Has the reader heard?
Nothing in Washington is getting done.
Congress is deadlocked with the Senate controlled by one party and the
House by the other. Things get passed in
the lower house and not even considered in the upper chamber. And then there is talk of impeaching the
chief executive. Things – using
technical language – are a mess.
But in all
honesty, things were mucked up before the current occupant of the White House
took over. The last period of production[1] – to the
dismay of some, the delight of others – was the first two years of the Obama administration. His health care legislation can be cited as
the last major achievement. Oh yes, the
Trump tax cut can be pointed out, but the advantage of that policy for the
typical American is highly questionable.
Perhaps, it is
a grand time for civics teachers to ask their classes: what does it take for legislation to happen? Surely, political scientists have looked at
this question. What have they found in
their research? As is usually the case
in the social sciences – political science being one of them – the scientists
have found various answers and do not agree on a single explanation. One can note a variety of theories these
scholars have developed.
Matt
Grossmann,[2] who
provides his own view, reviews a sampling of theories that address this
question. This posting shares his listing. A future posting will provide Grossmann’s view
and approach to his study of legislative production. But before getting into this main concern, a
background piece of information is helpful to share with the reader.
This writer,
in his initial graduate classes, was introduced to a transformative figure in
his life. That would be the late Dr.
Charles Adair of Florida State University.
In those years, he was a professor of education in the social studies
program. One of his assignments was to
write a position paper. This writer obviously
had other professors, but this particular assignment was not duplicated by the
others. The claim here is that writing a
position paper is a useful exercise.
A position
paper basically calls on a writer to review the literature of some topic – here
that would be the production achieved by law makers – and report and evaluate
the varies approaches, models, or theories the review discovers. The paper first defines the topic, then it
begins a rundown of the various views with critical evaluations of their
viability, and then adds a favored view with the reasons for its adoption. In that rationale, any limitations with the
view should be identified but overall its utility can be emphasized.
In what
follows, this posting offers an abbreviated version of a position paper; it offers
at least the “review of options” portion of such a paper. According to Grossmann, there are four main
theoretical approaches to studying the topic of legislative production – what he
calls policy change. Generally, before
reviewing these four, he offers the following as his predetermined bias in
considering the available theories.
To investigate the actors and
circumstances responsible for policy [or legislative] change, this book uses
secondary sources of policy history:
reviews by policy area specialists of extensive case evidence on the
political process surrounding policymaking.
These authors, who I call “policy historians,” catalog the important
output of government and explain how, when, and why public policy changes. They identify important policy enactments in
all branches of government and produce in-depth narrative accounts of policy
development. I use this historical
record to assess when and where policymaking takes place and which circumstances
and actors were responsible.[3]
To begin, the topic can be conceptualized
from a macro level or from a more granular analysis, at the micro
level. The literature seems, according
to Grossmann, to generally utilize macro approaches. Grossmann disagrees. He favors a micro approach – more below.
Grossman addresses the first two
views more or less jointly. The first
macro view depends on such factors as public opinion, media coverage, or
narrative takes on a policy area, or on some focusing event or string of
events. These views share an assumption: areas of energized activity among lawmakers
reflect an increased level of attention among the public, possibly stirred by
the media.
Another view using a macro approach elicits
another concern. That is that varying
oscillations between ideological camps – between Democrats (progressive or
liberal) control and Republican (conservative) control – explain when and over
what production occurs. While they are posed
as the main cause of change, they cannot predictively distinguish policymaking
from ideology, public opinion, or institutional partnerships.
Such approaches or views as these two
do not discriminate sufficiently among the factors at work. Therefore, their predictive or explanatory
viability is highly compromised. As to any
correlations that can be derived from their use, e.g., party control and
legislature production, Grossman points out:
[N]either policy productivity or its
ideological direction can be predicted from the ebb and flow of public opinion,
institutional partisanship, or ideology.
Furthermore, changes in productivity and the ideological direction of
policy go hand-in-hand because most policy changes expand the scope of government
responsibility.[4]
Therefore, as to the causes of policy change, one needs to
look elsewhere; there’s not enough explanatory power with these views. They point to post or after the effect
phenomena.
Grossman’s focus goes on to narrow
his concern to two factors. Yes, there
is the amount of legislative production, but there is also the harder to
quantify substance of that production.
And in this latter concern, one needs to account for the perceived importance
of what is produced through legislation.
One can have a lot of legislation on minor matters, but little affecting
big – or perceived big – issues.
Subsequently, another view emphasizes
issues or issue typologies. The key to
these macro theories is the existing players in the national political
arena. Who wins or who loses seems to be
the focus. If one can determine who is
backing or pushing a policy or set of policies (or which issues are addressed),
based on their perceived relative power bases, one can predict what gets
legislated.
The problem here is that such an
approach is highly dependent on the issue and does not allow for
generalizability of a set of factors.
That is, this explanation is too issue centered. Each issue has its corresponding set of
relationships among those who are supporting it and those who are opposing it. Also, there is the temporary set of circumstances. Hence, such an approach becomes a review of exceptional
situations – something not amenable to “scientific findings." Science demands generalizability.
The last set of theories reported by
Grossmann centers on one factor: a set
of actors. This view attributes success
or failure in advancing or achieving legislative outcomes on the abilities of a
set of entities. Entities can be
individuals, scientists, interest group(s), or the public in general. This category is summarily dismissed by
Grossmann with his claim that actors only become viable in limited situations.
Grossmann looks elsewhere to make up
his explanation. That would be relationships
among legislators that transcend Congressional sessions and presidential
tenures. This is more a micro view focusing
on various relationships and how they function.
The aim of this view is to be able to discover patterns and recurring elements
or types of elements. This blog in
future postings will delve into Grossmann’s view; that is, that portion of this
position paper will be the topic of future postings.
[1] Grossmann uses in his book the term
productivity. This, this account holds,
is a misuse of the term. A better term, production,
is more accurate. In his descriptions,
Grossmann seems to be concerned with the amount of legislative accomplishments
in terms of efforts resulting in laws or other forms of policy change. That is a production concern. Productivity introduces such factors as the
amount of resources expended in producing those changes and how efficient the
efforts have been. This posting,
therefore, will use the term production indicating the amount of policy change
in the form of laws being enacted.
[2] Matt Grossman, Artist of the Possible: Governing Networks and American Policy Change
Since 1945 (New York, NY: Oxford
University Press).
[3] Ibid., 2
(Kindle edition).
[4] Ibid., 3
(Kindle edition).
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