Political evocation and styles of candidate evaluation

Recent work in cognitive processing and individual decision making has emphasized that individuals vary in the criteria they bring to bear to evaluate political objects. In this paper we argue that individual differences are but one piece of the decision-making puzzle, and that environmental factors are also important. Of particular interest to us is the idea that different candidates evoke different evaluative criteria. Using data from a 1984 sample of undergraduates and the 1980 National Election Study, we find evidence that political evocation effects do exist. This result has implications for understanding both the decision calculus of individuals and the collective rationality of the electorate.     

Explaining variations in enforcement strategy: A comparison of the Swedish health care,eldercare, and compulsory school sector

This article analyzes whether, and if so, why, national inspectorates adopt different enforcement strategies when controlling the provision of welfare services, such as health care, eldercare, and the compulsory school. The findings show that the Swedish Schools Inspectorate uses a predominantly strict strategy, while the Health and Social Care Inspectorate relies on a more situational strategy. To explain this variation in enforcement strategy, the article tests four hypotheses derived from the literature on regulatory enforcement. The findings suggest that the variation between the agencies is not primarily the result of differences in resources or the authority to issue punitive decisions, as suggested by previous research. Instead, we find support for the hypothesis that the definition of quality can explain variation in adopted strategies, and partial support for the hypothesis that differences in regulatory mission can account for a variation in the agencies' formal enforcement strategies.     

Toward a new institutional strategy framework for political marketing

The present literature on political marketing strategy has provided important knowledge about how the material context of technologies, polls or competitors influences strategy formulation. However, less attention has been directed to the constraints facing a political organization from the social context related to habits, norms or social conventions. This article thus aims at bringing organizational new institutional theory into the field of political marketing strategy. Accordingly, it is investigated how political organizations when initiating marketing strategies act or react toward institutionalized demands in their environment, such as issues or ideas that are considered socially appropriate. As such, a strategy framework consisting of a phase model and a typology is developed. The phase model is drawn from extant literature within organizational new institutional theory stating that decision makers will (1) scan information from their environment, (2) interpret this incoming information in available cognitive categories and (3), finally, select a strategy premised on their cognitive interpretations. On this ground, we build a novel typology that specifies which political marketing strategy decision makers will select under different cognitive framings of their environment. Here, we delineate four ideal type political marketing strategies—conformity, decoupling, defense and entrepreneurial—that correspond to how organizational decision makers interpret their institutional surroundings. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Choosing appropriate techniques for socio-political forecasting

After defining scientific forecasting, the crucial role of assumptions in such forecasts is explicated. This is followed by a discussion of the representations upon which forecasting systems are based. Six variables are then introduced to capture differences in socio-political forecasting circumstances: level of detail, accuracy, agreement on problem representation, robustness-brittleness, number of variables and interdependencies, and disturbance. A categorization of forecasting approaches - expert based, Bayesian, extremal statistical, and rule based - is offered. These forecasting approaches are then cross-referenced with the forecasting circumstances to produce recommendations for choosing an appropriate forecasting technique in a given policy circumstance. Most examples in the article are drawn from the realm of foreign policy and international politics, and the cross-referencing section concentrates on foreign energy policy examples.     

Understanding Campaign Strategy

SUMMARY

The role of professional political consultants in campaigns is not very well understood, at least from a theoretical perspective. As a result, we know very little about how campaign strategy is developed. This article is an attempt to think theoretically about how professional campaign operatives craft strategies for candidates. It begins with a review of previous research on consultants and campaign strategy. That work helps lay a foundation for a theory of professional campaign activity that focuses on the development of campaign strategy. I then turn to campaign professionals themselves. Based on interviews with numerous consultants and other campaign operatives, I identify common approaches to building strategy within campaigns. Finally, I explain the notion of ‘deliberate priming,’ a theoretical understanding of professionally run campaigns that emerges from the consultant interviews and previous scholarship in this field.     

Different Groups, Different Strategies: How Interest Groups Pursue Their Political Ambitions

The article compares the political activities of different types of interest groups. Drawing on data from a survey of all Danish national interest groups, it demonstrates significant variation in the strategic choices of different types of groups. Groups with corporative resources direct much attention towards influencing the bureaucracy. They possess resources valued by officials and therefore have good options for utilizing a strategy targeting the administration and seeking corporatist integration. By contrast, public interest groups are more likely to use publicly visible strategies in which affecting the media agenda plays a central role. By engaging in such strategies, public interest groups can demonstrate a high level of engagement to their diffuse membership. Furthermore, the goals of public interest groups are typically conducive to pursuit through public strategies. A third category of other groups is incorporated in the analyses as a point of reference to establish patterns of strategy use. While there are clear differences between groups with regard to most strategies of influence, different types of groups are equally engaged in a parliamentary strategy. Interacting with Parliament seems to be important for groups integrated in corporatist structures as well as for those relying more on public strategies.     

Cluster‐Based Policy Making: Assessing Performance and Sustaining Competitiveness

Tremendous changes in technology, political and social frameworks, as well as the impacts of globalization, have put pressure on countries to become competitive. One strategy for creating an engine of economic growth is the creation of clusters. These clusters, be they naturally or artificially conceived, hold the promise of becoming the economic weapons of a country. Many studies have been done to understand the factors behind the successes and failures of clusters. One of the reasons behind the inconsistent success of existing cluster policy frameworks in managing cluster performance is the fact that clusters often are at different levels of development, and it will require different strategies to create, enhance, and sustain their competitive advantage. This paper aims to propose and demonstrate a more holistic framework designed to understand key cluster dynamics that drives cluster performance, which then will enable policy makers to work toward ensuring sustainable cluster development.     

Cultures of Public Policy Problems

This article is an essay about the construction of a culturalist theory of problem definition in the public domain. Using grid-group Cultural Theory and a typology of the structures of policy problems, questions are posed such as the following: Why do some policymakers prefer to define problems as overstructured and not understructured? May one predict that policymakers who adhere to different ways of life will prove to be more adept in solving some problem types rather than others? Renowned policy science research work suggests how each way of life corresponds to a particular problem definition strategy. Hierarchists will impose a clear structure on any problem, no matter what the cost. Isolates see social reality as an unstable casino in which any privileged problem structure jeopardizes chances for survival. Enclavists (or egalitarians) will define any policy problem as an issue of fairness and distributive justice. Individualists will exploit any bit of usable knowledge to improve a problematic situation. These four focal strategies are part of repertoires of problem definition strategies, where each cultural solidarity type disposes of a differentially composed set of secondary strategies. Finally, it is suggested that the links between group-grid Cultural Theory and policy problem types may serve the practitioner as analytic tool for active and (self-) critical problem structuring and (re)framing.     

The role of mitigation and strengthening cognitive operations in brand names design: a case study of Spanish and American wine brands

Despite the relevance of powerful brands in the present-day market, research on the process of brand name design from a cognitive perspective focuses almost exclusively on the effects of the use of conceptual metaphor, and to a lesser extent, metonymy, overlooking the role played by other cognitive strategies. This paper analyzes the potentiality of mitigation and strengthening cognitive operations as tools for the systematic, risk-free design of new brand names with highly predictable and felicitous connotations. In particular, it focuses on their role in the systematic generation of axiologically positive brands in both Spanish and American wine labels, thus largely reducing the need for the costly and time-consuming cultural checks that branding companies need to run on new brand names before their commercial launching. In so doing, the interaction of the two aforementioned cognitive operations with a number of pragmatic principles and cultural models of social interaction, and their subservience to other cognitive operations, like those of comparison, correlation, and domain expansion and reduction, are also considered. The results of the study offer new insights on the semantics of commercial brand names which should prove useful for branding professionals, as well as data of interest to linguists dealing with inter-linguistic issues and cognitive modeling alike.     

Multimodal narratives in SIA's “Singapore Girl” TV advertisements – from branding with femininity to branding with provenance and authenticity?

This paper analyses the multimodal narratives in Singapore Airlines (SIA)’s TV advertisements. Adapting the concept of the foreground–background continuum in multimodal interaction analysis, the first section of this paper analyses the narratives in 10 TV commercials available online from 1970s to 2013. Following the comparative analysis, a close investigation from a social semiotic perspective is conducted on SIA's latest TV advertisement in 2013. Through the analysis, this study shows how gendered representations of the Singapore Girl are manipulated in SIA's advertisements. It also reveals how these gendered representations adopted by SIA are married with contemporary branding philosophies, which also work to cloak them in relation to the use of increasingly well-rounded narrative structure. This study hopes to shed light on the understanding of how gender and sexist ideologies and representations are discursively embodied in contemporary branding strategies used by large-scale advertisements and campaigns spanning a long period.     

Connecting the Candidates: Consultant Networks and the Diffusion of Campaign Strategy in American Congressional Elections

Modern American political campaigns are typically conceptualized as “candidate‐centered” and treated as conditionally independent in quantitative analyses. In reality, however, these campaigns are linked by professional consulting firms, which are important agents of campaign strategy diffusion within the extended party networks of the contemporary era. To test our hypothesis that consultants disseminate campaign strategies among their clients, we analyze new data on U.S. House elections derived from Federal Election Commission records. Using spatial autoregressive models, we find that candidates who share consultants are more likely to use similar campaign strategies than we would otherwise expect, conditional on numerous explanatory variables. These results, which largely withstand an extensive series of robustness and falsification tests, suggest that consultants play a key role in diffusing strategies among congressional campaigns.     

The role of the state in enabling private sector development: an assessment methodology

There are many ideas about how the state can and should enable private sector development. However, most of these ideas are not derived from the private sector itself. Participatory policy research has so far been confined to public sector development contexts. This article provides some background information about the garment and textile industry in Zimbabwe. It then describes one pioneering attempt to develop and assess an enabling state assessment methodology in this context, for possible use in the private sector more generally. The methodology described consists of a series of participant‐developed checklists, around the predetermined themes of the policy, agency and enterprise environments. These checklists were explored through the use of semi‐structured dialogue, using visual methods such as impact diagramming, Venn diagramming, master charts and problem trees, in the context of enterprise‐based meetings and two subsequent workshops. The article summarizes the main constraints and recommended actions identified by the participants. The participants, the researchers and the author also assess each step of the methodology.These steps include: developing an agenda; designing the process; identifying a target population and research team; developing and applying the methodology; analysing the results and documenting the process. Lessons are also drawn from this assessment for each stage of the methodology. This article concludes with a discussion about the transferability of the methodology and the need to experiment with other methodologies. The final section also draws out the differences and similarities between this and other types of participatory policy research. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Research Note: Libertarian-authoritarian Value Change in Britain, 1974–2001

This research note explores the mechanisms behind age differences and changes over time in one of the two major value dimensions in British politics, libertarian-authoritarianism. I show that the British electorate has become substantially more libertarian over the last 30 years, but that older people have remained more authoritarian than younger people over this period. Conventionally, due to the problem of the under-identification of models containing age, period and cohort variables, it is difficult to assess whether this indicates generational differences, and generational change, or not. This paper overcomes some of these problems however, by measuring social ageing factors, such as marriage, and using panel data to rigorously assess how individuals change due to these social ageing factors. I find little evidence of psychologists' claims that social ageing leads to increases in authoritarianism, and conclude that both age differences and changes over time are generational in nature.     

Inquiring into activist publics in chronic environmental issues: use of the mutual‐gains approach for breaking a deadlock

This study aims to understand different publics' communicative behaviors for problem solving surrounding an oil spill issue in Korea. Specifically, it explores the differences between chronic activists and other types of publics who were affected by this chronic environmental issue. A total of 24 interviews were conducted, from which five different types of publics were identified. The findings suggest that the majority of activists who are currently working on the issue are closed‐chronic activists, which are slightly different from Ni and Kim's findings on chronic activists' communicative behaviors. Interviews were also conducted with five communication experts to propose viable conflict resolution strategies for the issue. The mutual‐gains approach is recommended as a viable organization–public conflict resolution strategy. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Dole “Godless Americans” advert: representations of the unfaithful,disloyal villains

Using a rhetorical analytic methodology, this study examines the representations constructed in the “Godless Americans” advert from the North Carolina 2008 US Senate race between incumbent Republican Elizabeth Dole and Democratic challenger Kay Hagan. Bringing to consciousness ideologies that influence messages is important because they are often taken at face value without understanding of their underlying meaning. Religious faith, morality and trustworthiness are values conveyed in this advert through the devices of framing, coded language and propaganda techniques. Non-linguistic elements are effectively coordinated to perpetuate the code of disloyal villains, activating cognitive networks of fear and anger toward atheists. By marginalizing atheists, an ideology that runs counter to the US Constitution is exposed coming from a lawmaker entrusted to uphold it.     

Tackling the Performance Regime Paradox: A Problem-Solving Approach Engages Professional Goal-Based Learning

Public performance regimes are bedeviled by a paradox: they must engage the specialized knowledge of professionals who often perceive those very regimes as a threat to their autonomy. The authors use a mixed-method analysis of performance management in Danish hospitals, with separate data for managers and frontline professionals, to offer two insights into this challenge. First, the study shows that managerial behavior—in the form of performance information use—matters to the way frontline professionals engage in goal-based learning. Second, it shows that the way managers use performance data matters. When managers use data in ways that reinforce the perception of performance management as an externally imposed tool of control, professionals withdraw effort. However, when managers use data in ways that solve organizational problems, professionals engage in goal-based learning. The threat to professional values that performance regimes pose can therefore be mitigated by managers using data in ways that complements those values.     

Incrementalism: Dead yet Flourishing

Charles Lindblom's 1959 essay “The Science of ‘Muddling Through’” is best known for the strategy of decision making—disjointed incrementalism—that it recommended. That famous paper and Lindblom's related work also provided two theories: a critique of the conventional method (the synoptic approach) and an argument for using incrementalism instead. Both are applied theories: they are designed to help solve complex policy problems. Lindblom's negative applied theory has stood the test of time well: the empirical foundations of its main micro‐component (cognitive constraints of individuals) and its central macro‐component (the impact of preference conflict on policy making) have grown stronger since 1959. The picture regarding the positive applied theory is more mixed. As a coherent decision‐making strategy, disjointed incrementalism has almost disappeared. Yet its key elements, the major heuristics identified in “Muddling Through,” are thriving in many applied fields. Intriguingly, they are often accompanied by subroutines—especially optimization as a choice rule—typically associated with the synoptic approach.     

我国现阶段家庭问题的心理分析及对策

本文从心理学角度对家庭问题及其原因进行了分析研究,并提出了解决现代家庭问题的基本思路:整体看待家庭问题,增强家庭的正向力量;遵循家庭经营的法则;进行婚姻家庭辅导,构建学习型家庭;营造良好的文化引导氛围。     

Wakeup Call: Strategic Management,Network Alarms,and Performance

New empirical evidence suggests that service performance is shaped by the strategies adopted by public organizations and the networking behavior of public managers. Strategy captures two central behavioral aspects of public organizations: the way in which objectives and actions are selected (processes), and an organization’s approach to service delivery (content). Networking is similarly concerned with the behavior of public managers as they interact with others. These twin themes are linked in an integrated study that explores the relationship between strategy, networking, and service performance within a sample of English local governments. The results show that strategy processes based on rational planning offer long‐run positive effects on public services, as does a strategic proactive stance.     

Intergovernmental Structure and Fiscal Management Strategies: A Crossnational Analysis

Does intergovernmental structure have a systematic effect on the impacts of local governments' fiscal policy responses? Using empirical data from more than 800 local governments in five countries, the article concludes that intergovernmental structure is associated with the impact attributed to various fiscal management strategies. Such strategies have generally had greater impact in local governments in federal systems than those in unitary state systems. There are similarities between federal and unitary local governments regarding the fiscal management strategies that have least impact, and both types stress the importance of productivity gains via technology. But the differences in relative importance and level of impact are more striking than the similarities. In particular, fiscal management strategies involving the relations of the local government with other governments, such as obtaining intergovernmental revenue and shifting service provision to other governments, have greater impact in significantly more federal systems than in unitary state systems. These federal local governments also experience greater impacts from increasing user charges and raising local taxes. In contrast, local governments in unitary state systems place greater reliance on the more politically expeditious strategy of across–the–board expenditure reductions and on reductions of capital spending. These findings suggest that local governments in more decentralized systems have greater flexibility to manipulate relations with other governments in order to enhance their own fiscal situation. The data also suggest that the government's level of fiscal stress is not systematically associated with the level of impact from most fiscal management strategies, especially in the unitary state systems.