Legislative Voting Behavior,Seen and Unseen: A Theory of Roll‐Call Vote Selection

The empirical study of legislative behavior largely relies on roll‐call vote analysis, but roll‐call votes in many legislatures represent only a sample of legislative votes. We have good reasons to believe this sample is particularly poor for inferring party effects on legislative behavior. The selection of votes for roll call may be endogenous to exactly the characteristics of voting behavior (for instance, party cohesion) that we want to study. We must understand the roll‐call vote institution and account for its selection effects before we can draw inferences about legislative behavior from roll‐call results. This article develops a game‐theoretic model of roll‐call vote requests predicated on party leaders requesting votes to enforce party discipline. The model offers general and testable predictions about the selection process and how it affects observed and unobserved legislative voting behavior, particularly party cohesion.     

THE IMPACT OF PUBLIC MANAGEMENT REFORMS ON STUDENT PERFORMANCE IN DANISH SCHOOLS

Many resources have been invested in reforming the public sectors of most countries in the world during the last 20 years. Greater focus on evaluation and performance is one of the most central aspects of these reforms, but despite much academic research virtually no systematic evaluations of the outcome of the reforms themselves are found. This paper presents a study of the effect of performance management reforms of Danish public schools on the achievements of more than 80,000 lower secondary students. The study finds no or very small effects on performance measured as average exam scores, but highly significant effects on inequity in the sense that students with low socioeconomic status perform worse at reforming schools than at similar non‐reforming schools. These results, as well as the methodological challenges involved in estimating reform impact, emphasize the need for more empirical scrutiny of what effects the reforms have.     

POWER-CONTROL THEORY,GENDER, AND DELINQUENCY: A PARTIAL REPLICATION WITH ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE ON THE EFFECTS OF PEERS*

This examination of Hagan et al.'s (1985, 1987) power-control theory of delinquency and gender finds that gender and delinquency are related to the relative authority of parents at work in ways unexpected by power-control theory. Support is found, however, for the power-control thesis pertaining to parental control and risk-taking attitudes. In reconciling differences between these findings and those of Hagan et al., the conclusion is that relations of affiliation as well as parental authority are important determinants of delinquency and its relationship with gender.     

A Contagious Concept: Explaining the Spread of Privatization in the Telecommunications Sector

Qualitative studies suggest that the spread of privatization of public utilities is due to a change of the economic paradigm and institutional isomorphism pressures. However, current quantitative studies mostly account for domestic factors. These factors can explain differences in national privatization trajectories but cannot explain the large trend. Based on a quantitative analysis of privatizations in the telecommunications sector in 21 OECD countries, the article argues that emulation pressures can explain the trend toward privatization. The analysis suggests that privatization gained legitimacy as more and more governments emulated privatization policies they observed in countries they perceived as similar. However, the article finds no evidence of cross‐sectoral diffusion. Thus, according to the analysis, telecommunications privatization diffused within the same sector between countries, but not within the same country between different sectors.     

After Enlargement: Voting Patterns in the Sixth European Parliament

We examined how voting behavior in the European Parliament changed after the European Union added ten new member‐states in 2004. Using roll‐call votes, we compared voting behavior in the first half of the Sixth European Parliament (July 2004‐December 2006) with voting behavior in the previous Parliament (1999–2004). We looked at party cohesion, coalition formation, and the spatial map of voting by members of the European Parliament. We found stable levels of party cohesion and interparty coalitions that formed mainly around the left‐right dimension. Ideological distance between parties was the strongest predictor of coalition preferences. Overall, the enlargement of the European Union in 2004 did not change the way politics works inside the European Parliament. We also looked at the specific case of the controversial Services Directive and found that ideology remained the main predictor of voting behavior, although nationality also played a role.     

To Simulate or NOMINATE?

Carroll et al. (2009) summarize the similarities and differences between the NOMINATE and IDEAL methods of fitting spatial voting models to binary roll‐call data. As those authors note, for the class of problems with which either NOMINATE and the Bayesian quadratic‐normal model can be used, the ideal point estimates almost always coincide, and when they do not, the discrepancy is due to the somewhat arbitrary identification and computational constraints imposed by each method. There are, however, many problems for which the Bayesian quadratic‐normal model can be easily generalized, so as to address a broad array of questions and take advantage of additional data. Given the nature and source of the differences between NOMINATE and the Bayesian approach—as well as the fact that both approaches are approximations of the decision‐making processes being modeled—we believe that it is preferable to choose the more flexible Bayesian approach.