Understanding the Policy Process: The Work of Henry Mintzberg

Do Henry Mintzberg's writings make an enduring, invaluable contribution to our understanding of the contemporary public policy process? Mintzberg argues that organizations display eight structural configurations and corresponding coordinating mechanisms. Such structural configurations are shaped by a variety of contingency factors, especially power and environmental ones. Using Mintzberg's work, eight policy modes, corresponding to structural configurations within government organizations and political systems, are identified and placed on a matrix that comprises two dimensions: standardization and centralization. Six polarities in the policy process arise from this matrix. Mintzberg's work, the paper argues, remains of enduring value because it provides a seminal framework for a richer understanding of the current policy process, by offering a contingency theory of structures and policy modes, as well as by frank acknowledgment of the protean nature of the policy process.     

The 1989 European elections: Campaigns and results

Abstract: This article gives an overview discussion of the electoral campaigns and the results of the European elections of 1989. The role of national as well as European actors and issues during the campaigns are highlighted, and the results are discussed, both in view of turnout and party strength, in terms of its likely implications for the national and European political process.     

文化资源排查:一个迫切性的工作

文化资源所具有的巨大的文化价值、社会价值和经济价值已经是全社会的共识。在现代化建设和市场经济背景下，文化资源流失速度空前严重，必须加强文化资源保全。保全文化资源最迫切的是文化资源排查和整理工作，这是保存和保护文化资源的前提，也应成为政府当下的一项重要工作。现在的经济实力和便捷交通为文化排查提供了物质条件，大学生就业难的问题为文化排查准备了人力条件。排查完成后的人才也有相应的社会需求转型。     

Cultural Theory: The Neglected Variable in the Craft of Policy Analysis

This article discusses the role of the craft of policy analysis in public policymaking and, relating to cultural theory, provides a causal explanation for differences and nuances in the craft of policy analysis. Two perspectives underlie this article: The first is the role of policy analysis in policymaking; the second concerns cultural theory and its contribution to policy analysis. While highlighting the role of culture in policy analysis, the article suggests that in order to improve policy analysis processes, policy analysis studies and policy analysis training should take into account cultural factors. Finally, in view of the scarcity of studies in this domain, this article suggests a rationale for studies that enhance the understanding of how political cultures interfere with normative policy analysis and proposes an agenda for research on policy analysis craft by cultural bias.     

The Advantage of Proximity: The Distinctive Role of Local Government in Cultural Policy

The arts and cultural sector has historically relied on funding from state and federal levels of government. Increasingly, however, local government has become a source of distinctive cultural policy making and a provider of significant funding for arts and cultural activities. The paper notes the relative absence of analyses of the role of local government in policy literature. It argues that with the recent proliferation of dedicated local cultural policies and plans, the attention of scholars is warranted. Through an analysis of the cultural plans of five local councils around Australia, the paper argues that the distinctive feature of cultural policy at the local level is a function of local government's proximity to its constituents, flexibility in decision‐making and the discretionary nature of its expenditure.     

Bad for Men,Better for Women: The Impact of Stereotypes During Negative Campaigns

In this paper, we examine whether the impact of negative advertising on citizens’ evaluations of candidates depends on the gender of the candidates. Given common gender stereotypes, we expect negative campaigning aimed at women candidates will affect citizens differently than negative campaigning against male candidates. The results of our study, derived from a survey experiment conducted on a nationwide sample of more than 700 citizens, demonstrate that negative commercials are less effective at depressing evaluations of woman candidates, compared to male candidates. The findings are consistent and strong, across a range of forces that people use to assess competing candidates (i.e., affect and trait evaluations, people’s beliefs about issues, anticipated vote choice). The tight control of the experimental design, including randomization of respondents into different conditions that vary in only one way, demonstrates that the gender of the candidate influences people’s reactions to different types of negative commercials.

The Consequences of Concurrent Campaigns for Citizen Knowledge of Congressional Candidates

Congressional campaigns do not occur in isolation, but concurrently with many other races. What are the effects of overlapping campaigns for how people learn about congressional candidates? On one hand, intensely fought races on the same ballot may encourage people to extend interest to contemporaneous races. Alternatively, competing campaigns may distract voters and limit learning about down-ticket contests. Using American National Election Studies data from 1996 to 2002, I test the consequences of state level presidential, senatorial, and gubernatorial campaign intensity on citizen learning about congressional candidates. I find that while the local intensity of the presidential race has little effect on knowledge of House candidates, the intensity of the Senate race is positively associated with candidate recognition. These effects vary depending on the nature of the election, where House candidates benefit from intense Senate races on the ballot particularly in midterm election years.     

Learning about Learning: Discovering the Work of Policy

The development of policy rests on skilled practice by knowledgeable practitioners – ‘policy work’ – and it is important to know what skills and knowledge this work calls upon, and where these are learned. Although there is substantial academic knowledge and courses in this field, many practitioners will argue that policy work is ‘as much an art as a science’ and is something that ‘you learn as you go’. This article reports on an exploratory study of policy practitioners’ accounts of their practice, what counts as knowledge, and in what contexts it is ‘useful’. We examine the discourses through which policy work is accomplished, the way in which people learn to do it, and the place of academic work in the constitution of these discourses. Drawing on our respondents understanding of policy practice, we discuss what more might be done to facilitate learning about the work of policy.     

Nordic Cultural Baselines: Accounting for Domestic Convergence and Foreign Policy Divergence

The five Nordic countries converged remarkably when developing domestic institutions, but they diverged significantly when developing foreign policies. Grid-group theory prescribes four contending cultures—hierarchy, egalitarianism, individualism, and fatalism—and offers a basis for understanding the structure of political coalitions and conflicts. Surveys from the five Nordic countries measuring cultural baselines are used to estimate the degree of convergence and divergence. The countries converge with reference to high agreement with egalitarianism, individualism, and hierarchy, and disagreement with fatalism. This concords with the historically strong regime of social democracy in this region. The five countries diverge with reference to their foreign policy in that they polarize along two dimensions. To the east, there is increasing fatalism associated with countries not being members of NATO; to the north, there is increasing egalitarianism associated with countries not being members of the European Union. Given the importance of popular support through referenda, an eventual accession of Norway and Iceland to the EU cannot happen unless egalitarianism diminishes among their publics.     

Public Support for Environmental Policy in Finland: Cultural Interpretations of Survey Results

This article studies what the Finnish people think about environmental policy and the policy instruments in use. It describes the main features of the public legitimacy of the environmental policy. The survey results are interpreted using a cultural approach, a concept of 'veil of insignificance' and some ideas of risk society theory. The Inglehartian theory of postmaterialist values is also discussed. The Finns actively support environmental policy when it concerns industry, businesses and landowners, but when the policy instruments interfere with people's own lives their support decreases radically. The article argues that the reasons for these contradictory attitudes are more complex than the freerider theory supposes. According to international surveys made during the 1990s, the Finns are less concerned about environmental problems than are people in other European countries. The article argues, for cultural and historical reasons, the Finns have a strong ecological self-identity which can in some conditions hinder the development of more ecological attitudes.     

From Public Support for the Arts to Cultural Policy

Although public funding for the arts had been an element of budget and appropriations business at both the federal and state levels for over a quarter century, the idea that policy justifies and directs these resource allocations has been slow to emerge. This article provides a historiographical discussion of how the issue was framed and of the resistance to the term “cultural policy” through reference to contextual, political, and epistemic factors. It then uses four presidential reports ranging from 1953 to 1997 to track the evolution of political language concerning the policy definition of the arts and culture, the roles and responsibilities of the federal government regarding these, and the emergence of a range of policy issues beyond public funding.     

Gender and Jail Work: Correctional Policy Implications of Perceptual Diversity in the Work Force

Although women now represent a significant proportion of many (if not most) jail staffs, the degree to which their perceptions of corrections work differs from males' remains largely unexplored. In this paper, we compare female and male jail staff perceptions regarding the stress associated with work in jails, the job satisfaction to be derived from jail work, the job environment experienced in jails and the level of commitment to jail facilities across five jail settings. Our findings show important gender-based similarities and differences that need to be understood to maximize the benefits of the work force diversity that women bring to the corrections profession.     

Sub-National Election Campaigns: The Danish Local Elections of November 1989*

Electoral campaigning is studied almost without exception at the national level. This article has chosen another road, claiming that electoral campaigning can also be studied at the local election level. Campaigning before the Danish local elections of 21 November 1989 is studied. The design permits comparisons between the two levels (national/local) as well as between different units at the local level. It furthermore provides an opportunity for studying the influence of local party systems as well as local mass media on election campaigning. A substantial part of the article discusses the institutional frameworks surrounding electoral campaigning in the municipalities studied and in general. It is maintained that the electoral system, the mass media structure, and the (local) party system are important contextual factors or frameworks. Given this, it is argued that organization, past performance, and campaign focus as a mix of policy proposals and leader image are paramount in affecting the local election vote. The main conclusions are: local election campaigning differs from national election campaigning; local election campaigning matters, i.e. it has a direct effect on the vote; and the functions of local party organizations in connection with local elections and local performance make them less vulnerable to organizational decline, which most mass membership political parties are experiencing at the national level.     

基层自治:对社区公共事务和文化生活的管理——日本冲绳县言壳谷村区自治会的考察与分析

日本社会基层自治组织的性质、功能和活动内容在富有长期历史传统的基础上 ,又随着国家经济、政治和文化制度的变化而逐步演进发展。本文通过对日本冲绳县言壳谷村区自治会的实地考察和资料分析 ,力图取得一些有益的认识 ,以期对推进我国的基层组织和民主政治建设起到他山之石的作用。