Contribution limits and the effectiveness of campaign spending

Much work on the apparent ineffectiveness on incumbent spending in congressional elections has hypothesized that the productivity of incumbent spending is low because incumbents operate on the “flat part” of their election returns function. Differences in campaign spending associated with state campaign finance laws allows for a test of this hypothesis because restrictions on campaign contributions tend to reduce campaign spending. Exploiting cross-state variation in campaign finance laws, this study tests whether campaign expenditures by state House candidates are more productive when candidates are subject to contribution limits. The results show that campaign expenditures by incumbents and challengers are more productive when candidates run in states with campaign contribution limits, as opposed to in states without limits. In states with contribution limits, incumbent spending and challenger spending are equally productive, and spending by both candidates is quantitatively important in increasing their vote shares.     

America's Palimpsest: Ground-Zero Democracy and the Capitol Mall

This article examines the history of the Capitol Mall from its inception in 1791 to recent legislation prohibiting further development along the Mall's primary axes. This movement to restrict further development of the Mall's massive open spaces derives from concerns that fail to fully articulate the iconographic significance these spaces represent. Drawing from the Mall's 200-year history of master planning, this article examines the Mall's palimpsestic and emergent qualities and presents planning criteria that make it possible to build future commemorative works within the Mall's primary open spaces while retaining the overall integrity of its grandeur.     

The tripartite regulation of America's health services

The Republican takeover of Congress suggests that the payer-driven forces of managed care, capitated payment, and the regional networks (alliances) will serve as centerpieces to improve the organization, financing, and delivery of our nation's health services. These "voluntary" alliances, frequently as an amalgamation of health providers and health insurance underwriters, often foreshadow the powerful, geographically linked regional health networks that are evolving into oligopolies. The authors anticipate, as a result, the formation of state health services commissions that will regulate market share, the scope of health services, reimbursement rates and allowable profits. State departments of public health and insurance will have their own regulatory duties. Complex relationships will result as these groups will often have conflicting, politically-charged goals.     

Public campaign financing and the rise of radical-right parties

While public campaign financing is often thought of as a way to “level the playing field” of elections, I argue that such policies may have unintended second-order consequences. Namely, that increasing the degree to which public funding drives political campaigns disproportionately aids radical-right parties. This is a counter-intuitive result, as public financing of elections has recently become an important issue for those on the political left as a method to restore power to the majority. Rather, it seems to aid not only those on the right, but those on the political fringe. Through a cross-national analysis of 328 lower-house elections in 20 advanced democracies, I demonstrate that public financing serves to significantly increase vote-share of the radical-right.     

The campaign dynamics of economic voting

This paper considers the relationship between election campaigns and the impact of economic evaluations on vote choice. The motivation is the standard expectation that the campaign generally serves to amplify the significance of economic considerations in the voter's calculus—to focus his/her attention on this “fundamental” element of the electoral decision. Drawing on survey data from ten national elections across four countries (Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States) and applying both parametric and semi-parametric statistical techniques, the paper finds no support for this proposition. The paper reflects on the significance of this conclusion for work on political learning during election campaigns, the literature on economic voting, and the study of electoral behaviour more generally.     

Citizen uncertainty and turnout in the 1980 presidential campaign

In this paper the concept of uncertainty regarding for whom a citizen should vote is developed and is shown to be an important component of rational choice models of decision making. Uncertainty is measured using the 7-point issue scales from the 1980 Center for Political Studies survey. A nonrecursive, simultaneous-equation model of the determinants of uncertainty and turnout is developed and is estimated using a “modified” two-stage least squares technique. Among other results, we find that uncertainty is the most important determinant of whether or not citizens vote—stronger than civic duty, education, or strength of partisanship.     

Judicial politics in Britain: Patrolling the boundaries

This study considers judicial policy‐making in Great Britain by noting the peculiarly British institutional restraints on judicial action of parliamentary sovereignty, the resulting subordination of all courts to the legislative branch and the absence of a codified charter of rights or constitution. Though there is no judicial power to annul legislative or executive actions, British courts and judges still play a small, but significant, role in policy‐making through the common law and, in particular, through judicial review of adminstrative actions. A written bill of rights would likely draw courts further into the the political arena and politicise the appointment of judges.     

Changing paradigms: Changing interpretations of the public sector in Latin America's economies

Public Choice - This paper attempts to show that over time most economists' view of the role of the state in Latin America's economies has changed considerably. In the 1950s and 1960s state...     

Europeanisation and social movements: The case of the Stop TTIP campaign

Over the past years, the economic crisis has significantly challenged the ways through which social movements have conceptualised and interacted with European Union institutions and policies. Although valuable research on the Europeanisation of movements has already been conducted, finding moderate numbers of Europeanised protests and actors, more recent studies on the subject have been limited to austerity measures and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) has been investigated more from a trade unions’ or an international relations perspective. In this article, the TTIP is used as a very promising case study to analyse social movements’ Europeanisation – that is, their capacity to mobilise referring to European issues, targets and identities. Furthermore, the TTIP is a crucial test case because it concerns a policy area (foreign trade) which falls under the exclusive competence of the EU. In addition, political opportunities for civil society actors are ‘closed’ in that negotiations are kept ‘secret’ and discussed mainly within the European Council, and it is difficult to mobilise a large public on such a technical issue. So why and how has this movement become ‘Europeanised’? This comparative study tests the Europeanisation hypothesis with a protest event analysis on anti‐TTIP mobilisation in six European countries (Italy, Spain, France, the United Kingdom, Germany and Austria) at the EU level in the period 2014–2016 (for a total of 784 events) and uses semi‐structured interviews in Brussels with key representatives of the movement and policy makers. The findings show that there is strong adaptation of social movements to multilevel governance – with the growing presence of not only purely European actors, but also European targets, mobilisations and transnational movement networks – with a ‘differential Europeanisation’. Not only do the paths of Europeanisation vary from country to country (and type of actor), but they are also influenced by the interplay between the political opportunities at the EU and domestic levels.