Ann Mari May

Women and the Great Retrenchment: The Political Economy of Gender in the 1980s

Policy analysts and scholars are only now beginning the serious task of sifting through the debris of the 1980s to chronicle the impacts of policy changes and to evaluate the policies as well as the policymakers. The 1980s will no doubt be remembered as having produced the worst recession since the Great Depression and perhaps, more generally, as a period of economic retrenchment [Dugger 1992]. While many segments of society were affected by the restructuring inherent in Reaganomics, the impact on women merits special attention, particularly in light of demographic changes in voting behavior. It has long been understood that discernable differences exist between women and men on issues, party identification, and candidate selection. Women tend to favor less military spending and more government spending on social services, to more often identify with the Democratic party, and to vote for Democratic candidates over Republican candidates [Matlack 1987; Shapiro and Mahajan 1986; Zipp and Plutzer 1985]. In the 1980s, however, womens participation rates exceeded those of men for the first time in U.S. history. Women

President Eisenhower, Economic Policy, and the 1960 Presidential Election

This article examines economic policy in the Eisenhower years and the presidents role in the 1960 election. I measure the impact of changes in fiscal policy on real GNP and show that policy in 1959 was unusually contractionary and cannot be dismissed as merely evidence of Eisenhowers fiscal conservatism.

The Presidential Political Business Cycle of 1972

Previous studies of the political business cycle have examined time series data to determine whether a pattern of pre-election boom and post-election slump exists. The studies do not investigate the behavior and mechanisms by which a politician may effectuate a political business cycle. We focus on one time period, 1969 to 1972, and conclude that President Nixons personality and operating environment explain why he manipulated the economy for political gain. The mechanisms he utilized to improve macroeconomic conditions before the 1972 election include monetary policy, fiscal policy, and wage-price controls.

Contemporary Philosophy of Science and Neoinstitutional Thought

Orthodox neoclassical economists as well cannot make sense of economics, but they too can make sense of logic and so they stipulate that economics must be presented in terms of their favorite logical system -logical empiricism-and therein lies one of the fundamental stumbling blocks to progress within the discipline of economics. The neoclassical paradigm that now dominates the profession is purportedly based upon a methodological foundation of logical empiricism, which the neoclassical economists themselves cannot conform to, but which nonetheless has proven to be quite useful in undercutting the legitimacy of those alternative research programs that do not support the ideological conclusions of neoclassicism. One such alternative research pro-

The ‘Woman Question’ and Higher Education

This uniquely interdisciplinary study offers a provocative, contemporary look at the ‘Woman Question’ in relation to higher education at the dawn of the twenty-first century. Leading feminist scholars from a wide variety of perspectives and disciplines — including history, philosophy, education, psychology, sociology, and economics — evaluate the role of biology, discrimination, and choice in rationalizing women’s exclusion from fully participating in the process of knowledge production, as well as examining institutional impediments. Contextualizing arguments against women’s inclusion and including contemporary perspectives on gender, this book offers a rich, multi-layered examination and critical insights into understanding the near universal difficulties that women encounter as they seek to participate fully in the process of knowledge production.

Gender, Biology, and the Incontrovertible Logic of Choice

This uniquely interdisciplinary study offers a provocative, contemporary look at the ‘Woman Question’ in relation to higher education at the dawn of the twenty-first century. Leading feminist scholars from a wide variety of perspectives and disciplines — including history, philosophy, education, psychology, sociology, and economics — evaluate the role of biology, discrimination, and choice in rationalizing women’s exclusion from fully participating in the process of knowledge production, as well as examining institutional impediments. Contextualizing arguments against women’s inclusion and including contemporary perspectives on gender, this book offers a rich, multi-layered examination and critical insights into understanding the near universal difficulties that women encounter as they seek to participate fully in the process of knowledge production.