Should I Stay or Should I Go Now? Voluntary Retirement from Danish Local Government

Why do politicians choose to retire voluntarily from a position they have been working hard to get? It is argued in this article that the institutional setting of the elected assemblies influences the direct, as well as the alternative costs and benefits of having a political career and hence the patterns of voluntary retirement. Drawing on previous research from the United States Congress, this is explored in a new empirical setting: local government in Denmark. The results show that positions at the labour market matter as private‐sector employees are more likely to retire than public‐sector employees. Furthermore, internal institutional factors matter. Holding an institutional position such as chairing a committee makes retirement less likely. Furthermore, seniority makes the councillors more likely to retire when age is controlled for – a result not found in national studies. However, councillors who reach a high‐ranking position at an early stage are not more likely to quit with seniority than those who do not reach such a position. A high personal share of votes decreases voluntary retirement. In contrast to previous findings, the ideological distance from the ruling party does not play a role. This may be due to norms of consensus in the local councils.     

Biology,Ideology, and Epistemology: How Do We Know Political Attitudes Are Inherited and Why Should We Care?

Evidence that political attitudes and behavior are in part biologically and even genetically instantiated is much discussed in political science of late. Yet the classic twin design, a primary source of evidence on this matter, has been criticized for being biased toward finding genetic influence. In this article, we employ a new data source to test empirically the alternative, exclusively environmental, explanations for ideological similarities between twins. We find little support for these explanations and argue that even if we treat them as wholly correct, they provide reasons for political science to pay more rather than less attention to the biological basis of attitudes and behaviors. Our analysis suggests that the mainstream socialization paradigm for explaining attitudes and behaviors is not necessarily incorrect but is substantively incomplete.     

Should We Support Illiberal Religious Democracies?

The terms on which the US will agree to settle the conflict in Afghanistan reflect a much greater issue that the US faces in the Middle East: will it support only those who seek to establish democratic regimes that also respect individual, or ally itself with the often much more powerful groups that may be democratic, but are likely to foster regimes based on Shari'a law? At the very least, the West should urge all to respect the right to life, call on regimes to negotiate with protesters rather than machine‐gunning them, and insist that protesters follow the Egyptian and Tunisian model of peaceful uprising. Beyond such liberal basics, it is best to let each nation work out its own regime. As a matter of policy, in order to support democratic groups and evolving democratic regimes in the Middle East, western governments had best be prepared to ally themselves with political forces whose liberal credentials, one must recognise, are evolving but not yet particularly high.     

From Welfare to Work: Has Welfare Reform Worked?

This paper discusses estimates of the effect of welfare reform,as measured by the imposition of time limits and family cap provisions, on the employment and fertility of less educated unmarried women. This analysis shows that welfare reform has induced less educated unmarried women to move from welfare to work in significant numbers. The imposition of time limits and other administrative reforms correlated with it have increased the employment of unmarried women with 12 or fewer years of education by an estimated 363,171, approximately 28 percent of the decline in welfare caseloads for this group since 1994. Furthermore, evidence shows that women who have left welfare for employment worked approximately 29 hours per week, which even at low wages may significantly improve their financial status relative to public assistance. However, little evidence can be found to show that the imposition of time limits and family caps affect the fertility of less educated unmarried women. © 2001 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

How Restricted is the Job Mobility of Skilled Temporary Work Visa Holders?

Using the National Survey of College Graduates, we investigate the job mobility of skilled workers holding U.S. temporary visas. Such workers either have legal restrictions on their ability to change employers or may be reluctant to leave an employer who has sponsored them for permanent residence. We find that the voluntary job‐changing rate is similar for temporary work visa holders and natives with similar characteristics, but that it spikes when temporary work visa holders obtain permanent residence. The spike magnitude implies mobility is reduced during the application period by about 20 percent, alleviating concerns that employers exercise strong monopsony power.     

Women's Work? The Distribution and Prestige of Portfolios in the Canadian Provinces

Historically not only have women cabinet ministers in Western democracies been few in number, but they have generally been limited to "women's ministries" such as education, health, social services, and culture. This article systematically investigates the responsibilities and prestige of portfolios that women cabinet ministers in the ten Canadian provinces have held over a 21-year period, 1976–1997, an era in which their share of cabinet positions rose from less than 4% to almost 25%. Although still concentrated in traditional women's ministries, they have diversified the portfolios they hold. Using a tri-fold classification of portfolios into (1) important, (2) middle range, and (3) junior positions, we find that women increasingly have achieved more prestigious portfolios, perhaps a reflection of the reduced number of cabinet positions in the 1990s and more concerted attempts to promote women. But the law of increasing disproportion still exists, at least in overall terms of the relative prestige of cabinet positions.     

What Is Political Science? What Should It Be?

This paper examines the five myths that govern political science: that it studies politics; that it is scientific; that one can study politics cut off from the other social sciences and history; that the state is neutral; and that the bulk of the work in the discipline furthers the cause of democracy. Within political science, there have been three main approaches to criticizing these myths: a moderate one that treats the elements in these myths as more or less disconnected; a radical one that sees a systemic connection between these elements; and a Marxist one that names this system "Capitalism" and privileges the role of the capitalist state in explaining both politics and political science.     

Mandarins versus Machiavellians? On Differences between Work Motivations of Administrative and Political Elites

This article explores how work motivations differ between administrative and political elites, based on 94 qualitative interviews conducted in the Netherlands, European Union, and United States. Both elite groups are primarily motivated in their initial choice of public service by wanting to contribute to, serve, or improve society; job content, career opportunities, political ideals, and personal background are also important motivators. Once in public service, serving society remains important, but politicians differ from public managers in that they want to have a big impact and bring about actual societal change, and they consider themselves best equipped to do so, whereas the latter value intellectually stimulating work more than anything else. Motivational categories for both groups are relatively stable across institutional settings. Theorizing on the results, the author offers seven propositions for future research. This article contributes to the research on motivation in the public domain by using qualitative methodology and including politicians.     

Pain Management and Work Capacity: Evidence From Workers’ Compensation and Marijuana Legalization

We study whether the work capacity of the older working population responds to improved pain management therapy access. We use the adoption of state recreational marijuana laws (RMLs) as a large policy shock to access to a non-pharmaceutical pain management option. We focus on workers’ compensation cash benefit receipt as a measure of work capacity, finding that receipt declines in response to RML adoption. Workers’ compensation cash benefits are awarded to workers who require time away from work to recover from an injury, which arguably captures a policy-relevant aspect of work capacity. We observe similar shifts in complementary proxies for work capacity, including work-limiting disability rates. After considering a range of alternative mechanisms, the evidence suggests that the primary driver of the reductions in workers’ compensation benefits is improvements in work capacity.     

Power and Responsibility: Should We Spare the King's Head?

Michel Foucault calls for the head of the king in political theory. In doing so he seems to sever the concept of power from its relation to human responsibility. However, for theoretical 'monarchists' such as Stephen Lukes, the whole point of identifying a relationship of power is to fix responsibility for its exercise. Given the contingency of political action, I agree with Foucault that it is not always possible to attribute responsibility for the effects of power to a particular agent. However, Foucault stretches the concept of power too far beyond its ethical association with human responsibility. Consequently, the idea of power becomes practically meaningless.     

Performance Management Routines That Work? An Early Assessment of the GPRA Modernization Act

The Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) of 1993 provided a well‐studied framework for U.S. federal performance management initiatives. In the aftermath of the update of GPRA in 2010 with the GPRA Modernization Act, the authors offer the first systematic scholarly assessment of the new legislation. Managerial use of performance data was an explicit goal of the Modernization Act, an objective that eluded prior federal reforms. The Modernization Act established a new series of performance routines to encourage performance information use. The analysis shows that as federal managers experience those routines, they are more likely to report using performance data to make decisions. Specifically, routines centered on the pursuit of cross‐agency priority goals, the prioritization of a small number of agency goals, and data‐driven reviews are all associated with higher rates of performance information use. The authors also find that managers in better‐run data‐driven reviews report greater use of performance data.     

Durable Governors as Political Leaders: Should We Limit Tenure?

"Durable governors," that is, governors who have had more thaneight years of continuous service and won three or more electionsin the past four decades, are of major importance for debatesover limits on gubernatorial tenure. This study examines hypothesesregarding the socioeconomic, political, and individual characteristicsassociated with the emergence of durable governors and theirdegree of political success during their later terms of office.Major differences exist between states which have produced durableDemocratic governors and states which have produced durableRepublican governors. Surprisingly, however, durable governorsdo not emerge more frequently in less competitive states. Thelevel of success which the durable governors have had in maintainingelectoral support and partisan legislative majorities giveslittle indication of a general decline of performance duringlengthy tenure. The performances of the durable governors andthe conditions which have facilitated their emergence lend supportto the movement away from constitutional limitations on gubernatorialreelection.