The Office of Management and Budget: The Quarterback of Evidence-Based Policy in the Federal Government

2018 ◽  
Vol 678 (1) ◽  
pp. 112-123
Author(s):  
Kathy Stack
Keyword(s):  
Federal Government ◽  
Social Services ◽  
Administrative Data ◽  
Data Linkage ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Federal Agencies ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Obama Administration ◽  
Evaluation Capacity ◽  
White House

During the Obama administration, the White House Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) leadership helped to initiate and cement evidence-based policymaking reforms across the federal government, particularly in social services programs. Notable accomplishments were in the design of outcome-focused programs that use and build evidence, the strengthening of agency evaluation capacity, and interagency data-linkage projects to harness administrative data. Here, I review those accomplishments and catalog the key assets and tactics that OMB used to help federal agencies increase their use of evidence and innovation. I also assess the shortcomings and limitations of the Obama-era OMB approach and draw conclusions about what could be done in the current or a future administration to further advance evidence-based policymaking in the executive branch. Specifically, I propose that Congress and the administration should work to improve agency evaluation capacity, assess and report on agencies’ progress in using and building evidence, and establish an Intergovernmental Evidence and Innovation Council.

Congress and the Bureaucracy: Who Makes the Law?

Congress ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 239-260
Author(s):  
Benjamin Ginsberg ◽  
Kathryn Wagner Hill
Keyword(s):  
Labor Market ◽  
Environmental Impact ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
Social Services ◽  
Food Supply ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Employment Opportunities ◽  
Health Maintenance ◽  
Bureaucratic Power ◽  
Executive Agencies

This chapter concerns how Congress deals with bureaucratic power. Much of today's federal bureaucracy can trace its origins to Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal. Under FDR's leadership, the federal government began to take responsibility for management of the economy, provision of social services, protection of the public's health, maintenance of employment opportunities, promotion of social equality, protection of the environment, and a host of other tasks. As the government's responsibilities and ambitions grew, Congress assigned more and more complex tasks to the agencies of the executive branch, which sometimes were only too happy to expand their own power and autonomy. Executive agencies came to be tasked with the responsibility for analyzing and acting upon economic data; assessing the environmental impact of programs and projects; responding to fluctuations in the labor market; safeguarding the food supply; regulating the stock market; supervising telecommunications and air, sea, and land transport; and, in recent years, protecting the nation from terrorist plots.

Trump appointees will undercut US federal programmes

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Federal Government ◽  
Government Spending ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Federal Agencies ◽  
The State ◽  
Federal Spending ◽  
Content Type ◽  
State And Local ◽  
Federal Taxes ◽  
Tax Deduction

Significance Some hard-right members of the Republican congressional caucus argue that allowing federal spending to lapse and threatening a government shutdown could force legislators to approve steep cuts to the federal bureaucracy. As congressional factions, leaders and President Donald Trump’s administration weigh in on government spending, debates about the appropriate scope of federal agencies and programmes are likely to feature prominently. Impacts Costly entitlement programmes are unlikely to be targeted for cuts owing to their popularity. Congressional allies of USAID will block Trump’s plan to consolidate it into the State Department. Empty executive branch-appointed positions will hinder the effective functioning of the federal government. The proposed abolition of the state and local tax deduction for federal taxes will place pressure on sub-national government programmes.

Nixon's Administrative Presidency Revisited: Aberration or Watershed?

1992 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 249-271
Author(s):  
Ron Seyb
Keyword(s):  
Community Development ◽  
Human Resources ◽  
Natural Resources ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Managerial Effectiveness ◽  
White House ◽  
Richard Nixon ◽  
Top Managers

On 5 January 1973, one month after his reelection to a second term, Richard Nixon described for Congress a major restructuring of his cabinet and White House staff. Nixon began by emphasizing his determination to “revitalize and streamline the Federal Government in preparation for America's third century,” a reference to his effort of the preceding two years to replace seven domestic executive departments and several agencies with four “superdepartments”: a Department of Natural Resources, a Department of Community Development, a Department of Economic Affairs, and a Department of Human Resources. The failure of Congress to report out of committee any of the four bills Nixon submitted in March 1971 to create these superdepartments was now prompting the president to act unilaterally to “reorder … the timeworn and in many cases obsolete relationships among top staff and line officials” in an effort to realize “the broadening of policy perspectives on the part of top managers and advisers” and improvements in “managerial effectiveness” he had hoped to achieve through comprehensive reorganization of the executive branch.

scholarly journals Evidence‐based priorities of under‐served pregnant and parenting adolescents: addressing inequities through a participatory approach to contextualizing evidence syntheses

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna Dion ◽  
Aime Klevor ◽  
Amy Nakajima ◽  
Neil Andersson
Keyword(s):  
Social Services ◽  
Adolescent Mothers ◽  
Priority Setting ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Post Partum ◽  
Perinatal Outcomes ◽  
Health Inequities ◽  
Participatory Approach ◽  
Perinatal Health ◽  
Evidence Based

Abstract Purpose This study describes an interdiscursive evidence-based priority setting process with pregnant and parenting adolescents and their services providers. Methods A mixed methods literature review identified studies reporting on perinatal outcomes and experiences of adolescents during pregnancy to 12 months post-partum published in Canada after 2000. We also calculated relative risks for common perinatal risk factors and outcomes for adolescents compared to adult populations from 2012 to 2017 based on data from a provincial database of maternal and newborn outcomes. Two trained peer researchers identified outcomes most relevant to their peers. We shared syntheses results with four service providers and 13 adolescent mothers accessing services at a community service organization, who identified and prioritized their areas of concern. We repeated the process for the identified priority issue and expanded upon it through semi-structured interviews. Results Adolescent mothers face higher rates of poverty, abuse, anxiety and depression than do adult mothers. Adolescents prioritized the experience of judgment in perinatal health and social services, particularly as it contributed to them being identified as a child protection risk. Secondary priorities included loss of social support and inaccessibility of community resources. The experience of judgment in adolescent perinatal health literature was summarized around: being invisible, seen as incapable and seen as a risk. Adolescent mothers adapted these categories, emphasizing organizational and social barriers. Conclusions Young marginalized women are disproportionately affected by inequities in perinatal outcomes, yet their perspectives are rarely centered in efforts to address these inequities. This research addresses health inequities by presenting a robust, transparent and participatory approach to priority setting as a way to better represent the perspectives of those who carry the greatest burden of health inequities in evidence syntheses. In our work, marginalized adolescent parents adapted published literature around the experience and consequences of social stigma on perinatal outcomes, shifting our understanding of root causes and possible solutions.

Principles Matter

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos A. Ball
Keyword(s):  
Federal Government ◽  
Free Speech ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
Democratic Institutions ◽  
Democratic Values ◽  
Short Term ◽  
White House ◽  
Rule Of Thumb ◽  
Constitutional Principle ◽  
Long Run

Progressives who opposed the Trump administration’s policies found themselves repeatedly relying on constitutional principles grounded in federalism, separation of powers, and free speech to resist the federal government. Although many progressives had either criticized or underemphasized those principles before Trump, the principles became vital to progressive causes after Trump was elected. Using dozens of examples from the ways in which Trump abused presidential powers, this book explains how the three sets of principles can help mitigate the harms that autocratic leaders in the Trump mold can inflict on both democratic institutions and vulnerable minorities. In doing so, the book urges progressives to follow this rule of thumb in the post-Trump era: if a constitutional principle was worth deploying to resist Trump’s harmful policies and autocratic governance, then it is likely worth defending in the post-Trump era even if it makes the short-term attainment of progressive objectives more difficult. This type of principled constitutionalism is essential not only because being principled is good in and of itself, but also because being principled in matters related to federalism, separation of powers, and free speech will help both advance progressive causes over the long run and reduce the threats posed by future autocratic leaders in the Trump mold to our system of self-governance, to our democratic values, and to traditionally subordinated minorities. Going forward, progressives should promote and defend constitutional principles grounded in federalism, separation of powers, and free speech regardless of whether they have an ally or an opponent in the White House.

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