Jerome S. Legge

“Wicked Problems,” Public Policy, and Administrative Theory Lessons From the GM Food Regulatory Arena

As societies worldwide struggle to address what policy analysts call “wicked problems” such as world hunger, malnutrition, and ecological sustainability, analysts from a variety of perspectives have questioned the administrative state’s abilities to deal with them. Ascendant since the early 1990s as a prescription for remedying these shortcomings is a market, technocratic, and non-deliberative theory of administration that some have called “neo-managerialism” and others the “managerialist ideology.” This study uses European attitudes toward promoting the use of genetically modified (GM) foods as a “policy window” for exploring how well or ill-suited the neo-managerialist philosophy informing the U.S. government’s promotional campaign was with the factors driving European opposition to GM foods. Causal modeling of the “calculus of dissent” that led to a the European Union (EU) moratorium on GM foods suggests that deliberative (rather than neo-managerialist) theories of administration are better suited for the “collective puzzlement of society” that wicked problems require.

Public Opinion, Risk Perceptions, and Genetically Modified Food Regulatory Policy

The underlying assumption of multinational corporations and US government campaigns to inform citizens worldwide of the advantages of genetically modified (GM) foods has been straightforward: if citizens better understand GM science and benefits, they will become less wary of GM foods. To test the assumptions of proponents regarding science-based information campaigns, we use heteroskedastic probit analysis to analyze responses to the 1999 Eurobarometer survey. The results suggest that pro-GM food campaigns, directed at enhancing citizens’ understanding of the underlying science and biotechnology of GM food benefits, may not be as effective as GM proponents expect, and may even be counterproductive. The analysis also reveals, however, that support for GM foods is likely to be linked to citizens’ trust in government. Thus, campaigns stressing the regulatory capacity and willingness to protect public health, safety, and the environment, rather than merely leavening citizens’ understanding of the genetic science and biotechnology informing GM foods, may be more effective.

Measuring Productivity in U. S. Public Administration and Public Affairs Programs 1981-1985

This article replicates the 1981 study of Morgan and colleagues and focuses on the productivity of public affairs and administration programs in the United States from 1981 to 1985. While many of the highest-ranked programs retain their 1970-1980 positions, the article notes a dramatic improvement on the part of other institutions. In addition to examining overall productivity, the number of published articles is considered as a ratio to the number of faculty in order to control for the size of faculties. While some smaller programs are helped by the ratio measure, high productivity is more characteristic of doctoral degree-granting institutions.

Privatization and Public Opinion in Germany

Privatization has been a major issue around the world, but research on public opinion about it has been scarce. The German Social Survey provides an opportunity to compare citizen opinions from a formerly socialist-authoritarian regime with those from a democratic regime, in their opinions about privatizing banks, electrical power, and hospitals. As do citizens in surveys in other nations, Germans support privatization of the services in the order just given. Citizens from the east, where privatization led to sharp increases in unemployment, oppose privatization much more than do westerners. A LISREL analysis indicates that their opposition is not due to their concerns about its economic effects on themselves or the nation (“economic pessimism”), but more due to perception of the proper role of government (“opposition to government spending”), and sense of political efficacy. The analysis also reflects on the roles of other variables such as ideology, partisanship, gender, being unemployed, education, and preference for taxes versus public services. We discuss implications for theory and research on public opinion about government policies and services, such as the role of direct economic self-interest versus more symbolic and ideological orientations.

African American Adolescents and Menthol Cigarettes: Smoking Behavior Among Secondary School Students

PURPOSE This paper examines the impact of smoking menthol cigarettes among secondary students, primarily African Americans, across five measures of smoking behavior. METHODS Data were gathered from a 2006 survey of six secondary schools in a large urban area in the southeastern United States. Ordered logit analysis is employed to estimate race and menthol effects on cigarette consumption. RESULTS African American youth smoke at lower rates than white adolescents; menthol smokers consume cigarettes at higher rates irrespective of race. Most importantly, there is a strong interaction effect with black menthol smokers demonstrating the highest levels of cigarette consumption. CONCLUSIONS There is a need to provide adolescent and adult African Americans accurate information on the dangers of menthol cigarettes. Any proposed legislation should consider the special problems of menthol and its relationship to high cigarette consumption, especially for African American adolescents.

Can Government Regulate Fertility? An Assessment of Pronatalist Policy in Eastern Europe

The authoritarian governments in Eastern Europe have played an active role in the fertility regulation of their citizenry. This article examines government attempts to encourage population growth in Eastern Europe with particular attention given to Romania Hungary and the German Democratic Republic. Governments attempting to influence reproductive behavior can utilize 3 types of policies--the moral-propagandistic the economic and the legal-administrative. Romania has focused on the latter issuing a decree in 1966 banning abortion for women under age 45 with less than 4 children. Hungary has pursued a policy with some legal-administrative aspects but it has included more positive economic incentives for families to have children. Allowances were raised for a second child and monthly maternity payments were increased through the third offspring. Hungary also expanded its network of family planning centers and offered more courses on sex education and family life. The German Democratic Republic has emphatically followed an economic incentive approach in its pronatalist policy. In 1976 the government adopted regulations that raised paid maternity leave to 26 weeks provided cash allowances during the time of unpaid leave for 2nd and 3rd births gave working mothers a fully paid work week of 40 hours raised the value of birth grants and provided newly married couples with loans to buy and furnish homes. The population growth policy followed by Romania is likely to fail--abortion is deeply engrained in Romanian culture. Hungarys mixed administrative-economic approach should be effective. But the purely economic incentives of the German Democratic Republic should work permanently.

Evaluating patient education: a case study of a diabetes program.

This paper presents an evaluation of a diabetic education program for patients at Stephens County Hospital in Toccoa, Georgia. An analysis of covariance is employed along with multiple classification analysis to determine the effect of the program in reducing hospital readmissions. The major finding is that the teaching program is an important variable in the reduction of readmissions. A second outcome is that the occurrence of diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) on initial admission is a second factor in determining readmissions. Patients having the benefit of instruction are less likely to experience readmission than those not being educated; those having DKA are more likely to be readmitted within six months from release than those not having this degree of loss of control. Implications of this study suggest that in designing a diabetic education program, greater attention must be focused upon the needs of the ketosis- prone patients.

Investigating adolescents’ sources of information concerning tobacco and the resulting impact on attitudes toward public policy

Background. In this study, we investigated different sources of information concerning the use of tobacco and the impact that these sources may have on attitudes toward tobacco policies. Methods. We surveyed 4336 high school students gathered from 5 high schools in the Southeastern United States. Results. The results indicate that just over half of these youth are supportive of public policies targeting bans on smoking in public places and having a minimum age to purchase tobacco products. Race is significant in impacting both age restriction and prohibition of smoking in public places, with African American youth being less supportive of both dependent variables. However, holding this variable constant in an ordinal logistic regression, we found that attitudes toward policy are impacted by the environment related to smoking in which the youth lives; the extent to which the youth believes he/she is well informed; and more important, the amount of correct and accurate information on smoking the youth possess. Conclusions. Communicating accurate information is vital in increasing youth support for pending or already existing tobacco policies.

Policy Alternatives and Traffic Safety: Mandatory Seat Belts and Drunk Driving Reform in California

Government has taken a variety of approaches to achieve its policy objectives. One strategy which has been utilized across a variety of issue areas is deterrence. Specifically, government attempts to induce desirable behavior by raising the certainty, swiftness and/or severity of penalties on citizens. As a policy tool the concept of deterrence has been utilized with uneven success in juvenile and adult corrections (Erickson, Stafford, and Galliher 1984; Pestello 1984; Deutsch and Alt 1977; Loftin and McDowall 1984). In addition, deterrence has entered discussions of the effectiveness of capital punishment (Ehrlich 1975; Bailey 1983; McFarland 1983) and the literature on the prevention of spousal abuse (Sherman and Berk 1984; Berk and Newton 1985). Highway safety is another policy area where the deterrence concept has been utilized extensively. The purpose of this paper is to review and analyze the effects of a deterrence-based reform of the drinking and driving laws in California, effective January 1, 1982, along with the January 1, 1986, mandatory seat belt law.

The persistence of ethnic voting: African americans and jews in the 1989 New York mayoral campaign

This paper investigates the concept of “ethnic voting ” in the 1989 New York Mayoral campaign. The ethnic voting hypothesis holds that when other independent variables such as party, income, and ideology are controlled, ethnic identity should exert a significant impact on candidate selection. Results indicate that ethnicity exerts a strong impact on the vote, particularly among African American and Jewish respondents, with strong loyalty to candidates of their own ethnic group.