performative elements of dying. To explore and unpack these processes, we draw together different facets of previous conceptual work in sociology, working towards a more nuanced conceptualization of the in-patient hospice experience.
Heal thyself: Dealing with trauma work - Gaza 2008/2009
Authors: Chaufan Claudia , Isa Khaleel
Published: January 2011

We report the case of a Palestinian American psychologist trained to work with psychologically traumatized patients, who consulted with one World Health Organization mental health practitioner assisting the people of Gaza during the Israeli invasion of December 2008. We describe the unresolved tension experienced by the consulting provider, between feelings of helplessness and horror associated with the attack and the drive to assist a client, in this case a colleague, a drive that characterizes the helping professions generally, and discuss ways to improve healthcare providers’ abilities to deal with trauma work. Our goal is to call attention to one overlooked health effect of the continuing military occupation of the Palestinian territories (oPT), that is, its impact on healthcare providers, by giving voice to these providers, and to elaborate on the limitations of existing categories and theoretical frameworks to conceptualize and address trauma work in the oPT and similar settings. This article is part of a broader project examining the implications of the ongoing military occupation of the Palestinian territories for health inequalities, health services, and public health infrastructure.
Why is gold valuable? Nature, social power and the value of things
Authors: Schoenberger Erica
Published: January 2011

The paper proposes a social history of the value of gold that stresses its connection to the acquisition, use and defense of social power. Gold’s natural scarcity has continually been reinforced by an artificial scarcity arising from how powerful groups have used it, but the ruling class monopoly of control has alternated with periods of more widespread social access. In one period, gold is very closely held by a small number of very high-status people, followed by a time, often related to war, when the distribution of gold is significantly expanded socially. Then gold is drawn back in to the center and is closely held once more. This pattern is evident in Antiquity and, surprisingly, the 20th century. The paper explores the way in which the value of things established under one social order may continue to inflect the perception of value in later periods.
The monad and the nomad: medical microbiology and the politics and possibilities of the mobile microbe
Authors: Attenborough Frederick
Published: January 2011

This paper is about the ontological politics and possibilities of the mobile microbe. It seeks to foreground a link that exists between current understandings of the mobile microbe and the conditions of possibility structuring the production of such a microbe in the medical microbiological sciences. When the microbial world is brought into the field of medical perception, it is a monadic microbe, isolated and alone, that appears. But why is this? Because out there, in the microbial world, things travel alone? Working through a case study of the 2003 severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak, this paper suggests not. That SARS was caused by one viral agent, a coronavirus (CoV), is now microbiological fact. But the argument here is that this fact is an effect; that various medical microbiological practices and interventions, whilst establishing the visibility of this monadic human coronavirus, were serving, at the same time, to suppress any possibility of a very different, and differently mobile, human coronavirus becoming similarly visible. And that is where the politics comes in. For if politics, the realm of the political, can be taken to arise in situations where various possibilities exist but not all possibilities can be chosen, then it follows that there is a politics bound up with the practical production of the mobile microbe in the medical microbiological sciences.
Skin, race and space: the clash of bodily schemas in Frantz Fanon’s Black Skins, White Masks and Nella Larsen’s Passing
Authors: Pile Steve
Published: January 2011

Nella Larsen’s novel Passing offers the opportunity to reconsider the relationship between race and space. The novel provides an account of space that is highly racialized. It describes 1920s Chicago as having heavily proscribed white and black spaces. However, race itself is far more uncertain. The novel’s two main characters, Irene and Clare, though black by blood in US American racial schematics, are both able to pass as white. Their skin colour renders their race ultimately unknowable: they can easily cross the borders between the white and the black world. By using Frantz Fanon’s notions of corporeal schemas and epidermal schemas, and by focusing on skin itself, it is possible to open up another way of seeing race and space in the novel. The paper argues that these bodily schemas ultimately clash, and come to grief, in the novel. Even so, this clash of bodily schemas enables a possible resolution to the problem of seeing the body either through black/ white grids of signification and power, or through their aggregation into phenotypes or races. In this view, bodily schemas may come to define race and space, but never exclusively in one way or another.
Racial narratives: Miskito and colono land struggles in the Honduran Mosquitia
Authors: Mollett Sharlene
Published: January 2011

This article examines the multiple ways race and racialized processes are embedded in Miskito Indian and ladino colono land struggles in Honduras. In the context of more than 30 years of state refusals to formalize the boundaries of Miskito ancestral territories, this article interrogates the ways in which the state accommodates ladino colono encroachments inside Miskito space. State and colono challenges to Miskito customary claims echo early post-colonial narratives of integration under the Civilization Program. Drawing from ethnographic accounts, this article illuminates how meanings and practices are intertwined in the way land use production and racial hierarchies are mutually constituted. Thus, I argue that Miskito, state and colono narratives of land struggle draw on, contest and reinvigorate a longstanding state nationalist project of ‘whitening’ where racial imaginaries are encoded in environmental arrangements and assessed through ascendant conceptions of suitable and unsuitable land use practices.
Policy Diffusion as a Geographical Expansion of the Scope of Political Conflict: Same-Sex Marriage Bans in the 1990s
Authors: Haider-Markel Donald P.
Published: January 2011

In 1996, more than half of the states considered legislation banning same-sex marriages. This article examines these events as a geographic expansion of the scope of the conflict rather than as traditional state-centered policy innovation. I argue that the diffusion of same-sex marriage bans was determined by the organized efforts of advocacy coalitions and internal state characteristics rather than by regional diffusion or communication among policy experts. I use state-level data collected from activists, media accounts, and official sources to establish the organized efforts to ban same-sex marriage. I then develop and empirically test a model of policy diffusion to predict both state consideration and adoption of policies banning same-sex marriage. The findings suggest that the diffusion of these policies is best explained by the presence of an organized national campaign by conservative religious groups, the local resources of interest groups, and other internal state characteristics rather than by regional diffusion patterns. I also find that the influence of state characteristics may vary during the policymaking process.
The Impact of Social Diversity and Racial Attitudes on Social Welfare Policy
Authors: Johnson Martin
Published: January 2011

Students of race and politics in the U.S. have long asserted a relationship between the racial composition and public policies of states. A related but distinct line of research demonstrates a strong connection between white attitudes about the perceived recipients of social welfare spending—blacks and members of other minority groups—and support for these programs. This article bridges these lines of scholarship by asking how racial diversity shapes aggregate attitudes about minorities in the American states and how these opinions in turn influence welfare spending. Using public opinion data from the General Social Survey (1974–96), I find that diversity has a direct influence on welfare policy in the states, as well as an indirect influence through shaping majority-group racial attitudes. Diversity and racial attitudes are found to have these effects even when controlling for factors traditionally used to explain variation in state spending levels, such as party competition, lower class mobilization, ideology, and state capacity.
Following a False Trail: The Hunt for White Backlash in Kentucky's 1996 Desegregation Vote
Authors: Voss D. Stephen , Miller Penny
Published: January 2011

We test the “white backlash” hypothesis—that white racial conservatism grows as black population density increases—using methods and data parallel to those upon which the concept was originally developed. A 1996 Kentucky referendum vote to strike school segregation from the state constitution serves as a rare measure of “old-fashioned racism.” We estimate the white vote for segregation using ecological inference techniques, and show that the county-level pattern of white segregationist support for this referendum actually runs in the opposite direction from that predicted by the backlash hypothesis. Precinct-level Kentucky analysis and county-level analysis of a related South Carolina referendum validate our finding against the white backlash hypothesis. We conclude that the frequent failure of recent research to find white backlash, especially among urban voters, therefore cannot be explained away by the absence of measures of old-fashioned racism. Rather, the geographical pattern of American racial conservatism seems to have changed since the successes of the Civil Rights movement.
Placing State Supreme Courts in State Politics
Authors: Brace Paul , Hall Melinda Gann , Langer Laura
Published: January 2011

This essay places state supreme courts in state politics by tracking some of the major lines of research on these important institutions, documenting the importance of state supreme courts, and illustrating important variations among state supreme courts on a host of factors, including docket composition, the exercise of judicial review, litigant patterns, and turnover rates. Through analyses of original data on separation-of-powers relationships in the abortion controversy, it also provides a brief empirical demonstration of how courts influence and are influenced by the political and policy processes operating in the states, and how comparative research helps resolve fundamental controversies in political science. We conclude that there is a remarkable and unfortunate asymmetry between the political importance of state supreme courts and the attention given to them by the research community. Moreover, by capitalizing on the analytical advantages of comparative state judicial politics scholarship, scholars will be able to solve some of the most complex puzzles in the study of state politics.
The Politics of Torts: Explaining Litigation Rates in the American States
Authors: Yates Jeff , Davis Belinda Creel , Glick Henry R.
Published: January 2011

Debate rages over whether Americans have become enormously litigious, but little research considers why Americans file cases in the first place or adequately considers rates of litigation over time. This article examines tort filings in ten representative states over a 20-year period and analyzes the impact of social, political, policy, and legal system factors that may account for case filings. We find that filing rates vary substantially over time within individual states, which adds to cautions about claims of general litigiousness. Our analysis also demonstrates that social complexity, opportunities for political participation, and social policy are the most important explanations for variations in filing rates. The tendency of Americans to use the courts to resolve disputes is related to the milieu in which they live and how the political system responds to demands for participation and social support.
Street-level Bureaucrats, Administrative Power and the Manipulation of Federal Social Security Disability Programs
Authors: Keiser Lael R.
Published: January 2011

The implementation of federal programs provides an opportunity for state officials to impose their own interests on the policy process. The federal government delegates administrative power to the states to implement federal programs. Because elected state officials serve as one of the principals to street-level bureaucrats, these officials should be able to influence these street-level agents to implement policy to further state needs. However, very little research has examined whether street-level bureaucrats act strategically to benefit state interests as they implement policy. In this article, I use Seemingly Unrelated Regression analysis to examine variation in award rates across the 50 states in two federal disability programs, SSI and SSDI. My findings reveal that program incentives lead state street-level bureaucrats to act strategically in implementing these programs. State bureaucrats reduce access to federal programs when state governments incur costs associated with those programs, especially under conditions of fiscal stress.
Moderating Backlash: Racial Mobilization, Partisan Coalitions, and Public Policy in the American States
Authors: Krueger Brian S. , Mueller Paul D.
Published: January 2011

In general, state public policy responds positively to increased electoral participation among social groups. However, consistent with the racial threat hypothesis, this pattern appears to reverse itself for African Americans: as blacks turn out in greater proportions they actually incur decreasing policy responsiveness. Another research tradition suggests that political parties play a crucial mediating role between interests and government. Thus, African Americans may be able to counter this backlash effect by increasing their participation in the Democratic partisan coalition. Using a variety of pooled time series techniques, we demonstrate the general robustness of the racial backlash model but find that when African Americans increase their contribution to the Democratic coalition, state policy responds better to their interests. This result demonstrates the centrality of parties for democratic responsiveness.
The Impact of State Campaign Finance Laws
Authors: Gross Donald A. , Goidel Robert K.
Published: January 2011

We compare spending in concurrent senate and gubernatorial elections to determine if campaign finance laws influence candidate campaign spending. We find that candidate-based public financing combined with spending limits influence candidate spending, but the effect is largely dependent on the level of the limits. We find that contribution limits do not influence candidate spending. If the goal of reform is to reduce candidate spending—or to affect electoral competition or voter turnout by reducing candidate spending—our results suggest that state public financing is more likely to be successful than contributions limits.
Misreport of Vote Choice in U.S. Senate and Gubernatorial Elections
Authors: Carsey Thomas M. , Jackson Robert A.
Published: January 2011

Previous research has found strong evidence of a pro-winner vote misreport bias in the National Election Studies (NES). We extend this research by examining the reported vote for U.S. senator and governor in the 1990, 1992, and 1994 NES and in the 1990 and 1992 Senate Election Studies (SES). We find continuing evidence of a pro-winner misreport problem. In contrast, we uncover no significant pro-winner bias in state exit polls conducted by the media. We test two commonly asserted explanations of the source of this misreport bias, but find no evidence that the problem is related either to the number of days between the election and the survey interview or to incumbency. Finally, we test a model of the misreport process that suggests that less politically engaged and less politically sophisticated voters are most likely to over-report support for the winner. Our results here are mixed; we find some evidence that Independents are more likely to misreport in favor of the winner, but we find no evidence that education level affects the likelihood of misreporting.
The Florida State University State Politics and Policy Data Archive
Authors: Barrilleaux Charles
Published: January 2011

The State Politics and Policy Data Archive is a free-access, web-based archive of publication-related datasets focusing on comparative American state politics and policy research. This essay describes the utility of the archive, provides instruction on its use, and requests that readers contribute data.
The Impact of a Low-Wage Strategy on State Economic Development
Authors: Hansen Susan B.
Published: January 2011

The American states have pursued several different approaches to create jobs and foster economic development, including reducing the social cost of labor. I show that state labor costs are markedly lower in 1995 than in 1970, based on a factor analysis of wages and state regulations affecting unions and the cost of labor. Corporate low-wage strategies, international and interstate competition for business, and the growing weakness of labor unions are posited to account for this. But regression analysis shows that lower labor costs have had no significant impact on rates of job creation since 1980, have reduced unemployment only slightly, and have been less effective in the latter respect than either tax cuts or other economic development policies. Moreover, reducing labor costs can have adverse consequences, such as rising income inequality, slower growth in gross state product and productivity, and a less competitive position for states in the international economy.
Sink or Swim: What Happened to California's Bilingual Students after Proposition 227?
Authors: Bali Valentina A.
Published: January 2011

Proposition 227, passed by California voters in 1998, aimed to dismantle bilingual programs in public schools and to replace them with English-only programs. Bilingual education, a long-standing program in California, involved mostly Hispanic students of limited English skills who were taught initially in their native language, and then were gradually transitioned into English-only classes. Using individual-level data from one southern California school district, I find that in 1998, before Proposition 227, limited-English-proficient (LEP) students enrolled in bilingual classes had lower scores in reading than LEP students who were not enrolled in bilingual classes, and who were, in general, more proficient in English. In math, bilingual students had test scores as good as those of non-bilingual LEPs. But in 1999, after Proposition 227, the same set of bilingual students had reading and math scores that were no worse than those of non-bilingual LEPs. Proposition 227, which interrupted bilingual programs and emphasized English instruction, did not set bilingual LEP students back relative to non-bilingual LEPs, and it may have even benefited them.
Whose Variance Is It Anyway? Interpreting Empirical Models with State-Level Data
Authors: Gill Jeff
Published: January 2011

Researchers commonly apply inferential statistical procedures to population data from the 50 U.S. states as if they were estimating population parameters from sample statistics. This method is incorrect because with population data there is no need to make inferences about quantities that are already known. Instead, authors should simply provide evidence that their specified model provides a good fit to the data. Summary measures of variance as well as the full engine of Bayesian statistics perform this function. This research note demonstrates why the current practice of making inferences from population data with the null hypothesis significance test is wrong, provides some specific examples of problems in the literature, and gives prescriptive advice about correctly assessing and conveying empirical model results.
A Note on the Dynamics and Idiosyncrasies of Gubernatorial Popularity
Authors: Adams Greg D. , Squire Peverill
Published: January 2011

We examine the effects of state economic conditions on gubernatorial popularity using time-series analyses of gubernatorial approval ratings for 10 states. We find that although unemployment rates affect some governors' approval ratings, the dynamics of gubernatorial approval are highly idiosyncratic. Our results suggest that a single model may be inadequate to describe patterns of public approval, even for candidates elected to similar offices. The unique personal characteristics of the officeholder, as well as differing constituent expectations, may be at least as important as the general economic variables typically included in models of public approval.
On the Outside Looking In: Lobbyists' Perspectives on the Effects of State Legislative Term Limits
Authors: Moncrief Gary , Thompson Joel A.
Published: January 2011

Term limit laws for state legislators now exist in 19 states. While these laws were passed as early as 1990, they have only recently actually forced legislators from office. Prior to the 2000 elections, only two states (California and Maine) had experienced virtually complete legislative turnover in at least one chamber as a result of term limits. Nine other states have had at least one cohort of legislators forced out of office. Now that a significant portion of these legislative bodies has been replaced by term limits, we can begin to examine the consequences of this reform. We report findings from a survey of lobbyists in five term-limits states. We find strong consensus among these lobbyists that term limits have caused the state political influence structure to shift away from the legislature and toward the governor, administrative agencies, and interest groups. With regard to the impact on internal operations and procedures of the legislature, we discover considerable variation across states, variation that, in part, is related to legislative professionalism.
Accountability in a Federal System: The Governor, the President, and Economic Expectations
Authors: Orth Deborah A.
Published: January 2011

How do people hold elected officials accountable for expected economic conditions in a system of government in which jurisdiction and responsibility are divided such as they are in the United States? Due to the president's visibility, people may hold all elected officials of the president's party responsible for economic conditions. Or, people may be able to differentiate between state and national economic conditions and jurisdictional responsibilities and hold governors of either party accountable for state economic conditions. I use ordered probit to analyze a pooled model of 13 individual-level mid-1990s Michigan opinion surveys and find no evidence that individuals consistently rely on a presidency-centered referenda model of cognition when evaluating the state's governor. Instead, gubernatorial performance ratings reflect an incumbent-centered accountability model. The evidence also suggests jurisdictional accountability, where gubernatorial evaluations are influenced by state economic expectations, but not by national economic expectations.
Trickle Up Political Socialization: The Impact of Kids Voting USA on Voter Turnout in Kansas
Authors: Linimon Amy , Joslyn Mark R.
Published: January 2011

Can a school curriculum influence the political socialization of students? And if so, can such socialization “trickle up” to influence the political socialization of these students' parents? We examine the effects of Kids Voting USA in Kansas to answer these questions. By the 1996 presidential election, Kids Voting was implemented in several Kansas counties. Consequently, we are able to compare turnout—and change in turnout across different elections—in such counties with those that did not adopt the program. After controlling for a variety of county-level characteristics that are likely to affect turnout, regression analyses indicate a positive and significant contribution of Kids Voting to county turnout, and change in turnout across elections. We address the practical implications of this study and emphasize its theoretical contribution to theories of political socialization.
Explaining State Internet Sales Taxation: New Economy, Old-Fashioned Interest Group Politics
Authors: Best Samuel J. , Teske Paul
Published: January 2011

Retail sales on the Internet are growing at a rapid pace. Some states have tapped into this potential revenue source with Internet sales taxes, while others have not. What are the factors that lead states to make these policy decisions? Using a 50-state comparative research design, we find that interest groups, as much as the partisan and economic factors emphasized in previous research on state tax policy, are correlated with adoptions of these state tax innovations. Furthermore, this interest group influence is not limited to a single industry, but comes from self-interested groups representing both sides of the issue, including newly emerging technology interests.
Elite Interviews and State Politics Research
Authors: Beamer Glenn
Published: January 2011

Elite interviews have long been a staple of state politics research. Improved information technology facilitates the use of elite interviews, but also underscores the need for attending to their design, operationalization, and analysis. This essay provides a framework for developing, conducting, and interpreting elite interviews, and suggests means to enhance the validity and reliability of findings by considering instrumentation, sampling, data collection, and transcript analysis.
The Christian Right and Public Policy: Social Movement Elites as Institutional Activists
Authors: Wald Kenneth D. , Corey Jeffrey C.
Published: January 2011

When social movement activists achieve an institutional position at the policymaking table, does their political behavior moderate with the norms of that institution? We explore this question by examining the behavior and attitudes of Christian Right activists appointed to serve on the 1997-98 Florida Constitutional Revision Commission (CRC). This commission was marked by an unusually high degree of conflict between three factions—Democrats, business-oriented Republicans, and socially conservative Republicans associated with the Christian Right. We found that by maintaining an outsider, purist political style, the commissioners with Christian Right ties were ineffective, isolated, and estranged from the mainstream Republicans on the CRC. The former remained true to their outsider status, behaving more like purist social movement activists than public officials with professional orientations. While these Christian Right elites adapted outwardly to some institutional norms for strategic purposes, they did not assimilate wholly to the demands of conventional political interchange.
Single-Member Districts and the Representation of Women in American State Legislatures: The Effects of Electoral System Change
Authors: King James D.
Published: January 2011

This study assesses the effects of changing electoral structure on the representation of women in American state legislatures. Specifically, how does converting from multimember districts (MMDs) to single-member districts (SMDs) affect the proportion of women serving in the state legislature? I use a quasi-experimental design, comparing election results from the four states that eliminated MMDs during the reapportionment following the 1990 census to those in eight states whose systems did not change during this period. The weight of the evidence suggests that abandoning MMDs for SMDs decreases the representation of women in state legislatures.
The Turnout Rate among Eligible Voters in the States, 1980–2000
Authors: McDonald Michael P.
Published: January 2011

Aggregate voter turnout rates in the United States have been used in many political science studies, as both a dependent and an independent variable. Most of these studies use the voting-age population as the denominator in their turnout rate measure. However, the voting-age population is not the same as the population of eligible voters. I demonstrate why this distinction matters and outline the steps to construct the voting-eligible population for each of the states from 1980–2000 to provide more accurate measures of state-level voter turnout rates.
Gubernatorial, Senatorial, and State-level Presidential Job Approval: The U.S. Officials Job Approval Ratings (JAR) Collection
Authors: Beyle Thad , Niemi Richard G. , Sigelman Lee
Published: January 2011

Job approval ratings for state governors, unlike those for the United States president, have been relatively inaccessible to political scientists. We introduce the U.S. Officials Job Approval Ratings (JAR) dataset, a new compilation of gubernatorial job approval ratings—along with senatorial and state-level presidential ratings—that draws together many of these ratings, beginning with the first published rating in 1947 and extending through 2000. We describe some of the characteristics of these data, especially the kinds of rating scales used and their impact on overall approval assessment. We then show that 1993–2000 presidential approval levels varied widely from state to state and are correlated with state-level support for Clinton in the 1996 presidential election. Finally, we note that while gubernatorial approval often declines over time, many governors remain popular over the length of their term.
Fiscal Transparency, Gubernatorial Approval, and the Scale of Government: Evidence from the States
Authors: Alt James E. , Lassen David Dreyer , Skilling David
Published: January 2011

We explore the effect of the transparency of fiscal institutions in government on the scale of government and gubernatorial approval using a formal model of accountability. We construct an index of fiscal transparency for the American states from detailed budgetary information. With cross-sectional data for 1986-95, we find that—on average and controlling for other factors—fiscal transparency increases both the scale of government and gubernatorial approval. Our results imply that more transparent fiscal institutions induce greater effort by politicians, to whom voters give higher job approval, on average. Voters also respond by entrusting greater resources to politicians where fiscal institutions are more transparent, leading to larger government.
Gubernatorial Approval and Administrative Influence
Authors: Dometrius Nelson C.
Published: January 2011

The connection between the government and the governed is often evaluated using election results. This article explores this connection between elections using data on gubernatorial approval in the states. Specifically, I ask the question, Do governors with greater job approval ratings have greater influence over the state bureaucracy than governors with lower approval ratings? Measures of both gubernatorial influence and administrator contact with gubernatorial staff are regressed on gubernatorial approval ratings from state polling data, along with controls for other state characteristics. The results show that approval does affect a governor's influence with the bureaucracy, and as such, serves as an additional connection between the government and the governed.
Size Doesn't Matter: In Defense of Single-State Studies
Authors: Nicholson-Crotty Sean , Meier Kenneth J.
Published: January 2011

Despite the bias against such studies in our discipline, we argue that research designs focusing on a single state are sometimes preferable to those employing data from all 50 states. Single state studies are appropriate when the researcher wishes to generalize to a unit of analysis other than the states themselves, when conditions in a given state provide a unique opportunity for the most rigorous test of a hypothesis, and when the measurement advantages of a single-state study outweigh the costs of limited generalization. We draw on a range of literature to reinforce our primary contention, that it is soundness of theory and rigor of analysis, rather than the number of states, that makes research valid and important.
Deservingness, Discretion, and the State Politics of Welfare Spending, 1990-96
Authors: Barrilleaux Charles , Bernick Ethan
Published: January 2011

Are the politics of welfare policy for the “deserving” and “undeserving” poor the same? We use pooled cross-sectional time-series analyses of state government discretionary welfare spending on general assistance (GA) and Supplemental Security Income supplements (SSI-S) to address this question. We find that efforts to assist the GA population decline as electoral competition increases while efforts to assist the SSI-S population increase, providing evidence that only the deserving poor are favored by heightened political competition. We also find that SSI-S benefits rise with ideological liberalism, electoral competition, and the percentage of African Americans in a state. When considered in light of the negative effect of larger African American populations on states' SSI-S efforts, this suggests targeting of particular groups. Finally, we find that SSI-S enrollments are reduced, but the per-recipient payments are increased under state administration, suggesting that state administrators are more likely to provide more services to existing clientele than to expand their client base.
Enhancing Civic Engagement: The Effect of Direct Democracy on Political Participation and Knowledge
Authors: Tolbert Caroline J. , McNeal Ramona S. , Smith Daniel A.
Published: January 2011

What is the impact of direct democracy on citizens' political participation and knowledge? Progressive Era reformers and normative theorists have argued that institutional procedures allowing citizens a more direct role in government decision-making will increase civic engagement, broadly defined. Using American National Election Studies data for 1996, 1998, and 2000, we test this hypothesis. Our multivariate analysis suggests that exposure to ballot initiatives increases the probability of voting, stimulates campaign contributions to interest groups, and enhances political knowledge. However, we find that the impact of the initiative process on political participation and knowledge varies with electoral context.
Postmaterialism and Post-Industrialism: Cultural Influences on Female Representation in State Legislatures
Authors: Camobreco John F. , Barnello Michelle A.
Published: January 2011

In the last 30 years, female state legislative representation in the United States has increased steadily and dramatically. While the cross-sectional variation in this representation has been studied at length, longitudinal changes have yet to be explained. We attempt to do this using two theories of large-scale cultural and political attitude change over the last several decades—postmaterialism and post-industrialism. Our empirical analyses are more consistent with post-industrialism theory than postmaterialism theory. We find that both cross-sectional differences and longitudinal changes in the percentage of state legislators who are female are explained primarily by college education and religious adherence, not age cohort or income. The effects of college education and religious adherence remain strong even in the presence of controls for other cultural and institutional variables that have been found to influence the sexual composition of state legislatures. Thus, our study suggests the existence of an education-religion cleavage on social issues among Americans.
Campaign Professionalism in State Legislative Elections
Authors: Abbe Owen G. , Herrnson Paul S.
Published: January 2011

We know that state legislative election campaigns have become increasingly expensive in recent years, but have they also become more professionally run? We assess the degree to which campaign professionals have proliferated in state legislative election campaigns and explain this development in terms of the institutional changes in state legislatures and the “congressionalization” of state legislative elections. Nearly one-half of all state legislative candidates answering our survey had hired professionals for their campaigns, using them mostly for direct mail, media advertising, campaign management, and polling. Open-seat candidates waged more professional campaigns than incumbents or their challengers. We find that campaign professionalism in state legislative elections is primarily a function of campaign spending, but that challengers hire professionals at lower spending levels. We also find that employing professionals improves the electoral performance of challengers, but not that of incumbents or open-seat candidates.
Public Attitudes toward the Policy Responsibilities of the National and State Governments: Evidence from South Carolina
Authors: Schneider Saundra K. , Jacoby William G.
Published: January 2011

How do Americans feel about the respective policy responsibilities of the national and state governments? This article addresses this question using data from a public opinion survey in South Carolina. The study has three major findings. First, people do seem to have meaningful opinions about national versus state government responsibilities, regardless of whether the issue is presented in policy-specific or general terms. Second, framing effects do not exist for these attitudes because the aggregate distributions of opinion do not change across the two presentations. Third, citizens' beliefs about specific programmatic activities appear to be derived largely from their more general comparative evaluations of the national and state governments. These findings have important implications for both scholarly theories of and practical political concerns about federalism in the United States.
The Political Economy of Gubernatorial Smokestack Chasing: Bad Policy and Bad Politics?
Authors: Turner Robert C.
Published: January 2011

Why do states persist in offering large financial incentives to induce firms to relocate to or expand in the state, a practice commonly derided as “smokestack chasing?” The conventional wisdom is that while these incentives have little effect on firms' business decisions in the long term, they are a good political strategy for governors seeking to improve economic conditions and political support in the short term. I test these hypotheses by examining the economic and electoral impact of industrial recruitment policies in Wisconsin, Virginia, Michigan, North Carolina, Maryland, Indiana, and Kentucky. I find, first, that these policies pay immediate dividends for governors by increasing county-level job growth and per capita income prior to the next election. Second, governors recruit firms strategically to relocate to counties that opposed them in the previous election. But, third, this industrial recruitment does not increase electoral support for the governor. In fact, the more success a governor has in recruiting firms or jobs to a county, the fewer votes he or she receives in it in the next election.
Not All Money Is Equal: The Differential Effect of Spending by Incumbents and Challengers in Gubernatorial Primaries
Authors: Bardwell Kedron
Published: January 2011

What is the impact of campaign spending on the vote in gubernatorial primaries? Is spending by challengers and incumbents equally effective? Answering these questions could shed light on the effectiveness of incumbent spending in elections generally and on the impact of campaign finance reform. In a two-stage least squares analysis of primaries from 1980 to 2000, this study finds that spending by incumbent governors has no independent impact on their vote share. On the other hand, spending by challengers is effective in attracting votes, even after controlling for challenger quality and incumbent popularity. However, relatively few races are close enough for challenger spending to be decisive. This suggests that to improve gubernatorial primary competition, states would need to increase public campaign funding and spending limits substantially.
The Measurement of the Partisan Balance of State Government
Authors: Klarner Carl
Published: January 2011

This note examines problems associated with measuring the partisan balance of state government. A description of a new publicly available dataset is given, as well as of the methods used to collect these data. The results of three data analyses using different measures of state government partisan balance demonstrate that sometimes measurement error on this variable can influence substantive findings.
Strategic Candidate Decisionmaking and Competition in Gubernatorial Nonincumbent-Party Primaries
Authors: Kang Insun , Niemi Richard G. , Powell Lynda W.
Published: January 2011

In contrast to research on congressional and state legislative elections, strategic entry into gubernatorial contests has been largely unexplored. We examine the influence of incumbency, gubernatorial popularity, and other factors on candidate strategic decisions and the resulting level of competition in nonincumbent-party gubernatorial primaries between 1974 and 2000. We find that incumbency and gubernatorial popularity interact in their effect, with popular incumbents discouraging competition and unpopular incumbents encouraging it. The size of the potential candidate pool, the condition of the state economy, state partisanship, and state party endorsement practices also influence competition.
Improving the Harvest of State Legislative Research
Authors: Clucas Richard A.
Published: January 2011

The American state legislatures provide a unique opportunity for the study of lawmaking. This essay describes and analyzes state legislative research since 1990 and offers suggestions for future research. The discipline made significant gains during this period, expanding our knowledge on a wide variety of important topics and concerns. Despite these gains, many gaps in our knowledge remain unfilled and many questions remain unanswered. The field has been particularly weak in building theory. Scholars need to make a more concerted effort to develop our theoretical understanding of state legislatures for the field to develop greater direction and coherence.