Carl Grafton

The behavioral study of political ideology and public policy formulation

Abstract Political ideology is related to public policy formulation in a scholarly and systematic manner with surprising rarity. This article describes the use of newspaper and journal of opinion editorials as barometers of ideological content and signed digraphs as devices for hypothesis formulation regarding ideological change. Policy formulation for incomes policies in the Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon administrations and abortion from the 1930s to the present are used to illustrate the utility of these approaches.

Public policy for business and the economy Ideological dissensus, change and consensus

A substantial literature shows that ideology, often describable on a conservative-liberal spectrum, is a significant independent variable influencing the formulation of public policy. The 1960s–1990s are frequently depicted as decades of ideological tumult. However, analysis of the editorials of major publications shows that substantial agreement existed on public policy directions for business and the economy throughout most of these years. Furthermore, in some policy areas initial dissensus was followed by significant movement toward consensus. A theory presented here based on the concepts of successful market operation, market misbehavior, and market breakdown explains in large part the reasons for this long term policy consensus as well as movement from dissensus to consensus.

The Reorganization of Federal Agencies

This study presents a theory of federal agency reorganization covering a large per centage of reorganization cases occurring from 1934 through 1976. The theory views federal agency reorganization as closely related to de novo agency creation. Agency reorganization and creation are often the last two steps in an escalation process through which society deals with problems generated by large scale discontinuous socioeconomic-technological changes called novelties. Escalation is part of a more comprehensive process called conceptualization in which interest groups and govern ment officials seek to understand a noveltys implications, to modify the novelty to fit socioeonomic-political systems, and to modify socioeconomic-political systems to fit the novelty. If an agency is created before conceptualization has ended, it is very likely that it will be reorganized repeatedly until conceptualization is complete. Thus two modes of agency reorganization are identified: reorganization of existing agencies as part of the escalation response to a novelty, and instability caused by agency creation prior to the end of conceptualization.

Shadow theories in Fountain's theory of technology enactment

Fountain was concerned with the effect of information technologies on government. Her thesis was that government organizations are strongly motivated to adopt information technologies and that the ways these technologies are used and their effects vary depending on agency interests. Although Fountain claimed to present original ideas, elements of her thesis have been commonplace for decades in political science, public administration, business administration, and the field of science, technology, and public policy. Instead of crediting orthodox concepts such as technological determinism, rational actor models, incrementalism, and systems analysis, she attacked them as “shadow theories” only to import large elements of them back into her own framework. Fountain sought to dazzle us with her originality when she really was assembling a worthwhile research agenda out of good ideas taken from existing scholarship. Instead of encouraging cooperation in her modest venture, she invites a backlash.

Book Review: Mapping Cyberspace: Social Research on the Electronic Frontier

ics to the arts and humanities to change the nature of social existence. When these writers and artists make a substantive contribution to theoretical physics (rather than the other way around), we will be able to say that science can be democratized. Everyone hopes and expects that democratic processes will limit damage done by potentially destructive technologies. The editor and authors represented in this book do not contribute to that cause. They confuse science and technology and the very different social controls that do and should govern each, reflexively point with alarm to the dangers posed by inventions (technology not science) making little attempt to weigh benefits against dangers, and uncritically urge reforms that have little chance of enactment or being efficacious even if enacted.

The Creation of Federal Agencies

This paper is an attempt to understand the processes by which federal agencies are created. Its major thesis is that a majority of agencies (which also tend to be the largest and most important) were created as a last resort response to large scale socioeconomic-technological discontinuities, labeled “novelties.” The origins of novelties are explored, and a historically based, probabilistic model is developed which permits an observer to make predictions about the politics of agency creation on the basis of novelty characteristics and the interest group activities which ordinarily surround a noveltys occurrence.

Supplementing Zupan's Measurements of the Ideological Preferences of U.S. Presidents

Mark A. Zupans synthetic Americans for Democratic Actionpresidential ratings published in Public Choice in 1992 runfrom 1947–1989. The authors extend Zupans ratings through1999.

Liberal–conservative conflict and consensus in policy making

Abstract This study argues that ideology can play a major and positive role in the policy making process. Using the policy areas of civil rights and public education, it demonstrates that when policy initiatives are both ideologically consistent and based on a clear delineation of the dynamics of how the policy will change the current situation for the better, the ensuing debate between liberals and conservatives generally results in effective policy. When both elements are not present, ineffective policy results.

The behavioural study of political ideology and public policy: Testing the Janda, Berry, and Goldman model

In previous work the authors found a variant of the theory of market failure to be a way to link political ideology and public policy for business and economics. However, the theory of market failure says little about other aspects of ideology and domestic public policy. Janda, Berry, and Goldman offer a model of ideological attitudes toward equality, freedom, and order that might explain ideological positions toward public policy unrelated to business and the economy. The present study compares the Janda, Berry, and Goldman model to depictions of liberalism and conservatism in a variety of scholarly journals and finds the model to be partly valid.

Computer Tools for Crafting Clear and Attractive Diagrams in Social Science

This article evaluates two categories of software with which diagrams can be created. Diagram- building programs are usable mainly for drawing simple figures such as flow charts, decision trees, and organization charts—essentially boxes containing labels connected to one another with lines. Inexpensive general-purpose drafting or computer-aided design (CAD) programs generate much more complex images with greater varieties of shapes. The evaluation criteria used are flexibility—variety of drawings that can be rendered; variety of built-in shapes; attractiveness of results; exportability; ease of operation; screen-printer agreement; ease of drawing a flow chart, simple graphics, and complex diagrams; and automatic line routing. All but one program are Windows-based, and most are relatively inexpensive.