Politics and Corporate‐Sector Environmentally Significant Actions: The Effects of Political Partisanship on U.S. Utilities Energy Efficiency Policies

This study assesses the direct, indirect, and total impacts of political partisanship on state‐level utilities' investment in energy efficiency. This subject is of utmost importance because energy efficiency improvement has become a linchpin in worldwide efforts to combat climate change and other environmental challenges. Analysis of data on 51 electric utilities nested within 31 U.S. states indicates that political partisanship influences utilities' energy efficiency policies. There is strong evidence that electric utilities in states dominated by the Republican Party are less likely to invest in energy efficiency than those in states governed by the Democratic Party. This finding suggests that political partisanship may be shaping the policy and regulatory frameworks put in place by state governments to incentivize or compel the participation of private‐sector entities' in environmental management and/or resource conservation.     

The Era of State Energy Policy Innovation: A Review of Policy Instruments

U.S. energy and climate policy has evolved from the bottom‐up, led by state governments, and internationally recognized for the use of unconventional and innovative policy instruments. This study focuses on policy instruments adopted throughout the era of state energy policy innovation that aim to diversify, decentralize, and decarbonize the electricity sector. Specific attention is devoted to the renewable portfolio standard, net metering, interconnection standards, tax incentives, public benefit funds, and energy efficiency resource standards. This analysis synthesizes the findings from the energy policy literature and provides a summary of the current state of understanding about the effects of various state energy policy instruments, and concludes with a discussion of broader trends that have emerged from the use of policy instruments in the state energy policy innovation era.     

A 21st Century Low‐Carbon Transition in U.S. Electric Power: Extent,Contributing Factors,and Implications

The U.S. electric power sector has experienced a substantial shift of the generation mix since the turn of the century, moving from heavy reliance on coal‐powered generation to one drawing more from natural gas and, more recently, renewables. This transition has been forged by a mix of macroeconomic factors (recession and recovery); technological breakthroughs (horizontal drilling coupled with hydraulic fracturing; improvements in natural gas plant efficiency); clean energy policies at federal, state, and local levels of government; and private sector demands for carbon‐free energy sources. These factors have combined to reduce carbon emissions from electric power generation substantially this century. In this article we examine the extent of this transition, its causes, as well as the distinct American institutional factors steering it, including energy and environmental federalism, electoral politics, and the political economy of clean energy policy enactment and resistance.     

Housing,Welfare Reform,and Self‐Sufficiency: An Assessment of the Family Self‐Sufficiency Program

Abstract

Recently passed welfare reform legislation may have adverse impacts on the incomes of public and assisted housing residents and hence on the rental income of housing authorities. One way to dampen these impacts is to help welfare‐reliant tenants find jobs. The Family Self‐Sufficiency (FSS) programs sponsored by many housing authorities may be an important means of doing this. This article presents the findings of an early study of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's FSS program and explores the program's potential for dampening the impacts of welfare reform. The study involved a mail survey of the coordinators of 564 FSS programs.

The survey results indicate a surprising lack of interest in the early FSS program among potential participants. The results also indicate that these programs are inadequately staffed, and that the programs’ potential to dampen the effects of welfare reform are limited by the relatively small percentage of welfare‐reliant residents enrolled.     

The container security initiative costs,implications and relevance to developing countries

Following 9/11, the Department of Homeland Security established the Container Security Initiative (CSI) programme in 2002 in response to the threat from terrorist attacks involving weapons of mass destruction transported by cargo containers. This project establishes the tracking and targeting of ‘high risk’ containers and their subsequent scanning with X‐ray machines before loading onto the U.S. bound ships. To date, 44 of the world's largest ports have agreed to become CSI‐compliant, the majority of which are located in industrialised countries, while developing and least developed countries are under‐represented. CSI‐eligibility requires that ports represent a considerable volume of U.S. bound container traffic and invest in container scanning devices. Every non‐intrusive inspecting device (NII) costs several million dollars while investments in IT and existing infrastructure often triple the compliance costs. Containers originating in a CSI port are expedited through U.S. customs, representing a comparative trade barrier for exporters from non‐CSI ports. Thus, CSI acts as a tool for the U.S. to improve security, while representing a challenge to exporting countries' market access. This article provides an evaluation of the impacts this plan will have on the export competitiveness of developing countries. It reviews the potential benefits this programme offers in terms of improved trade facilitation, as well as proposing recommendations for its expansion to include developing countries. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Defining Environmental Justice Communities for Regulatory Enforcement: Implications from a Block‐Group‐Level Analysis of New York State

The absence of a clear definition of environmental justice areas has been cited as one of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's major deficiencies in managing federal environmental justice programs. Several states have explicitly defined potential environmental justice areas and integrated targeted efforts into the policy‐making process. At the block‐group level, this study evaluates the effects of New York State's environmental justice policy, which defines communities of concern in terms of demographic and socioeconomic characteristics as well as mandates supplemental regulatory enforcement activities for these neighborhoods, on the agency's policy implementation practices under the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act. The empirical findings suggest that there is inconclusive evidence regarding race/ethnicity‐ and class‐based environmental inequity. Also, the state's policy intervention is not universally effective. Moreover, task environments of a given community are a consistent determinant of the agency's regulatory compliance monitoring and assurance activities. This study then derives broader implications regarding the adoption of a policy instrument that defines and screens potential environmental justice communities.     

“Plug into Choice”? The Trouble with Common-Sense Participation in a Smart Electric Grid

Smart electric grids add digital technologies to the grid. While some suggest that they offer many environmental and social benefits, others remain critical and call them a neoliberal project. Considering smart grids a boundary object [Star, Susan L., and James R. Griesemer. 1989. “Institutional Ecology, Translations and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley’s Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907–39.” Social Studies of Science 19 (3): 387–420], I examine how multiple social groups come together in cooperation and conflict in the installation of one smart grid. In what follows, I first argue that participation is Gramscian common sense (1971), a taken-for-granted good in producing a smart grid. Gramsci points out that common sense can be used to reinforce oppressive ideologies of a hegemonic status quo, but that it also contains “good sense” that can be developed into counter-hegemonic narratives and movements. Second, I argue that in the course of cooperation and conflict, the smart grid indeed becomes more neoliberal, and this occurs through participation. While the utility often seeks or accepts public participation, the meaning of participation gradually becomes limited to individualistic and financially motivated “choice.” In the discussed case, many of the (less neoliberal) social and environmental benefits of the grid and more collectivist forms of participation were precluded. This article offers a grounded examination of a smart grid and a sympathetic critique of common-sense participation.     

Prominent Role Models: High‐Profile Female Politicians and the Emergence of Women as Candidates for Public Office

Can prominent female politicians inspire other women to enter politics? A woman occupying a high‐profile office directly impacts women's substantive representation through her policy actions. Here, we consider whether these female leaders also facilitate a mobilization effect by motivating other women to run for office. We posit that prominent women in politics serve as role models for other women interested in political careers, causing an increase in female candidates. We test this theory with data from the American states, which exhibit considerable variation in the sex of state legislative candidates and the high‐profile offices of governor and U.S. senator. Using a weighting method and data spanning 1978–2012, we demonstrate that high‐profile women exert substantively large positive effects on female candidates. We conclude that women in major offices are crucial for women's representation. Beyond their direct policy impact, they amplify women's political voice by motivating more women to enter politics.     

Integration of Environmental Concerns in a Trans‐Atlantic Perspective: The Case of Renewable Electricity

The issue of integrating environmental concerns into energy policy decision making is increasingly addressed, not least related to climate change. Although the United States, unlike the EU, did not sign the Kyoto Protocol, several U.S. states promote renewable electricity (RES‐E), and some of these initiatives are linked to climate‐change mitigation efforts. The present article assesses in this connection the six New England states of the United States, comparing their efforts of integrating RES‐E with climate change to the Nordic countries in Europe. In order to explain different approaches, the article focuses on the importance of different EU and U.S. multilevel governing structures. The analysis indicates that the New England states' RES‐E promotion thus far has not been substantially integrated with climate‐change concerns, whereas in the EU's more top‐down approach, climate change figures more prominently vis‐à‐vis RES‐E. EU policies represent an increasingly important driver for the Nordic countries. In the United States, on the other hand, it remains an open question as to how future federal policy efforts will relate to existing policies at the state level.     

Why Is the Intelligence Community So Difficult to Redesign? Smart Practices,Conflicting Goals,and the Creation of Purpose‐Based Organizations

The adoption of “smart practices” requires that smart practices can actually be identified for the areas of public policy in which we are interested. For the problem of designing structures for public agencies, however, identifying smart practices is not easy. This article explores the reasons for the substantial conservativism, lasting over 50 years, regarding the structural design of the U.S. intelligence community. One central argument is simply that it was very difficult to discover a clearly superior structure; in fact, the long‐standing structure may have had some unrecognized virtues. But the other central argument is that one smart practice may have emerged since the 9/11 attacks: It involves the creation of problem‐focused interagency centers that are intended to enhance the sharing and integration of information within the intelligence community. These conclusions about redesigning the structure of the intelligence community are based on the arguments of Luther Gulick on methods of departmentalization and Martin Landau on redundancy and system reliability.     

The Effect of R&D Investment on Graduate Student Productivity: Evidence From the Life Sciences

This study examines the role of graduate training and R&D investments on research productivity by focusing on the effect of federal funding for early‐career graduate students. We employ a difference‐in‐differences research design drawing upon a sample of high‐quality life science graduate students who either are award recipients or honorable mentions of the prestigious U.S. National Science Foundation's Graduate Research Fellowship Program. We find that a $91,000 grant over three years has a limited, yet positive impact on the awardee's productivity. These effects are driven by the sample of graduate students without publications prior to applying for the fellowship.     

Political Science and Prediction: What's Next for U.S. Climate Change Policy?

This article analyzes how U.S. climate change politics and policy making are changing in the public, private and civil society sectors, and how such changes are likely to influence U.S. federal policies. It outlines the current status of U.S. climate change action and explores four overlapping pathways of policy change: (1) the strategic demonstration of the feasibility of climate change action; (2) the creation and expansion of markets; (3) policy diffusion and learning; and (4) the creation and promulgation of norms about the need for more aggressive climate change action. These four pathways seek to fruitfully draw from rationalist and constructivist approaches to policy analysis, without collapsing or confusing the different logics. Building on this analysis, it predicts that future federal U.S. climate policy will include six major components: (1) A national cap on GHG emissions; (2) A national market based cap‐and‐trade GHG emissions trading scheme; (3) Mandatory renewable energy portfolio standards; (4) Increased national product standards for energy efficiency; (5) Increased vehicle fleet energy efficiency standards; and (6) Increased federal incentives for research and development on energy efficiency issues and renewable energy development. In addition, expanding federal climate policy may bring about significant changes in U.S. foreign policy as U.S. international re‐engagement on climate change is likely to occur only after the development of more significant federal policy.     

After the Fukushima Disaster: Japan's Nuclear Policy Change from 2011 to 2012

This article analyzes why and how the cabinet of Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) decided in September 2012 to phase‐out nuclear power plants by 2039—the decision representing a large policy change from previous energy‐supply policy, in which the dependence on nuclear power would continuously grow. In doing so, this article examines the causal relationship between three factors identified on the basis of theoretical models explaining policy change; change in the governing coalition from the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to DPJ in 2009, the Fukushima accident, and the change in public opinion. Based on opinion poll and deliberative polling data, as well as discourse analyses of DPJ leaders’ statements, the article concludes that the change in public opinion on nuclear energy after the Fukushima accident was crucial in inducing the DPJ's decision to phase‐out nuclear power plants by affecting DPJ leaders' interests in vote‐ and office‐seeking. Finally, I discuss the applicability of the theoretical models developed on the basis of U.S. pluralistic cases to Japan and the issues to be explored for the further development of policy process models.     

Which Way to U.S. Climate Cooperation? Issue Linkage versus a U.S.‐Based Agreement

Several scholars have suggested that the United States can be compelled to reengage in the Kyoto process by linking cooperation on climate change to cooperation on trade or technology research and development. We argue that such issue linkage would likely fail and suggest that a more promising road to U.S. cooperation is to develop an alternative climate agreement based on federal U.S. climate policy. However, the question then becomes whether the Kyoto countries might be prepared to abandon the Kyoto process in favor of such a U.S.‐based agreement. We argue that if a U.S.‐based agreement were to be built on President Bush's current climate policy, the Kyoto countries (especially the European Union) would likely be reluctant to go along. However, if a U.S.‐based agreement were to be built on the many Kyoto‐like initiatives now emerging at state and local levels, the Kyoto countries might well be more favorably inclined.     

Food insecurity negatively impacts academic performance

Recent research has documented high rates of food insecurity among university students, particularly students in their first year. Food insecurity among university students has been linked to poorer self‐reported health and academic outcomes. However, few studies have linked reports of food insecurity to objective student outcomes. In this study, we examine how food insecurity is associated with first‐year university students' (n = 591) academic performance, adjusting for objective measures of high school academic performance and self‐reported indicators of socioeconomic background. Zero‐ and one‐inflated beta regression was used to examine if food insecurity predicted grade point average (GPA) in the fall 2015 and spring 2016 semesters. Logistic regression was used to determine if food insecurity at the end of the fall 2015 and spring 2016 semesters was a predictor of retention to fall 2016. Food‐insecure students had a significantly lower GPA than food‐secure students. In fall 2015, 59% of food‐insecure students obtained at least a “B” grade (GPA = 3.00); our models suggest this percentage would increase to 72% if these same students were food secure. Food‐insecure students were less likely to be enrolled in fall 2016 than food‐secure students (OR = 0.72, 95% CI [0.41, 1.27]), though this difference was not statistically significant. These results indicate that food insecurity negatively impacts first‐year university students' academic performance, even after adjusting for high school academic performance and socioeconomic background. Students GPA, and potentially university retention rates, may increase if food insecurity on campus is minimized.     

The impact of kindergarten entrance age policies on the childcare needs of families

The past two decades have seen a rising trend in the minimum entrance age for kindergarten in the U.S. A little‐noticed, but potentially large, consequence of raising the minimum entrance age is that it imposes additional childcare costs for families whose children are forced to stay out of school for an additional year. This paper develops a model for parents' kindergarten entrance age decisions and examines the relationship between socio‐economic factors and parents' desired entrance age for their child using a nationally representative dataset on kindergartners in the U.S. The estimates from this model are used to simulate the impact of alternate changes in kindergarten entrance age policies on the number and characteristics of children affected by the policy change, and to estimate the additional childcare cost burden from the policy change. © 2006 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management     

The Macroeconomic Effects of 2017 Through 2025 Federal Fuel Economy and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards

In the absence of a national carbon price, the federal Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards and the related greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) standards are the primary mechanisms through which the U.S. reduces transportation GHG emissions. In 2012, these standards were set to rise for light‐duty vehicles between 2017 and 2025, eventually achieving a target of 54.5 miles per gallon in 2025. Since 2012, conditions have changed: forecasts of future gasoline prices have dropped dramatically, consumers have demanded larger vehicles, and the cost of compliance appears to be larger than previously thought. In this article, we analyze the possible macroeconomic effects of the standards with both 2012 inputs and updated inputs to reflect these new market developments. The results reveal that the short‐term effects of the federal standards will be negative, but the long‐term effects will be positive, using both 2012 and updated inputs. The transition from annual negative employment impacts to positive impacts occurs between 2023 and 2026, depending on which set of assumptions are used. Possible revisions to the standards that freeze them at 2020 levels or decrease their stringency reduce short‐term negative impacts but also reduce long‐term positive impacts. We conclude with a discussion of policy implications as they relate to the current energy and climate policy conditions.     

Impact of “U.S. Veterans' Access,Choice and Accountability Act of 2014” on employee morale and work behavior: Does “creating an at‐will workplace” lead to better outcomes?

This study estimates the impact of job security rule changes on federal civilian employees' work attitudes and behavior (i.e., job satisfaction and turnover intention) by looking at recent U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)'s Veterans' Access, Choice and Accountability Act (VACAA) of 2014. The data for the analysis are derived from the 2010, 2011, 2013, 2014, and 2015 U.S. Federal Employee Viewpoint Surveys. A difference‐in‐differences quasiexperimental methodology was used to examine the effect of a job security rule change on VA employee job satisfaction and turnover intention. This study's results indicate that the overall effect of the introduction of a new job security rule at VA is a decrease of approximately 7 percentage points in employee job satisfaction and 8 percentage points in employee turnover intention, which are a substantial effect. This study contributes to both the theoretical and the empirical understanding of at‐will employment systems and public employee work morale and attitudes.     

Learning from the Philippine occupation: nation‐building and institutional development in Iraq and other high security risk nations

Outcomes of armed conflict in Afghanistan and Iraq indicate that the U.S. has been unprepared to fully address problems related to establishing social and economic stability, security and governance in the aftermath of war. This is unfortunate, given that U.S. policy makers' nation‐building efforts to achieve stability, security and good governance in these nations do not reflect what they should already have learnt about organisational and institutional development from past experiences providing significant development assistance to highly unstable nations. Based on the analysis rendered in this article, ‘smart practice’ development administration in such nations comprises the following key points that link nation building to institutional/organisational development:

• Nation building (creating new national sovereignty) is different from, and harder than, building government capacity (creating or strengthening institutions and organisations).
• Given that building government capacity typically requires years of patient assistance and financing, it is better to build on existing indigenous institutions like the civil service and military.
• The time and expense of development assistance to high security risk nations means that it is advisable to establish a multi‐lateral development assistance plan and a multi‐national, multi‐institutional framework for financing development to pay for all that is necessary over a long period of time (i.e. 20–50 years).
• Policy makers should emphasise social stability and stable economic growth under self‐governance to prevent actual or perceived economic exploitation.
• Policy makers' diplomatic efforts should secure accommodation of various stakeholders sufficient to permit compromise leading to formation of an independent government.
• Where occupation appears necessary to achieve security and stability, policy makers should allocate enough troops and money to do the job, and accurately assess and report all costs of military occupation and nation building.
• Once occupation has occurred, policy makers should not withdraw military support in a way that would increase the likelihood of civil war.
• Premature withdrawal of security, economic and political support prior to the point where high security risk nations are capable of governing themselves will cause a power vacuum, and may result in fragmented regional leadership by warlords. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.