The New Public Management, Homeland Security, and the Politics of Civil Service Reform

This article examines the George W. Bush administration's efforts to apply New Public Management reforms to the Department of Homeland Security. The primary focus is the administration's attempt to implement the law. The managerial strategy that Department of Homeland Security and Office of Personnel Management executives used to carry out the law in the massive new department receives attention, with a special focus on the approach used in dealing with the federal courts. The article suggests five general lessons concerning civil service deregulation at the federal level. The case reaffirms the notion that successful administrative reform requires a keen appreciation for the politics that shape it.     

The Politics of Bureaucracy and the failure of post-war reconstruction

Gordon Tullock’s The Politics of Bureaucracy must be considered one of the most important works on bureaucracy ever written. In this paper, I argue that Tullock’s analysis of bureaucracy is as relevant as ever. To support this claim, I focus on U.S.-led reconstruction efforts which attempt to export liberal democracy via military occupation. Bureaucratic organizations play a key role in these reconstruction efforts and as such, Tullock’s analysis is directly relevant. It is argued that Tullock’s study clarifies not just the limits of bureaucratic activity, but also the importance of spontaneous orders for coordinating activities outside those limits and generating the very institutional context in which liberal democracy can evolve and sustain. The main conclusion is that the nature of public bureaucracy constrains the ability of the United States to exogenously impose liberal democratic institutions in foreign countries for the very reasons Tullock emphasized long ago.     

Fair Treatment in a Divided Society: A Bottom‐up Assessment of Bureaucratic Encounters in Latvia

In real‐world bureaucratic encounters the Weberian goal of perfect impersonal administration is not completely attained and unfairness sometimes results. Theories of bias attribute unfairness to social characteristics such as income, education, ethnicity, and gender. A random theory characterizes unfairness as the result of idiosyncratic conditions that give everyone an equal probability of being treated unfairly regardless of their social characteristics. In Latvia, bias would be expected on grounds of ethnicity as well as social characteristics, since its population is divided politically by citizenship, language, and ethnicity as well as socioeconomic characteristics. Survey data from the New Baltic Barometer shows that a majority of both Latvians and Russians expect fair treatment in bureaucratic encounters and multivariate statistical analysis confirms the random hypothesis. Insofar as unfair treatment occurs it tends to be distributed according to idiosyncratic circumstances rather than being the systematic fate of members of a particular social group. The evidence indicates that the professional norms and training of service deliverers are more important in bureaucratic encounters than individual attributes of claimants, even in a clearly divided society.     

Electoral turnout and income redistribution by the state: A cross-national analysis of the developed democracies

Abstract.  This article explores the sources of variation in state redistribution across 13 developed democracies over the period 1979–2000, drawing upon data from the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, the Luxembourg Income Study and the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems. The discussion begins with the median voter hypothesis, which predicts that the extent of state redistribution in a country will be positively related to the degree of pre-government inequality. In seeking to extend the median voter approach, the article takes into account two additional variables: the level of electoral turnout and the degree to which turnout is skewed by income. The analysis confirms that pre-government inequality is indeed positively related to state redistribution. However, the predictive power of the median voter approach is significantly improved when account is taken of the level of electoral turnout and the extent to which the turnout rate reflects an income skew – variables that are themselves related. The link between turnout and redistribution is especially strong for social transfers as opposed to taxes, and for the lower and middle, as opposed to the upper, part of the income spectrum.     

Determinants of regime type in newly independent states

Abstract.  Since 1945, newly independent states have differed from longer lived states in their greater risk of violent conflict and more challenging environment for democratisation. The authors of this article theorise that certain economic, demographic, violence-related and external factors should affect the regime type (level of democracy versus autocracy) in newly independent states. Examining exclusively newly independent states that have undergone major political transitions allows one to determine factors favouring democracy over autocracy under such volatile circumstances. The authors test several hypotheses, using cross-sectional and cross-sectional time-series analyses, and find that economic development elevates the level of democracy in new states. Cultural heterogeneity has no effect, but external factors play an important role. Genocide and politicide reduce democracy, while civil wars have the opposite effect. These findings prove robust to alternative measurements of the dependent variable and alternative model specifications.     

Killing Time: The World Politics of Civil War Duration, 1820–1992

Policymakers often trumpet the potential for third parties to stop the killing associated with civil wars, yet third parties as strategic actors also have incentives to encourage longer civil wars. We argue that in order to assess the influence of third parties on civil war duration, it is necessary to consider the interdependent nature of third party interventions as they are distributed across the set of civil war combatants. We also argue that it is important to consider the geopolitical context in which civil wars occur, rather than focusing solely on characteristics internal to these conflicts. To test our hypotheses about the impact of third parties and geopolitical factors on civil war duration, we rely on event history analysis and a sample of 152 civil wars for the period 1820–1992. We find empirical support for the idea that extremely long civil wars correspond to the equitable distribution of third party interventions—stalemates prolong wars. The analysis also indicates that separatist civil wars and ongoing civil wars in states proximate to the civil war state result in civil wars of longer duration. Finally, we find that when third parties raise the stakes of the conflict by engaging in the use of militarized force against the civil war state, the duration of these conflicts is reduced. In general, our analysis underscores the importance of modeling the interdependent and dynamic aspects of third party intervention as well as the world politics of civil wars when forecasting their duration and formulating policy.     

The struggle for power and control: shifting policy‐making models and the Harris agenda for education in Ontario

Abstract: This article describes the evolution of three different models in educational policy‐making in Ontario. In the late 1960s, education policy moved away from reliance on a traditional, centralized, administrative‐agency approach and gravitated towards a decentralized, asymmetrical policy interdependence that dominated until the mid‐1990s. The ndp government erected a more centralized scaffolding, with the centre undertaking a greater tutelary role vis à vis local authorities. The aim was to make more transparent the rules and standards by which local authorities, trustees and educators would operate and be held accountable. The education minister also sought to bolster local democracy by widening local parental participation in decision‐making, Since 1995, the Conservative government has erected a politicized administrative agency that has adopted a confrontational stance towards stakeholders, reduced the powers of school board trustees, decimated middle‐level professional staffing, and muffled teacher union executives. Decision‐making now seems to reside with Harris advisers and key cabinet ministers, whose stance is driven by an amalgam of neo‐liberal and neo‐conservative ideology and by voter opinion. This neo‐conservative approach differs in its embrace of a social conservatism ‐ that government maintain social order and that excessive concern for individual choice and liberty not be allowed to undermine it. Harris' social conservatism, in its K‐12 reforms, includes an embrace of regulation, hierarchy, monopoly and uniformity in the design of public policy. Sommaire: Cet article décrit l'évolution de trois modèles différents d'élaboration de politiques en matière d'éducation en Ontario. Vers la fin des anébes 1960, ces politiques d'éducation ne suivaient plus l'approche classique et centralisée caractéristique d'un organisme administratif; elles tendaient plutôt vers une interdépendance décentralisée et asymétrique, qui prédomina jusqu'au milieu des années 1990. Le gouvemement néo‐démocrate érigea une structure plus centralisée qui accordait au centre un plus grand rôle tutelaire par rapport aux autorités locales. Ceci, aux fins d'une plus grande transparence des règles et normes de fonctionnement et de redev‐abilité pour les autorités locales, les conseillers scolaires et les enseignants. Le minis‐tre de l'Éducation s'est efforcé aussi de favoriser la démocratic locale en amplifiant la participation parentale dans la prise de décisions. Depuis 1995, le gouvemement conservateur a éigé un organisme administratif politicisé qui a adopté des positions conflictuelles envers les intervenants, qui a réduit les pouvoirs des conseillers scolaires et qui a sabré dans les rangs du personnel professionnel de niveau intermédi‐aire tout en muselant les dirigeants syndicaux des enseignants. II semblerait que les décisions sont maintenant prises par les conseillers de Harris et par certains de ses ministres ‐ clé, poussés par l'opinion des électeurs et une idélogie à la fois néo‐libérale et néo‐conservatrice. Cette approche néo‐conservatrice embrasse un certain conservatisme social: le gouvemement doit maintenir l'ordre social qui ne doit pas être sapé par une trop grande préocupation concemant la liberté et les choix personnels. Le conservatisme social de Harris dans le cadre des réformes scolaires fait appel à la réglementation, à la hiérarchie, au monopole et à l'uniformité dans l'élaboration des politiques gouvemementales.     

Earth Day and Its Precursors: Continuity and Change in the Evolution of Midtwentieth‐Century U.S. Environmental Policy

Earth Day 1970's legacy overshadows two earlier events resulting in popular misconceptions about U.S. environmental politics: that environmental policy began with Earth Day and that Congress and the president were not concerned with the environment until public opinion and interest groups pressured them. These misconceptions increase public opinion ambivalence and frustrate environmental leaders. This paper describes Earth Day 1970, the congressionally established Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission established in 1958, and President Kennedy's Natural Resources Tour of September 1963, arguing the latter two prepared for the convergence of multiple streams of policy change that resulted in the first Earth Day.     

Public Perceptions of Benefits from and Worries over Plant‐Made Industrial Products and Plant‐Made Pharmaceuticals: The Influence of Institutional Trust

Although agricultural biotechnology has been a seminal reference point in risk perception studies, public awareness of their exposure to risk deriving from this new technology has been minimal at best. However, recent events indicate there may be growing public concern as new variations of this technology appear. Understanding what drives perceptions of benefits from the third generation of the agricultural biotechnology and what determines public worries are keys for the future of this technology. To this end, this study analyzes survey data from the midsouth region of the United States to construct four separate regression models of perceived benefits from and worries over plant‐made industrial products and plant‐made pharmaceuticals. Findings suggest that while prior experience with and knowledge about agricultural biotechnology has an impact on perceptions of benefits and worries, trust in farmers plays a highly important role in determining perceptions.