The Breakdown of Representation in American Politics

Streaming video requires Flash Player, RealPlayer, or Windows Media Player to view.Morris P. Fiorina is the Wendt Family Professor of Political Science at Stanford University and a senior fellow of the Hoover Institution. Fiorina has written widely on American government and politics, with special emphasis on topics in the study of representation and elections.Ohio State University. Mershon Center for International Security StudiesEvent Web page, streaming video, event photo

Legislative Choice of Regulatory Forms: Legal Process or Administrative Process?

Perhaps because of the importance and visibility of some regulatory agencies and commissions, numerous observers have come to regard the administrative form of regulation as the “logical“ or “natural“ method of intervening in the economy or society. In fact, however, regulation comes in a variety of forms. The administrative form might seem all pervasive upon first consideration, but a variety of legislative enactments clearly regulatory in effect such as large portions of the tax code, direct government subsidies and so forth suggest that delegation of legislative authority to administrative entities is, not so universal as is often assumed. Moreover, when viewed in historical perspective, choice of bureaucratic implementation of regulatory programs does not obviously emerge as the “logical“ or “natural“ method, at least not in the view of many political actors of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This paper surveys a heterogeneous body of literature on the subject of regulatory origin in order to identify proposed explanations for legislative choice of administrative forms of regulation in preference to judicial enforcement of legislative enactments. The focus of the survey is on the choices made by legislators and the considerations underlying their choices. Among the latter are (1) beliefs in the inherent superiority of administrative forms, (2) efforts to escape the costs, political and otherwise, of regulating directly, (3) ideologies supportive of delegation to administrators, and (4) uncertainty about the future operation of the regulatory process. These ideas are examined in an exploratory spirit; no firm conclusions are drawn at this time

Why Are There So Many Divided Senate Delegations?

The last three decades have witnessed a sharp increase in the number of states with spilt Senate delegations, featuring two senators of different parties. In addition, there is evidence that senators of different parties do not cluster in the middle: they are genuinely polarized. We propose a model which explains this phenomenon. Our argument builds upon the fact that when a Senate election is held, there is already a sitting senator. If the voters care about the policy position of their state delegation in each election, they may favor the candidate of the party which is not holding the other seat. We show that, in general: (1) a candidate benefits if the non-running senator is of the opposing parry; (2) the more extreme the position of the non-running senator, the more extreme may be the position of the opposing party candidate. Our 'opposite party advantage' hypothesis is tested on a sample including every Senate race from 1946 to 1986. After controlling for other important factors, such as incumbency advantage, coattails end economic conditions, we find reasonably strong evidence of the 'opposite party advantage.'

Legislative Facilitation of Government Growth: Universalism and Reciprocity Practices in Majority Rule Institutions

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Foundations of a Theory of Constituency Influence

This chapter contains a presentation and discussion of the components of our theory. We will introduce and attempt to justify a number of concepts and assumptions which in combination make possible the analysis in later chapters. Like all theoretical worlds, the one we posit is more or less unrealistic, an idealization of the empirical reality we hope to explain. But if we abstract appropriately and capture the most important features of the empirical situation, then we may expect to find that the theoretical processes present in the model world bear some correspondence to the behavior we observe in the empirical world

Bureaucratic (?) Failures: Causes and Cures

Bureaucracy is a traditional object of disparaging commentary, but in recent years it has received more than a proportionate share of popular and political criticism. Perceived problems of wasteful, unresponsive, power-hungry, and out-of-control bureaucracy have generated calls for across the board cut-backs in bureaucratic size and authority, as well as for various structural reforms designed to limit the activities of what is left after the pruning. This paper argues that much criticism of American bureaucracy is misplaced, and that attempts at structural tinkering are therefore doomed to fail. Too many critics of contemporary bureaucracy fail to understand that deeper political (usually Congressional) failures are the basic causes and bureaucratic failures often only symptoms. The single-member district electoral system, re-election seeking Congressmen, and the Congressional division of labor combine to produce a system in which apparent bureaucratic failures emerge as a by-product of efforts to generate political support. Structural reforms may be useful to contemplate, but they should address electoral and Congressional structures as well as if not more so than bureaucratic structures

Axiomatic Models of Risk and Decision: An Expository Treatment

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A Simple Theory of Constituency Influence

When combined, the set of ideas advanced in Chapter 2 constitute a highly simplified model of a representative's world as he ponders whether to cast a yea or nay. In this chapter we will ascertain how model representatives would behave in several of the contingencies which might arise in this model world