Think tanks and policy analysis

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Rich
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Policy Analysis ◽  
The United States ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
The 1960S

Since the 1960s, think tanks have proliferated in the United States, especially ideological think tanks, with conservative think tanks coming to substantially outnumber liberal organization. In this environment, the quality of analysis from think tanks is often in question and consumers of their work seem to be more often attracted to analysis that supports preexisting point of view rather than the most rigorously produced research. For sure, think tanks matter; they are among the most important sources of analysis in American policymaking. But in order to be influential, think tank analysts must target their audiences clearly and be relentless in marketing their work.

A Transatlantic Network

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Stedman Jones
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
The United States ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Political Organization ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
Heritage Foundation ◽  
Cato Institute ◽  
Set Up

This chapter explores how a transatlantic network of sympathetic businessmen and fundraisers, journalists and politicians, policy experts and academics grew and spread neoliberal ideas between the 1940s and the 1970s. These individuals were successful at promoting ideas through a new type of political organization, the think tank. The first wave of neoliberal think tanks were set up in the 1940s and 1950s and included the American Enterprise Institute and the Foundation for Economic Education in the United States, and the Institute of Economic Affairs in Great Britain. A second wave of neoliberal think tanks were established in the 1970s, including the Centre for Policy Studies and the Adam Smith Institute in Great Britain, and the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute in the United States.

Guillermo del Toro

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dolores Tierney
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
English Language ◽  
The United States ◽  
Harry Potter ◽  
Spanish Language ◽  
Alfonso Cuaron ◽  
The 1960S

Guillermo del Toro (b. 1964) is an Oscar-winning Mexican director, screenwriter, producer, novelist, film scholar, curator, and nonfiction writer who works internationally on English-language and Spanish-language projects in Mexico, New Zealand, Spain, and the United States and across a number of different media, including film, television, animation, and novels. Although he has worked in multiple genres, including horror (Mimic (1997), Blade II (2002), Crimson Peak (2015)), action/fantasy (Hellboy (2004), Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008)), science fiction (Pacific Rim (2013)), and hybrids of these and other genres (The Shape of Water (2017)), he is most known for the gothic sensibility of many of his projects (Cronos (1993), The Devil’s Backbone (2001), Pan’s Labyrinth (2006), Crimson Peak (2015)). Relatedly, Del Toro’s Cronos and his subsequent films, including those he has produced have contributed greatly to the rehabilitation of the horror and fantasy genres from the cultural disreputability they suffered through the 1960s to the early 1990s and also facilitated more horror production in Mexico going forward. In addition to the gothic quality of his work, Del Toro’s auteur status is often traced through the recurring imagery, themes, and monsters that appear across his oeuvre and through the recurring preoccupations with the contiguity of real and fantasy worlds and with ghosts as manifestations of the (historical and political) past. Although Del Toro has made and been involved in the production of some notable franchise films in recent years, directing Blade II, Hellboy, and Hellboy II: The Golden Army, receiving a screenwriting credit for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012), The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (2013), and The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (2014) he has also turned down several opportunities to work on franchise films in the Narnia and Harry Potter series (passing on directing Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban but suggesting his compatriot Alfonso Cuarón for the job instead) and leaving the production of The Hobbit films after work on the scripts. He’s also received writing credit on Trox Nixey’s Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark (2010).

Demanding Information: Think Tanks and the US Congress

2009 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 225-242 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony M. Bertelli ◽  
Jeffrey B. Wenger
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Empirical Support ◽  
The United States ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
Policy Positions ◽  
Us Congress ◽  
The Us ◽  
Market Factors ◽  
Political Entrepreneurs

The recent growth in the formation of think tanks in the United States raises questions about their role in the democratic process. A theory of think-tank formation is pre here, which posits that committee debate creates incentives for legislators to seek research-based, policy-analytic information supporting competing policy positions. As political entrepreneurs recognize this demand, they supply think tanks, just as scholars have suggested they supply interest groups. An important macro-level implication of this theory is that as legislators’ ideological polarization increases, the demand for policy analysis increases, as does the number of think tanks supplied. Empirical support for this proposition in the United States from 1903 to 2003 is shown, while controlling for market factors measuring the opportunity cost of investing in think tanks.

scholarly journals Comparative Analysis of the Foundation of Chinese and American Analytical Centers

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lou Wei
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
Policy Decision ◽  
The United States ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
Internal Conflicts ◽  
Strategic Resources ◽  
The World ◽  
The U.S

Think Tanks are the organizations specialized in the research of development, in which experts and scholars of various disciplines using data to analyze the required disciplines or fields, and come up with optimal solutions to problems. In the beginning, the establishment of Think Tanks was to give advice on policy-decision of foreign and domestic policies. With the development and needs of the society, the types of Think Tanks have been diversified. The United States was the first country to found Think Tanks in the world. With accurate and comprehensive analysis and judgment, the U.S. Think Tanks have extensive and in-depth contact with the ruling authorities and have deep influence in the public, influencing the major decisions of the U.S. politics, economy, society, military, diplomacy, science and technology. In the past three decades, China has made great achievements in economic development. Although the current situation of Chinese Think Tanks’ development ranks second in the world in terms of the total volume, the influence is still limited and the quality needs to be improved. At present, influential Think Tanks mainly gather in Beijing, Shanghai and other political and economic centers, most of which are comprehensive and mainly focus on national strategy. In the process of transformation to new types, the main problems of Think Tanks are inability to provide forward-looking and time-sensitive products, are lack of reasonable talent composition and internal division of labor, and are difficulty in forming an effective government, society and international influence. By comparing the development of think tanks between the United States and China, this paper proposes that there are significant differences in the construction and application of think tanks between the two countries. As a developing country, China has to keep improving its own think tanks, vigorously raise the number and scale of the private think tanks, and intensify their influence steadily so that a relatively mature think tank market can be developed gradually. Talents pool is the most important strategic resources in the 21st century. In order to make rapid economic development and cope with the international situation, almost every country is attaching a great importance to the training of the talents at home and the talent introduction from other countries. Relatively speaking, the construction and development of think tanks is crucial to the strategic talents reserve. Only by constantly filling the think tanks with more talents can China cope with the ever-changing international situation and have a better solution to the internal conflicts. Key words: Think Tanks; China; the United States; Sino-U.S. Relations.

scholarly journals A study of the Japanese translation of Huckleberry Finn

1958 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Shozo Nakada
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Exploratory Study ◽  
The United States ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Sole Purpose ◽  
The Future ◽  
Representative Work ◽  
Japanese Translation ◽  
Huckleberry Finn

"The purpose of this investigation is to make an exploratory study of certain phases of a Japanese translation of Huckleberry Finn, in order (1) to find the method used in the translation; (2) to determine the qualities of the language in the translation; (3) to determine the stylistic qualities of the sentences; (4) and to form an evaluation of the Japanese translation by considering . its context from the point of view of style. A study of this type is important primarily because the information thus derived can make a definite contribution to an understanding of the quality of Japanese translations of Huckleberry Finn. There have been many Japanese translations of Mark Twain's works since 1916, but none of them has ever been introduced to the United States. Although it is a hasty judgment to apply the result of this study to other Japanese translations of Mark Twain's works, the study of the translation of Huckleberry Finn as Mark Twain's most representative work in the original can do much to lead to a better understanding and appreciation of the quality of the Japanese translations. This evaluation of the quality of the translation, however, is not the sole purpose of the study. This study will also show the differences of language between English and Japanese and hence the difficulties involved in the translation. The language and style of Huckleberry Finn are so peculiar that the reproduction into Japanese is extremely difficult. This study, therefore, deals with the language and style in the original and in the translation. Conceivably it may help improve the quality and method of Japanese translation in the future. "--Page viii-ix

The evolution of the policy analysis profession in the United States

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beryl A. Radin
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Policy Analysis ◽  
General Public ◽  
The United States ◽  
Policy Analyst ◽  
The Past ◽  
The 1960S

Despite the growth of the field in the United States over the past several decades, this is not a profession that the general public understands. Indeed, as time has gone by since the profession developed, there sometimes appears to be less agreement about the activity than there was in its earliest days. For the answer to the question ‘What is a policy analyst?’ is different today than it was in the 1960s, when the profession first defined itself. One can depict the realities of the policy analysis profession as occurring during three periods: 1960 to 1989, 1990 to 2003; and 2003 to the present. Using three points of time to frame this contrast does provide a way to emphasize the shifts that have occurred in the profession.

Determinants of Social Capital: New Evidence on Religion, Diversity and Structural Change

2007 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 368-377 ◽  
Author(s):  
MARCUS ALEXANDER
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Capital ◽  
Social Trust ◽  
State Level ◽  
The United States ◽  
American Democracy ◽  
Precise Understanding ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
New Evidence

Americans not only bowl less today than they did fifty years ago, but also some bowl more than others. This is one of the major and simple messages of Robert Putnam's influential study of social capital in America. Using a variety of data sources, Putnam documents a significant variation in the states' levels of social capital, while arguing for specific general causes of the decline of social capital across the United States. Here, we evaluate the power of Putnam's theory in explaining state-level variation of stocks of social capital. We find that the strongest determinants of social capital levels are basic social and economic differences between states, such as education, church membership, farming and unemployment. Controlling for these determinants, we also find no evidence for a much-debated link between diversity and social capital.Since the publication of Putnam's book, a growing quantitative literature on social capital has contributed to a much more nuanced and theoretically precise understanding of the link between social capital and the quality of American democracy. Pamela Paxton, as well as Dora Costa and Matthew Kahn, have re-examined Putnam's finding of the aggregate decline in social capital in the United States since the 1960s. Putnam's claim that higher levels of social capital improve the functioning of democracy on the state level has been examined systematically by, among others, Stephen Knack and Tom W. Rice. On a methodological level, Eric M. Uslaner has argued for a need to disaggregate different concepts of trust, and focus on generalized social trust and its effect on making democracy more effective.

Having Their Say, Leaving Their Mark

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 141-153
Author(s):  
Adolphus G. Belk ◽  
Robert C. Smith ◽  
Sherri L. Wallace
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Civic Engagement ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Black People ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Political ◽  
Historical Documents ◽  
Adverse Conditions ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Independent Organization

In general, the founders of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists were “movement people.” Powerful agents of socialization such as the uprisings of the 1960s molded them into scholars with tremendous resolve to tackle systemic inequalities in the political science discipline. In forming NCOBPS as an independent organization, many sought to develop a Black perspective in political science to push the boundaries of knowledge and to use that scholarship to ameliorate the adverse conditions confronting Black people in the United States and around the globe. This paper utilizes historical documents, speeches, interviews, and other scholarly works to detail the lasting contributions of the founders and Black political scientists to the discipline, paying particular attention to their scholarship, teaching, mentoring, and civic engagement. It finds that while political science is much improved as a result of their efforts, there is still work to do if their goals are to be achieved.

Bipartisanship as Possible Alternative of Russian Political System Evolution

2018 ◽  
Vol 42 ◽  
pp. 256-265
Author(s):  
Konstantin V. Simonov ◽  
Stanislav P. Mitrakhovich
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Political System ◽  
Party System ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
The United States ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Complex Structures ◽  
Practical Advice ◽  
Simultaneous Separation

The article examines the possibility of transfer to bipartisan system in Russia. The authors assess the benefits of the two-party system that include first of all the ensuring of actual political competition and authority alternativeness with simultaneous separation of minute non-system forces that may contribute to the country destabilization. The authors analyze the accompanying risks and show that the concept of the two-party system as the catalyst of elite schism is mostly exaggerated. The authors pay separate attention to the experience of bipartisan system implementation in other countries, including the United States. They offer detailed analysis of the generated concept of the bipartisanship crisis and show that this point of view doesn’t quite agree with the current political practice. The authors also examine the foreign experience of the single-party system. They show that the success of the said system is mostly insubstantial, besides many of such systems have altered into more complex structures, while commentators very often use not the actual information but the established myths about this or that country. The authors also offer practical advice regarding the potential technologies of transition to the bipartisan system in Russia.

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