Andrew Rudalevige

“Worked Out in Fractions”: Neutral Competence, FDR, and the Bureau of the Budget

Presidents seem to scorn the “neutral competence” political scientists insist they need. Franklin Roosevelt (1933-45), however, evidently embraced this administrative approach–even at a time when the demands for presidential leadership were arguably greater than those experienced by any of his successors. Roosevelt thus offers an important historical test case for both critics and advocates of neutral competence. Focusing specifically on the Bureau of the Budget (BoB), we ask what historical circumstances dictated FDRs use of this agency; how, if at all, that use comported with the more abstract notions of a neutrally competent presidential staff; and what lessons, if any, result for modern presidents. We argue that the BoB under FDR epitomized neutral competence, but that this orientation responded to his political needs. More generally, we conclude that what constitutes responsiveness varies greatly depending on a presidents political context. [T]he gulf between the textbook approach to staffing the presidency and the approach adopted by most postwar presidents is so great that one may be tempted to ask whether the institutional presidency, originally advocated by Brownlow fifty years ago, has not just been a figment of the imagination of political scientists and public administrators. John Hart, “The Presidential Branch” (1995, 216)

Executive Branch Management and Presidential Unilateralism: Centralization and the Issuance of Executive Orders

Despite the useful simplifying assumptions of recent work on unilateral power, archival analysis shows the issuance of executive orders is a process rife with transaction costs as presidents bargain with the bureaucracy over formulating their scope and substance. As a result, presidents must create what Williamson (1985) called “governance structures” to minimize those costs, with the Office of Management and Budgets clearance process at its heart. As with legislative policy formulation, presidents assert more centralized control over executive orders (EO) production on items that affect large numbers of departments, on matters of executive reorganization, and on significant matters. Political contexts are trumped by managerial concerns. Orders dealing with implementation of recently passed statutes or other presidential “clerkship” functions tend to follow a far less centralized formulation process.

Revisiting Midterm Loss Referendum Theory and State Data

The phenomenon of midterm loss—the drop in the midterm congressional vote for the presidents party from its level 2 years prior—is more than a century old and counting. Some see this as a predictable referendum on the presidents performance to date. Others argue that the referendum model does not hold up over time; still others, using survey data, find scant evidence for “pocketbook” voting in congressional elections. The data in this article escape reliance on a tiny sample of postwar midterms by using state-level data to test variants of the referendum hypothesis. They indicate no significant connection between state-level income change and the states midterm vote. However, consistent with the referendum hypothesis, national income change and presidential approval have a strong overall impact, though this impact has declined markedly since the mid-1970s. Short-term lagged vote variables and measures of congressional incumbency have grown stronger over time.

The Obama Administration: what can social science offer?

This paper reports on the 2009 Academy of Social Sciences annual debate about prospects for the new United States administration. Just half way into the ‘first hundred days’ of President Barack Obamas term, a panel of social scientists, convened by Philip Davies, Director of the British Librarys Eccles Centre for American Studies, addressed the question of what social science could offer the new president in various areas of policy and government action. Each of the panellists was offered the opportunity to revisit their presentations in the light of the discussion that took place, and this paper brings these thoughts together. Dilys Hill introduces the contributions with an overview commentary on the debate contributions. Andrew Rudaleviges analysis of the scholarship on managing the presidency leads him to state that ‘Presidential leadership lies … in garnering the benefits of centralising without losing the wider expertise brought to bear by a decentralised process. Herein—somewhere!—lies the holy grail of Cabinet Government, American-style.’ George C. Edwards examines presidential strategies for government with the conclusion that ‘Rather than creating the conditions for important shifts in public policy, such as moving public opinion in their direction, effective leaders are the less heroic facilitators who work at the margins of coalition building to recognise and exploit opportunities in their environments.’ Jenel Virden points out that in 2008 the percentage and numerical turnout of women was higher than that for men; women voted more for Obama than did men; and they were strongly hopeful that under the new administration prospects would improve. Having engaged so successfully with this sector of the population, the Obama Administration is under pressure to recognise and address its needs. Robert Singh points out that there are necessary reservations about the utility of social science in informing an Obama foreign policy, but nonetheless elaborates three propositions and seven principles that could usefully frame the administrations approach.

A Review of “The Discretionary President: The Promise and Peril of Executive Power”: Kleinerman, Benjamin A. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2009. 322 pages.

process. On the contrary, Sellers shows that communication is a key component of legislative policy making in the modern era, among party leaders, rank and file, and the media. Of course no book is without some minor room for improvement. In this case, I would have liked to see the introduction focus a bit more on themes that are in the conclusion, such as responsible party government, and the corporate consolidation of media outlets simultaneous to the rise of the “partisan” media. I would have also liked to see more of the actual data that was used in this project. The tables and figures that are provided are good, but the richness of the data is underutilized for the reader who wants additional detail; for example, who (by name) were the leading communicators in the House and Senate over time? How many reporters covered Congress during the study’s time period? Also is there any way to rate the effectiveness of the message giver—are some party leaders simply better at communications than others? Overall, I would highly recommend this book to any student of Congress, the presidency, or the media because it is the best recent work on the interdependence between politicians and the media and the impact of that relationship on policy outcomes. This book will serve as an excellent foundation for this author, and others, who might want to apply the framework to Internet and social networking media and their effects on the communication strategies of party leadership and rank–and-file members of Congress.