Evaluation of US state pollinators using 3 evidence-based policymaking frameworks

After the US federal government created a national pollinator protection plan in 2015, many states followed with their own. Since their goal is to promote pollinating insect conservation, we wanted to know whether the state plans are using best practices for evidence-based science policy. In early 2019 we found and downloaded every existing, publicly available US state pollinator protection plan. We then used content analysis to assess the goals, scope, and implementation of state-level pollinator protection plans across the US. This analysis was conducted using three distinct frameworks for evidence-based policymaking: US Department of Interior Adaptive Resources Management (ARM), US Environmental Protection Agency management pollinator protection plan (MP3) guidance, and Pew Trusts Pew-MacAthur Results First Project elements of evidence-based state policymaking (PEW) framework. Then we scored them using the framework criteria, to assess whether the plans were using known best practices for evidence based policymaking. Of the 31 states with a state pollinator plan, Connecticut was the state with the lowest total score across the three evaluation frameworks. The state with the highest overall scores, across the three frameworks, was Missouri. Most states did not score highly on the majority of the frameworks. Overall, many state plans were lacking policy elements that address monitoring, evaluation, and adjustment. These missing elements impact the ability of states to achieve their conservation goals. Our results indicate that states can improve their pollinator conservation policies to better match evidence-based science policy guidance, regardless of which framework is used.

State policies and upgrading in global value chains: A systematic literature review

This paper examines the role of state policymaking in a context of global value chains (GVCs). While the literature acknowledges that states matter in GVCs, there is little understanding of how they matter from a policy perspective. We address this tension between theory and practice by first delineating the state’s facilitator, regulator, producer and buyer roles. We then explore the extent to which corresponding state policies enable or constrain the following policy objectives: GVC participation; value capture; and social and environmental upgrading. We do so via a systematic review of academic GVC literature, combined with analysis of seminal policy publications by International Organizations. Our findings indicate that state policymakers leverage facilitative strategies to achieve GVC participation and enhanced value capture; with regulatory and public procurement mechanisms adopted to address social and environmental goals. Mixed results also emerged, highlighting tensions between policies geared towards economic upgrading on the one hand, and social and environmental upgrading on the other. Finally, we suggest that effective state policies require a multi-scalar appreciation of GVC dynamics, working with multiple and sometimes competing stakeholders to achieve their developmental objectives.

The roles of employers and trade unions in immigration and welfare state policymaking

Whether and under which conditions immigrants should be admitted and obtain access to employment and social security is an issue of continuously high political salience across the advanced democracies. Unions and employers, as traditionally influential actors in immigration and social policymaking, have important roles to play in this area, but their exact preferences, strategies and behaviour are theoretically difficult to determine and are still only partly understood. This article outlines a series of research problems regarding the roles of social partners in the social and economic integration of immigrants and discusses how the articles contained in this special issue address these problems.

5. Fiscal federalism

“Fiscal federalism” describes how during the early decades of the republic, Congress gave states money to help pay for new roads and canals, to support their militia, and to build colleges and universities. But the system of granting money to the states grew in the twentieth century, especially after the Sixteenth Amendment gave the national government the right to impose an income tax in 1913. The chapter discusses the federal grants program, which now provides about 30 percent of the average operating revenues of state and local governments. It also considers how the national government uses mandates to influence state policymaking, how states raise revenue through taxation, and the differences in state spending programs.

3. The evolution of federalism in law

Debates over the relative power of national and state governments have typically hinged on constitutional provisions. “The evolution of federalism in law” describes how, in the early years of the republic, the US Supreme Court played a key role in defining the nature and scope of the US federal system. It then outlines how judicial decisions of the twentieth century continued the expansion of federal authority. Although the national government has many tools to influence state policymaking and enact federal policy, US states retain important powers. For many Americans, the actions of state and local governments have a bigger impact on their lives than those of the national government.

The Presence and Consequences of Abortion Aversion in Scientific Research Related to Alcohol Use during Pregnancy

Recent research has found that most U.S. state policies related to alcohol use during pregnancy adversely impact health. Other studies indicate that state policymaking around substance use in pregnancy—especially in the U.S.—appears to be influenced by an anti-abortion agenda rather than by public health motivations. This commentary explores the ways that scientists’ aversion to abortion appear to influence science and thus policymaking around alcohol and pregnancy. The three main ways abortion aversion shows up in the literature related to alcohol use during pregnancy include: (1) a shift from the recommendation of abortion for “severely chronic alcoholic women” to the non-acknowledgment of abortion as an outcome of an alcohol-exposed pregnancy; (2) the concern that recommendations of abstinence from alcohol use during pregnancy lead to terminations of otherwise wanted pregnancies; and (3) the presumption of abortion as a negative pregnancy outcome. Thus, abortion aversion appears to influence the science related to alcohol use during pregnancy, and thus policymaking—to the detriment of developing and adopting policies that reduce the harms from alcohol during pregnancy.

Theoretical Perspectives on Subnational Public Policy and LGBT Law

Subnational policymaking is central to LGBT politics and law, in contrast to other arenas of policymaking for marginalized groups. With barriers to national policymaking in Congress and in the federal courts, LGBT rights activists have leveraged opportunities at the state and local levels to create LGBT-supportive policies. Opponents have also used subnational politics to further their agenda, particularly direct democracy, while LGBT rights activists have used elite politics, such as state courts, effectively. Subnational LGBT politics is also marked by a significant variety in policy outcomes, with a notable urban and suburban versus rural divide in policymaking and in the presence of openly LGBT elected officials. The case of LGBT policy and law has caused scholars to rethink questions such as the role of public opinion in state policymaking, morality politics, and courts and social change.

Conclusion

Summarises the nature of alcohol policy in Russia and explains why such diverse perceptions of it exist. The existence of the anti-alcohol initiative under Medvedev gave a false sense of cohesiveness and intentionality to alcohol policy, concealing its fragmented and ad hoc nature. The kleptocracy inherent in Russia’s political economy has a distorting effect on state policymaking, as formal state priorities are undermined by the priorities of informal power networks. This can be seen in the way in which an official policy of reducing spirits consumption has been distorted into policies that impact harshly on vodka’s main competitor, beer.