Political Responsiveness and Case Filings

2018 ◽  
pp. 83-102
Author(s):  
Banks Miller ◽  
Brett Curry
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Empirical Models ◽  
Divided Government ◽  
Prosecutorial Discretion ◽  
White House ◽  
Issue Area ◽  
Potent Predictor

This chapter investigates whether partisan control of the presidency and Congress is associated with how U.S. Attorneys (USAs) allocate their resources in filing cases across the issue areas we study. Empirical evidence is presented which suggests that partisan control of the presidency is a particularly potent predictor of prosecutorial discretion at the filing stage in four of the five issue areas we study. Findings from the investigation also indicate that divided government mitigates the association between partisan control of the White House and changes in case filings. In addition, the empirical models show that presidential and congressional attention to an issue area also conditions the extent to which federal prosecutors prioritize that issue.

Plea-negotiations, prosecutors and discretion: An argument for legal reform

2016 ◽  
Vol 49 (4) ◽  
pp. 564-582 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asher Flynn
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Legal Reform ◽  
Legal Process ◽  
Prosecutorial Discretion ◽  
Current Process ◽  
Criminological Research ◽  
Record Data ◽  
Defence Counsel ◽  
Almost All ◽  
External Scrutiny

Unlike the cynicism and accountability concerns applied to the use of discretion by police and judicial officers, prosecutorial discretion in plea-negotiations operates essentially free from external scrutiny or transparency. Globally, there is a scarcity of data and research on plea-negotiations, meaning we do not have the capacity to accurately measure their frequency, the contexts in which agreements are reached or to identify patterns in the types of offenders/offences most commonly involved. Additionally, in almost all Australian jurisdictions, plea-negotiations are not recognised as a legitimate legal process in statute, despite empirical evidence from the legal community suggesting their overtly encouraged and common use. Drawing from research in which 51 Victorian prosecutors were observed engaging in plea-negotiation practices over several months, and 54 interviews were conducted with prosecutors, defence counsel, judicial officers and policy advisors, this article intends to reignite discussions of the nontransparency of plea-negotiations in Australia, including highlighting the need for increased criminological research in this underexamined field. The article contends that all Australian jurisdictions should define plea-negotiations in legislation and record data on how often plea-negotiations occur, similarly to the current process of recording guilty pleas. Without such reform, plea-negotiations will remain nontransparent and misunderstood, as there will be no adequate mechanism to understand or examine how negotiations operate in practice or what their true impacts might be.

scholarly journals Presidential Persuasion and Public Opinion

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Eshbaugh-Soha
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Public Support ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
American People ◽  
Divided Government ◽  
Central Feature ◽  
White House ◽  
The Public ◽  
Policy Goals ◽  
Unrealistic Expectations

Presidential persuasion is a central feature of presidential power and leadership. Although originally conceived of as essential for bargaining with and influencing Congress and later the bureaucracy, the rise of television and polling science—along with the constraints imposed by legislative gridlock and divided government—afforded presidents regular opportunities to appeal to the public to achieve their policy goals. Despite some scholarly allegations that presidents should persuade the public, the White House’s own expectations that presidents can do so, and the extent to which the modern White House polls and attempts to influence news coverage and public opinion, the predominant conclusion of the literature is that presidential persuasion is unlikely to change public opinion. Even evidence that supports presidential persuasion may be marginal, mixed, time bound, or vary by domestic and foreign policy. At times, presidents may not be able to lead public opinion because they have responded to it. And even the act of speaking, as expressed by scholars of the rhetorical presidency, may puff up unrealistic expectations for the occupant of the office. Nevertheless, presidents may be able to influence the public’s agenda on issues not previously salient to the American people, prime favorable aspects of their policies through speechmaking, and act strategically to parlay existing public support into legislative victories.

Divided government and U.S. trade policy: theory and evidence

1994 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 595-632 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Lohmann ◽  
Sharyn O'Halloran
Keyword(s):  
Trade Policy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Distributive Politics ◽  
Institutional Constraints ◽  
Divided Government ◽  
Constraint Forces ◽  
Majority Party ◽  
White House ◽  
Policy Theory ◽  
The U.S

If different parties control the U.S. Congress and White House, the United States may maintain higher import protection than otherwise. This proposition follows from a distributive politics model in which Congress can choose to delegate trade policymaking to the President. When the congressional majority party faces a President of the other party, the former has an incentive to delegate to but to constrain the President by requiring congressional approval of trade proposals by up-or-down vote. This constraint forces the President to provide higher protection in order to assemble a congressional majority. Evidence confirms that (1) the institutional constraints placed on the President's trade policymaking authority are strengthened in times of divided government and loosened under unified government and (2) U.S. trade policy was significantly more protectionist under divided than under unified government during the period 1949–90.

Bargaining, Enforcement, and International Cooperation

1998 ◽  
Vol 52 (2) ◽  
pp. 269-305 ◽  
Author(s):  
James D. Fearon
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
International Cooperation ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
Bargaining Problem ◽  
Game Model ◽  
Relative Importance ◽  
High Expectation ◽  
Issue Area ◽  
Relative Gains

Neoliberals and their neorealist critics have debated the relative importance of two main obstacles to international cooperation—problems of cheating and enforcement and problems of relative gains. By contrast, I argue that problems of international cooperation have a common strategic structure in which a third, distinct obstacle plays a crucial role. Almost regardless of the issue area, states must first resolve the bargaining problem of agreeing on terms before they can implement and begin to enforce an agreement. Furthermore, the bargaining and enforcement problems interact. Using a game model, I show that if states must bargain to determine the deal to be enforced, the “shadow of the future” cuts two ways. A high expectation of continued interactions may make enforcing the agreement easier, but it can also give states an incentive to bargain harder, delaying agreement in hopes of getting a better deal. Empirical evidence from trade and arms control negotiations suggests that this mechanism may help to explain the costly standoffs that are often observed in international politics and are problematic for received neoliberal theories.

Explaining Lawmaking in the United States, 1877–1994

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
John S. Lapinski
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Multivariate Analysis ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Policy Issue ◽  
The United States ◽  
Issue Area ◽  
Legislative Productivity ◽  
Aggregate Measure

This chapter turns to lawmaking and shows that legislative productivity varies considerably by policy issue area. Specifically, it illustrates that the key determinants of legislative productivity differ by policy substance. It also provides empirical evidence that questions the benefits of pooling legislation when such aggregation often obscures empirical findings related to understanding the mechanisms of lawmaking. The chapter aims to determine whether pooling policies (using an overall aggregate measure of all legislation) is potentially inappropriate. This multivariate analysis draws on data using two different thresholds of significance. The highest threshold uses the top 500 enactments; while the second threshold uses the top 3,500 enactments. This threshold captures landmarks for very important legislation.

The Empirical Evidence of GARCH Effects on Return Series: Vietnam Stock Market 2000-2003

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Quan-Hoang Vuong
Keyword(s):  
Time Series ◽  
Stock Market ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Statistical Methods ◽  
Serial Correlation ◽  
Empirical Models ◽  
English Abstract ◽  
Regional Markets ◽  
National Economic

The Vietnamese Stock Market was officially born on July 20, 2000, and considered an experiment, in the sense that it would likely accept adjustment and constraints to reflect the contemporaneous national economic settings. This paper is one of the first applied econometric studies investigating an evidence of GARCH effects on return series of 10 individual assets and the VNI, an index devised as the market general price indicator. The results are encouraging: Firstly, we found evidence that the time series exhibit many similar properties as those for other regional markets, such as autoregressive and serial correlation; Secondly, using rather sophisticated empirical models for a newborn market, we succeed in achieving some nontrivial remarks with respect to the use of policy matters. This paper demonstrates the importance of the application of statistical methods, a topic still not received much attention from the economic researchers in Vietnam. (Downloadable paper in Vietnamese, with English abstract.)

scholarly journals Divided government, delegation, and civil service reform

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Elliott Ash ◽  
Massimo Morelli ◽  
Matia Vannoni
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Civil Service ◽  
Divided Government ◽  
Civil Service Reform ◽  
Us States ◽  
Using Data

Abstract This paper sheds new light on the drivers of civil service reform in US states. We first demonstrate theoretically that divided government is a key trigger of civil service reform, providing nuanced predictions for specific configurations of divided government. We then show empirical evidence for these predictions using data from the second half of the 20th century: states tended to introduce these reforms under divided government, and in particular when legislative chambers (rather than legislature and governor) were divided.

Challenges to the social motivation theory of autism: The dangers of counteracting an imprecise theory with even more imprecision

2019 ◽  
Vol 42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mirko Uljarević ◽  
Giacomo Vivanti ◽  
Susan R. Leekam ◽  
Antonio Y. Hardan
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Social Motivation ◽  
Motivation Theory ◽  
The Social

Abstract The arguments offered by Jaswal & Akhtar to counter the social motivation theory (SMT) do not appear to be directly related to the SMT tenets and predictions, seem to not be empirically testable, and are inconsistent with empirical evidence. To evaluate the merits and shortcomings of the SMT and identify scientifically testable alternatives, advances are needed on the conceptualization and operationalization of social motivation across diagnostic boundaries.

Integrating perspectives: How the development of second-personal competence lays the foundation for a second-personal morality

2020 ◽  
Vol 43 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Corbit ◽  
Chris Moore
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Developmental Process ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Personal Information ◽  
Personal Competence ◽  
Triadic Interactions ◽  
Personal Morality ◽  
Integrative Process

Abstract The integration of first-, second-, and third-personal information within joint intentional collaboration provides the foundation for broad-based second-personal morality. We offer two additions to this framework: a description of the developmental process through which second-personal competence emerges from early triadic interactions, and empirical evidence that collaboration with a concrete goal may provide an essential focal point for this integrative process.

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