REPRESENTATION, REAPPORTIONMENT, AND THE SUPREME COURT

Abstract. The reapportionment of congressional and state legislative districts occasioned by decennial censuses has generated intense political and judicial conflict. This conflict has made clearer several obstacles to a deeper understanding of the nature of representation. It has also led to the fashioning of a new equal protection jurisprudence by the Supreme Court in an attempt to grapple with apportionment disputes. The Court has established clear standards for redistricting congressional and state legislative seats. Yet after two decades, the Court has still not produced judicially manageable standards to deal with the problems of partisan gerrymandering, affirmative gerrymandering,'political fairness', and the Court's impact on public policy. A review of the pertinent cases makes it possible to forecast the probable outcome of litigation involving these issues in the 1980 round of reapportionments.     

AGENDA-SETTING BY STATE LEGISLATIVE BLACK CAUCUSES: POLICY PRIORITIES AND FACTORS OF SUCCESS

As their representation in legislative chambers has increased, black state legislators have organized into caucuses to maximize their policy influence. These caucuses act as policy entrepreneurs in initiating and advancing minority policy goals. The North Carolina Legislative Black Caucus is il- lustrative of an emerging force in half the states in moving minority policy issues from the systemic to the formal legislative agenda. Using the 1987 North Carolina Legislative Black Caucus as the research setting, supple- mented with selective data on other state caucuses, this article offers insights into the types of policy initiatives state legislative black caucuses advance. Also, situational and political factors that may foster successful agenda-setting are explored.     

ENERGY POLICY: HOW FAILURE WAS SNATCHED FROM THE JAWS OF SUCCESS

Prior to the energy crisis of 1973, the U.S. did not have an energy policy. The failure of the American political system to anticipate and respond to the changing facts of energy was an inevitable outcome of the way policy is made. Consistent with tradition, the search for a consensus was begun from 1973–1980. The U.S. abandoned cheap energy as a high priority and adopted secure, abundant and clean energy. Conservation came to be viewed as a source of energy along with nuclear power and synfuels. Price deregulation was the most important policy tool. The Reagan administration upset this consensus and substituted the market place as the means for maximizing supplies rather than reduce demand.
The federal role was limited to bringing publicly-owned bonds into the marketplace. At the same time, it reduced RED and concern for the environment. Thus, the Reagan administration succeeded in snatching failure from the jaws of success.     

POLICY COMMUNITY,POLICY NETWORKS AND SCIENCE POLICY IN AUSTRALIA

Abstract: The policy community approach to policy analysis has been developed from ideas expressed by Richardson and Jordan in 1979. The approach is increasingly used to identify the key actors and groups of actors who make policy decisions, to analyse the interactions between the groups and to hypothesise about the types of outcomes achieved. The approach aids analysis in policy contexts which cut across the boundaries of individual organisations in the policy process, across the public and private sectors, and beyond national boundaries. This paper evaluates several expositions of the approach with reference to an analysis of science policy in Australia and suggests typological refinements which enhance its explanatory capacity.     

PRIVATIZATION AND CORRECTIONS POLICY

Because corrections is a multibillion dollar growth industry it is attractive to profitmaking firms. The issue is not whether private firms should b e involved in corrections, for they already are; the issue i s how much Involvement should there b e and in what areas. The principal argument used in favor of private involvement is that they will be more efficient than public agencies. But, while this may well be true, the problem is, what impact will this have on corrections policy? Will it increase the move toward retribution and away from rehabilitation? Existing private involvement in corrections has been primarily in the direction of finding workable alternatives to prisons. Private profitmaking firms may take us in the opposite direction. A number of other issues and problems of privatization also are discussed.     

INTERNATIONAL FUTURES AND POLICY

Donna Meadows with John Richardson and Gerhart Bruckman . Groping in the Dark: The First Decade of Global Modelling .
Brita Schwarz with Uno Svedin and Björn Wittrock . Methods in Future Studies: Problems and Applications .
U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment . Global Models, World Futures, and Public Policy: A Critique .
Council on Environmental Quality and Department of State . The Global 2000 Report to the President: Entering the Twenty-First Century
Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development , Interfutures: Facing the Future: Mastering the Probable and Managing the Unpredictable
Richard Barnet . The Lean Years: Politics in the Age of Scarcity
Lester Brown . Building a Sustainable Society
Orio Giarini . Dialogue on Wealth and Welfare: An Alternative View of World Capital Formation
Julian Simon . The Ultimate Resource
Michael Marien and Lane Jennings (Eds.) . Future Survey Annual