title: Political reform in US states: Governors, legislators, and struggles over election redistricting law reform

authors: Commerer, Brent

subjects: US politics

abstract: In the United States, the decentralization of power over redistricting to the states has prevented the emergence of a national compromise between the major political parties to mutually reject election manipulation through gerrymandering. A confusing patchwork of redistricting regimes exist across the US, with significant variations between states in their gerrymandering practices and attempted anti-gerrymandering constraints. State legislators and parties typically cling tenaciously to their authority over redistricting in order to protect their own electoral interests, including through gerrymandering when possible. But in a quarter of US states, legislators have agreed to reduce their own redistricting powers in some way, for example, by delegation to a commission or executive officers. This research investigates why. Why has election redistricting law reform been enacted by some US state legislatures and not others, and under what conditions do legislators give up some of their powers over redistricting?

The chief original contribution of this thesis is the development of a new index to systematically measure and compare the redistricting systems of US states, as an alternative to simple arbitrary categorizations. System information has been collected inductively through analysis of all state constitutions, laws, and practices relevant to redistricting, and coded for all states to create a ten-point index of redistricting neutrality. This institutional and input-based approach complements the map-focused and output-based approach to gerrymandering detection popular in political science, such as the efficiency gap statistical test of Stephanopoulos and McGhee (2015) that was recently rejected by the US Supreme Court. Hypotheses have been methodically tested against the redistricting neutrality index and the key finding is that the variables normally used to explain inter-state political differences fail to explain variation in the redistricting index. Reform is not exclusive to small states, or rich states, or liberal states, or white states, or rural states, or Democratic states. An additional contribution of the thesis is a small expansion in our knowledge of redistricting system history, through brief case studies that examine political struggles over specific reforms in individual states.

The core argument of this research is that two factors most plausibly answer the research questions. First, gubernatorial leadership. Strong support from the governor is a necessary condition for reform in nearly all cases, as a means of herding legislative cats to a common purpose. This is true of most state policy areas and it is true of political reform as well. Second, strategic windows of opportunity are essential for providing leverage for leaders and reformers to persuade legislators to prioritize redistricting reform over their other interests. For example, perceived meddling by courts, ballot initiative threats, and concerns about future election losses can temporarily boost legislator support for reform, if a policy entrepreneur has done the work and is prepared to seize a rare opportunity when it arises. Gerrymandering does not harm individuals directly (as does denial of the right to vote) but rather indirectly through a distortion of democratic representation and the balance of political power, so reform coalitions struggle to mobilize public opinion about redistricting or to sustain issue salience. For states to reform redistricting, they need pro-reform governors and favourable contingent factors to help sway legislators.

text: Political reform in US states: Governors, legislators, and struggles over election redistricting law reform In the United States, the decentralization of power over redistricting to the states has prevented the emergence of a national compromise between the major political parties to mutually reject election manipulation through gerrymandering. A confusing patchwork of redistricting regimes exist across the US, with significant variations between states in their gerrymandering practices and attempted anti-gerrymandering constraints. State legislators and parties typically cling tenaciously to their authority over redistricting in order to protect their own electoral interests, including through gerrymandering when possible. But in a quarter of US states, legislators have agreed to reduce their own redistricting powers in some way, for example, by delegation to a commission or executive officers. This research investigates why. Why has election redistricting law reform been enacted by some US state legislatures and not others, and under what conditions do legislators give up some of their powers over redistricting?

The chief original contribution of this thesis is the development of a new index to systematically measure and compare the redistricting systems of US states, as an alternative to simple arbitrary categorizations. System information has been collected inductively through analysis of all state constitutions, laws, and practices relevant to redistricting, and coded for all states to create a ten-point index of redistricting neutrality. This institutional and input-based approach complements the map-focused and output-based approach to gerrymandering detection popular in political science, such as the efficiency gap statistical test of Stephanopoulos and McGhee (2015) that was recently rejected by the US Supreme Court. Hypotheses have been methodically tested against the redistricting neutrality index and the key finding is that the variables normally used to explain inter-state political differences fail to explain variation in the redistricting index. Reform is not exclusive to small states, or rich states, or liberal states, or white states, or rural states, or Democratic states. An additional contribution of the thesis is a small expansion in our knowledge of redistricting system history, through brief case studies that examine political struggles over specific reforms in individual states.

The core argument of this research is that two factors most plausibly answer the research questions. First, gubernatorial leadership. Strong support from the governor is a necessary condition for reform in nearly all cases, as a means of herding legislative cats to a common purpose. This is true of most state policy areas and it is true of political reform as well. Second, strategic windows of opportunity are essential for providing leverage for leaders and reformers to persuade legislators to prioritize redistricting reform over their other interests. For example, perceived meddling by courts, ballot initiative threats, and concerns about future election losses can temporarily boost legislator support for reform, if a policy entrepreneur has done the work and is prepared to seize a rare opportunity when it arises. Gerrymandering does not harm individuals directly (as does denial of the right to vote) but rather indirectly through a distortion of democratic representation and the balance of political power, so reform coalitions struggle to mobilize public opinion about redistricting or to sustain issue salience. For states to reform redistricting, they need pro-reform governors and favourable contingent factors to help sway legislators.

year: 2021

title: Incorporating discontinuous preferences into the analysis of discrete choice experiments

authors: Campbell, Danny

subjects: discontinuous preferences

abstract: Data from a discrete choice experiment on improvements of rural landscape attributes are used to investigate the implications of discontinuous preferences on willingness to pay estimates. Using a multinomial error component logit model, we explore differences in scale and unexplained variance between respondents with discontinuous and continuous preferences and condition taste intensities on whether or not each attribute was considered by the respondent during the evaluation of alternatives. Results suggest that significant improvements in model performance can be achieved when discontinuous preferences are accommodated in the econometric specification, and that the magnitude and robustness of the willingness to pay estimates are sensitive to discontinuous preferences.

text: Incorporating discontinuous preferences into the analysis of discrete choice experiments Data from a discrete choice experiment on improvements of rural landscape attributes are used to investigate the implications of discontinuous preferences on willingness to pay estimates. Using a multinomial error component logit model, we explore differences in scale and unexplained variance between respondents with discontinuous and continuous preferences and condition taste intensities on whether or not each attribute was considered by the respondent during the evaluation of alternatives. Results suggest that significant improvements in model performance can be achieved when discontinuous preferences are accommodated in the econometric specification, and that the magnitude and robustness of the willingness to pay estimates are sensitive to discontinuous preferences.

year: 2007-09

title: Whānau mentoring, Māori youth and crime

authors: Joseph, Robert

abstract: This article will discuss how the whänau was the traditional institution for teaching and nurturing children through (among other things) effective mentoring, and how children were taught tikanga, or the ‘right way’ to think, speak, act and become. Traditional leadership development, whänau dysfunction and whänau renewal are also discussed, followed by my conclusions. This article will not be discussing the place of colonisation, high unemployment, lower education rates and other socio-economic disparities among Mäori that play a part in the causes and perpetuation of Mäori youth and crime. A discussion on the Treaty of Waitangi, indigenous rights, and Mäori development is also omitted although the importance of each of these areas is acknowledged. As the theme of this issue of Childrenz Issues is ‘seeking pathways beyond colonisation’, the focus of this article is on Mäori dealing appropriately with the problems of Mäori youth and crime through effective mentoring within the institution of the whänau.

text: Whānau mentoring, Māori youth and crime This article will discuss how the whänau was the traditional institution for teaching and nurturing children through (among other things) effective mentoring, and how children were taught tikanga, or the ‘right way’ to think, speak, act and become. Traditional leadership development, whänau dysfunction and whänau renewal are also discussed, followed by my conclusions. This article will not be discussing the place of colonisation, high unemployment, lower education rates and other socio-economic disparities among Mäori that play a part in the causes and perpetuation of Mäori youth and crime. A discussion on the Treaty of Waitangi, indigenous rights, and Mäori development is also omitted although the importance of each of these areas is acknowledged. As the theme of this issue of Childrenz Issues is ‘seeking pathways beyond colonisation’, the focus of this article is on Mäori dealing appropriately with the problems of Mäori youth and crime through effective mentoring within the institution of the whänau.

year: 2007-01