Mixed electoral rules’ impact on party systems

The growing literature about mixed electoral systems has addressed their effect on party systems, voting behavior, campaign strategies, legislative roll-call voting, and other issues in a handful of countries. But, the effect of mixed systems has not been fully evaluated cross-nationally or longitudinally. Using data from the World Bank’s Database of Political Institutions, we address this gap in the literature by investigating two related questions. First, do mixed electoral rules produce different election outcomes than other election rules? Second, are these results attenuated by the definitions of mixed systems that scholars employ? We find that mixed systems generate outcomes that are distinct from other electoral systems and that these findings are generally robust across different definitions.     

Manufactured Responsiveness: The Impact of State Electoral Laws on Unified Party Control of the Presidency and House of Representatives, 1840–1940

The modern history of divided government in America suggests that the framers succeeded in creating a government unresponsive to popular passions. Yet in the nineteenth century the party winning the presidency almost always captured control of the House of Representatives. Why and how could nineteenth century national elections be so responsive that they resemble parliamentary outcomes? We identify electoral institutions present in the states that directly linked congressional elections to presidential coattails. Specifically, we estimate the impact of state ballot laws and the strategic design of congressional districts on presidential coattail voting from 1840 to 1940. We find that presidential elections, as mediated by state electoral laws, strongly account for unified party control of the House and the presidency throughout the nineteenth century.     

Technology transfer offices as providers of science and technology entrepreneurship education

The Journal of Technology Transfer - Universities show an increasing commitment to stimulate science- and technology-based entrepreneurship with the aim of contributing to societal and economic...     

Preferences and the Democratic Peace

A debate exists over whether (and to what degree) the democratic peace is explained by joint democracy or by a lack of motives for conflict between states that happen to be democratic. Gartzke (1998) applies expected utility theory to the democratic peace and shows that an index of states' preference similarity based on United Nations General Assembly roll-call votes ( affinity ) accounts for much of the lack of militarized interstate disputes (MIDs) between democracies. Oneal and Russett (1997b, 1998, 1999) respond by arguing that UN voting is itself a function of regime type—that democracy 'causes' affinity . Oneal and Russett seek to demonstrate their thesis by regressing affinity on democracy and other variables from a standard model of the democratic peace. I replicate results reported by Oneal and Russett and then extend the analysis in several ways. I find that the residuals from Oneal and Russett's regression of affinity remain highly significant as a predictor of the absence of MIDs. Further, significance for democracy is shown to be fragile and subject to variable construction, model specification, and the choice of estimation procedure.     

Beyond formal university technology transfer: innovative pathways for knowledge exchange

The Journal of Technology Transfer - University technology transfer is often associated with formal transmission of science-based inventions, for instance through the licensing of patented...