Public Policy Choices Research Articles

Alabama Getaway: The Political Imaginary and the Heart of Dixie (review)

Reviewed by: Alabama Getaway: The Political Imaginary and the Heart of Dixie Michael Bowen Alabama Getaway: The Political Imaginary and the Heart of Dixie. By Allen Tullos. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2011. 364 pp. $69.95 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-8203-3048-8. $24.95 (paper). ISBN 978-0-8203-3049-5. In Alabama Getaway, Emory professor Allen Tullos delivers a superbly written takedown of the state's political culture and collective memory explaining why Alabama rates second only to Mississippi in jokes made at its expense. Borrowing his title from the Grateful Dead, Tullos treads the line between historical narrative and political treatise, offering both an explanation for how the state got into such poor shape and suggestions for how it can improve. His tendency for well-crafted satirical phrases gives this pointed narrative of lost opportunities and missteps a comedic tone as he reminds the reader of how far Alabama has come, yet how far it still has to go. Tullos ties together a disparate group of attitudes and value judgments into what he calls the "Heart of Dixie." This "political imaginary," as he terms it throughout the book, holds a great deal of sway over the state's citizenry and limits the debates and public policy choices of its legislators. Chapter one brilliantly surveys the individual elements of the Heart of Dixie mentality. Using episodes from both Alabama history and the writings of its expatriate authors, Tullos reveals how the state's extreme conservatism chokes its economic and spiritual growth. The homophobia of Judge Roy Moore meshes almost seamlessly with the white flight to the Birmingham suburbs and Alabama Power's omnipresent opposition to climate change legislation. The Heart of Dixie is most openly expressed through the "sez-you" idea, a shorthand term for Alabama's obstinate refusal to take, or even acknowledge, criticism and its unwillingness [End Page 153] to address its failing education and taxation systems. The evidence Tullos assembles here gives the reader a clear understanding of how all-encompassing and restrictive this political imaginary is and the role it has played in retarding Alabama's progress. The middle third of the book is the Heart of Dixie in practice. After an extended treatment of the Alabama prison system, the most prominent embodiment of the state's systemic racism and punitive spirit, Tullos takes the reader on a tour of the last fifty years of Alabama politics. Out of this story, two villains emerge. The first, the 1901 state constitution, codified the power of elite landholders through a regressive tax system that overburdened the middle and lower classes. The second, Governor George Wallace, enshrined the "sez-you" system through his 1963 stand at the schoolhouse door in Tuscaloosa and his penchant for race-baiting throughout his career. Both represent the Heart of Dixie at its worst and Tullos persuasively argues that the state will not address its systemic racism and inequality until it scraps the constitution and moves past the legacy of Wallaceism. The final third of the book presents alternative visions to the Heart of Dixie, largely through the work of Civil Rights leaders and other African Americans who have continued the fight through the present. Chapters six and eight are groupings of anecdotes that highlight numerous examples of progressive political and judicial action. These serve as a stark contrast to the sketches of chapter one and clearly indicate that progress is possible in Alabama—just at a slower pace than nearly everywhere else. Here again, Tullos does an excellent job of linking history with contemporary events to illuminate a possible path to change. Despite covering such wide-ranging ground, Tullos's argument holds together fairly well. The one outlier is the chapter on Condoleezza Rice. As a native of Birmingham Rice is certainly fair game, but Tullos focuses almost exclusively on her role in the 2003 Iraq War. Rice's middle-class parents sheltered her from grassroots activism and looked down on the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth and his local movement for social justice. Rice transcended her hometown to become the first female African American Secretary of State, and one could make an argument that Rice's upbringing and experiences are proof...

Emergy-based environmental accounting: Evaluation of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region

An integrated environmental accounting of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region (IMAR) is presented, based on an emergy analysis using data on environmental and economic inputs and outputs within and without IMAR from 1987 to 2007. This includes an analysis of resource and economic structure and trade status. Using these metrics, IMAR is compared with other Chinese regions, as well as the nation as a whole, with respect to the performance and stainability of their respective ecological-economic systems. Results show that more than 85% of the emergy in IMAR was derived from home region sources, indicating a strong capacity for self-sufficiency, even if this amount as a percentage of the total declined from about 93 to 87 percent over the 20 year period. These results also show, that the value of the emergy-based stainability index (1.86 in 2007) indicates that IMAR is a sustainable system over medium length time periods. However, the imbalance of trade, the over-dependence on nonrenewable resources, and the high amounts of waste produced per unit of emergy expended, will all hinder the stainability of the system in the longer term context. Suggestions for public policy choices, relevant to these findings, are discussed.

Recovered, Reinvented, Reimagined

This article explores the role of scripted cable television in the making and remaking of place in the conjuncture of postdisaster crisis and the neoliberal transformation of urban space. I suggest that Treme contributes to the remaking of New Orleans by engaging conceptions of authenticity, dwelling on the elements of cuisine, music, and diversity that mark New Orleans as distinctive, and highlighting individual enterprise as a condition of possibility for remaking post-Katrina New Orleans. I also suggest that because it makes for compelling quality television and provides badly needed publicity and temporary economic stimulus for the local economy, Treme, the show and the HBO production, through no fault of its own, displaces critical engagement with public policy choices and state-centered redress for economic, cultural, and social injustice and inequality.

Political economy of the energy-groundwater nexus in India: exploring issues and assessing policy options

Indian agriculture is trapped in a complex nexus of groundwater depletion and energy subsidies. This nexus is the product of past public policy choices that initially offered opportunities to India’s small-holder-based irrigation economy but has now generated in its wake myriad economic, social, and environmental distortions. Conventional ‘getting-the-price-right’ solutions to reduce these distortions have consistently been undermined by the invidious political economy that the nexus has created. The historical evolution of the nexus is outlined, the nature and scale of the distortions it has created are explored, and alternative approaches which Indian policy makers can use to limit, if not eliminate, the damaging impacts of the distortions, are analysed.

Frontier Issues of the Political Economy of Migration

Migration has a strong economic impact on the sending and host countries. Since individuals and groups do not benefit equally from migration, interest groups emerge to protect and take care of their narrow self-interests and compete for rents generated by migration. Narrow self-interests may be present not only for interest groups but also for ruling politicians and civil servants. In this paper we consider how political culture is important for determining policy and how interest groups affect, via a lobbying process, the choice of public policy. We also consider how interest groups and lobbying activities affect assimilation and attitudes towards migrants and international trade. The narrow interests of the different groups may cause a decrease in social welfare, in some cases, and may enhance welfare in other situations.

The power of eco-labels: Communicating climate change using carbon footprint labels consistent with international trade regimes under the WTO

Information is power. At the intersection of culture, science, mass communication, and law, this paper argues that information provided by a transparent and internationally harmonized eco-label scheme serves to enhance understanding of public policy choices for mitigating climate change.Aproduct carbon footprint (PCF) label communicates climate change information to citizen consumers and can indirectly reduce GHG emissions. PCF labels are effective response measures that countries are taking to address global warming and are not obstacles to international trade. The international community should embrace domestic PCF labeling schemes, whether voluntary or mandatory. The PCF label and associated standards, which countries may use as domestic trade measures in response to the challenges of climate change, should be consistent with the rules and regimes of WTO agreements to ensure that these schemes support fair and free international trade. At some time in the future, the UNFCCC parties may reach agreement on a domestic response, including trade measures, to reduce GHG emissions, and PCF labeling schemes may be adapted as needed to assist developing countries’ participation. The WTO should support environmental trade measures that fight global warming, such as a domestic PCF label and associated standards.

Debt, Labor Markets and the Creation and Destruction of Firms

We analyze the financing decisions of firms that face a labor market with search frictions and examine public policy choices that influence the firms’ financing and liquidation choices. In our model, debt facilitates the process of creative destruction (i.e., the elimination of inefficient firms to facilitate the creation of new firms) but may induce excessive liquidation and unemployment; in particular, during economic downturns. Within this setting we examine the role of monetary policy, which can reduce debt burdens during economy-wide downturns, and tax policy, which can influence the incentives of firms to use debt financing.

The power of eco-labels: Communicating climate change using carbon footprint labels consistent with international trade regimes under the WTO

Information is power. At the intersection of culture, science, mass communication, and law, this paper argues that information provided by a transparent and internationally harmonized eco-label scheme serves to enhance understanding of public policy choices for mitigating climate change.Aproduct carbon footprint (PCF) label communicates climate change information to citizen consumers and can indirectly reduce GHG emissions. PCF labels are effective response measures that countries are taking to address global warming and are not obstacles to international trade. The international community should embrace domestic PCF labeling schemes, whether voluntary or mandatory. The PCF label and associated standards, which countries may use as domestic trade measures in response to the challenges of climate change, should be consistent with the rules and regimes of WTO agreements to ensure that these schemes support fair and free international trade. At some time in the future, the UNFCCC parties may reach agreement on a domestic response, including trade measures, to reduce GHG emissions, and PCF labeling schemes may be adapted as needed to assist developing countries’ participation. The WTO should support environmental trade measures that fight global warming, such as a domestic PCF label and associated standards.

Distributional effects of public policy choices

This paper examines the effects of a budget-neutral public spending allocation between public investment and private investment subsidy on inequality dynamics and intergenerational mobility in an environment with heterogeneous households and incomplete capital market.

Africa in the time of cholera: a history of pandemics from 1815 to the present

Introduction Part I. The First Six Cholera Pandemics, 1817-1947: 1. 'The fiend of pestilence' circles the globe 2. Medical responses 3. Cholera ravages Sub-Saharan Africa: Senegambia, Ethiopia, and Zanzibar, 1821-94 4. Cholera in North Africa and the Nile Valley: Tunisia, 1835-68, and Egypt, 1823-1947 Part II. The Seventh Cholera Pandemic Strikes Africa: 5. Medical changes 6. Seventh pandemic in Africa, 1971-2009 7. Risk factors: environment and geography, armed conflicts and the dispersal of refugees 8. Risk factors: public health policy choices among stable and weak states 9. Zimbabwe, portrait of cholera in a failed state 10. Cholera today.

Liberalización y reformas al agro: lecciones de México

In this article I examine the North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) to investigate its impact on agriculture and the rural economy in Mexico and assess the policies the country has adopted to support the process. The first conclusion is that NAFTAhas confirmed some predictions (an increase in the trading of agricultural and fresh fish products between member countries and price cuts to Mexican producers of non-competitive crops). The second conclusion is the non-fulfilment of other predictions, an important one of which was an increase in the production of Mexican maize —the country’s main crop and form of human sustenance, and considered non-competitive. The Mexican experience, however, shows that the polarized view of some political agents, which is reflected in their choice of public policies, has led to contradictions between goals and policies, that is, the protection of food safety and sovereignty in the context of an agricultural trade liberalization framework. The article concludes by indicating some of the lessons the Mexican experience has to offer to other Latin American countries with existing or pending free trade agreements.

Charter Rights and Public Policy Choices: The Supreme Court and Public Finance

Over the past two decades there have been numerous highly charged court cases involving claims that government program offerings and public spending fail to satisfy guarantees entrenched in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.1 Calls for enhanced appeal mechanism in refugee determination,2 provincial health care coverage of hospital translation services for the deaf,3 equal leave provisions4 for both adoptive and birth parents, government coverage of autism treatment regimes,5 and access to health care provision rather than access to a waiting list6 all illustrate the intersection of the Charter with the allocation of the public purse.

Critical Junctures or Slow-Moving Processes? The Effects of Political and Economic Transformations on the Mexican Public Sector.

This paper argues against prevailing explanations of public management change in Mexico that rely on analysis of “momentous” decisions and short term explanations of reform. In contrast, there is an explicit attempt to explain changes in the public sector by long-term developments in the political economy. Specifically, I will show how different processes of change have taken place in the Mexican public sector as a gradual adaptation to the processes of economic liberalization and democratization, punctuatted by specific reform efforts. The main hypothesis is that changes in the size and economic scope of the public sector are explained by changes in the government’s economic strategy, whereas the changes in structure and public management policy choices are better explained by the process of political democratization. The overall objetive of this research is to improve our understanding of the dynamics of institutional change in government structures, by emphasizing the distinction between deliberate reform and incremental change, and by linking both processes to broader developments in the political and economic spheres.

Assessing the Role of Increasing Choice in English Social Care Services

AbstractThis article aims to explore the concept of choice in public service policy in England, illustrated through findings of the Individual Budgets (IB) evaluation. The evaluation tested the impact of IBs as a mechanism to increase choice of access to and commissioning of social care services around the individual through a randomised trial and explored the experiences and perspectives of key groups through a large set of interviews. The article presents a re-examination of these interview data, using three ‘antagonisms of choice’ proposed in the literature – choice and power relations, choice and equity, and choice and the public nature of decisions – as organising themes. The randomised trial found that IB holders perceived they had more control over their lives and appreciated the extra choice over use of services, albeit with variations by user group. However, problems of power relations, equity and the constraints implied by the public nature of decision-making were complicating and limiting factors in producing the benefits envisaged. The focus on choice in policy, especially as implemented by IBs, emphasises an individualistic approach. The findings suggest that addressing broader issues relating to power, equity and an understanding of the public nature of choice will be of value in realising more of the benefits of the policy.

Using the Harvard HRM model to conceptualise the impact of changes to supervision upon HRM outcomes for different types of Australian public sector employees

Within the Australian context of a shortage of skilled professionals, this article uses the Harvard model of human resources management (HRM) to conceptualise how changes in stakeholder interests coupled with changes to situational factors affect public sector HRM policy choices that in turn affect HRM outcomes for different types of public sector employees. The findings obtained using path analysis suggest that the proposed model explained almost 50% for nurses and less than 14% for police officers. In the case of nurses, the strong significant relationship between HRM inputs and outputs may provide a further plausible explanation for one of the long-term consequences of new public management – namely, the inability to retain skilled employees (especially those in the health sector) across numerous OECD countries. The implication of these findings is that the present public sector HRM policy choice should be re-examined because of its impact on HRM outcomes. Moreover, public sector employees should not be regarded as one uniform group that responds alike to the same policy. Whilst the merits of pursuing a strong auditing focus may have benefited organisations financially, the benefits can only remain if public sector employees, including professionals, are prepared to work under those conditions. The inability to retain nurses in numerous countries, coupled with past studies that have identified (poor) management as a contributing factor, suggests that past HRM policy choices may have to be replaced by new HRM policy choices that focus on employees' perceptions of well-being. However, more studies using different types of professionals are required to confirm the generalisability of these findings.

Patient Data: Property, Privacy & the Public Interest

Changes in technology sometimes raise important public policy choices and require that we clarify key values and reexamine legal concepts. Such is the case with the development of electronic medical records (EMRs), which facilitate obtaining patient data from provider and insurer records. EMRs expand our ability to tap patient data and thereby create great potential benefits as well as risks. This new technology requires that we clarify the ambiguous property interests in patient data. How the law defines ownership of patient data will shape whether its benefits can be developed and also affects patient confidentiality.EMRs make it feasible to collect aggregate patient data that can be used to vastly improve medical knowledge, patient safety and public health. Researchers have long used patient data from clinical trials to evaluate the benefits and risks of drugs and medical therapy, compare their relative effectiveness, and analyze health care cost and quality.

Information Competency and Pressure‐induced Legislation

基于媒体话语的压力型立法是立法者信息能力不足的产物。如果立法者的信息 能力不能有效应对现代法律规制活动的知识挑战，那么将无法抵御媒体话语过度渗 透，导致立法与媒体之间的关联过于紧密，形成一旦媒体热议、立法就积极跟进的压 力型立法现象。法律制度是具有恒常性的规则，而压力型立法往往失却应有的冷静、 客观、慎重与全面，展现出背离理性立法的内在机理的决策特点，引发一系列既不公 平、也无效率的再分配效应。压力型立法凸显了信息在公共政策选择和制度设计中的 重要性，应当实施立法绩效评估制度，以此为立法者重塑信息能力提供充分的激励， 确保立法的科学性与合理性。 关键词: 信息能力 媒体话语 压力型立法 利益再分配效应 Pressure‐induced legislation occasioned by media discourse is actually the result of an information deficit on the part of legislators. If legislators' information competency fails to meet the knowledge challenges of the modern legal system and its activities, they will be powerless to resist the infiltration of media discourse. The result is that legislative activities are inextricably intertwined with the media; once a particular social issue is catapulted on to the media agenda, legislators have no choice but to fall into line, creating the phenomenon of pressure‐induced legislation. The essential characteristic of law is its inherent constancy and stability, whereas pressure‐induced legislation often loses the calmness, objectivity, prudence and comprehensiveness proper to law. Such legislative decision‐making runs counter to the inherently rational mechanism of legislation and produces unfair and ineffective redistributive results. Pressure‐induced legislation highlights the importance of information in public policy choices and institution design. It would be desirable for the whole legal system aimed at evaluating legislative performance to be introduced so as to provide legislators with a sufficient incentive to remodel their information competency and ensure the scientific nature and rationality of legislation.

Here We Grow Again! the Limits of State Financial Crises as Drivers for Policy Change, the Case of Canadian Publicly Funded Health Care, Evidence from Ontario

State finance crises can be used as levers to facilitate major policy changes. They can facilitate the opening or widening of windows for major changes in policies and even the over-arching macro-policy paradigm that shapes all other public-policy choices. This paper looks at the limits to this strategy through a case study of publicly funded health care in the Canadian province of Ontario. Ontario has a universal public health insurance system. Decision-makers have long been aware that the aging of society and other evolving factors will place pressures on the system unless the balance within the system of hospital vs. community care is adjusted. In the mid-1990s the government of the time appeared determined to make the necessary reforms, using its financial crisis as a lever. The changes that resulted proved short-lived and a major hospital building program is now under way. The paper explains this failure by reference to Tuohy’s theory of organizing logics. Although crises can be used to overcome some forms of resistance, when resistance is founded in organizing logics and/or founding principles it tends to be more resilient. Such forces must be harnessed in the service of change if reform is to succeed. The paper concludes by assessing what general lessons proponents of health care reform in Canada and other countries can learn from this case.

The sustainability of public health expenditures: evidence from the Canadian federation

The fiscal sustainability of government health expenditures is defined as the gap between growth rates of spending and measures of the resource base. The results show that over the period 1965-2008, real per capita Canadian provincial government health spending has grown at rates that exceed growth in basic measures of the resource base such as per capita gross domestic product (GDP), per capita federal transfers and per capita provincial government revenues. Forecasts of future spending to 2035 using determinant regression and growth rate extrapolation techniques show that Canadian provincial government health spending is projected to continue rising in the future and its share of provincial GDP will rise. While the amount spent on health is ultimately a public policy choice, provincial government health spending also cannot continue growing faster than the resource base indefinitely.

Internet Driven Convergence - Policy Implications

Digital content, Internet Protocol (IP), Moore’s law and a move from dedicated hardware to software based systems and rights management are enabling convergence. Convergence can be thought of as occurring in three phases. In the first phase of convergence legacy market players have entered one another’s traditional markets and offered a range of services and service bundles to end users. In the second phase internet based applications and content have been offered by non-traditional players in the communications and entertainment markets such as Apple, Microsoft, Skype, Google, Hulu and Spotify. In the third phase, which we may now be entering, applications, services and content delivered via the internet replace existing platform specific services. Access platforms are likely to change, with fibre replacing copper; and cable (intermediate between fibre and copper), fibre and satellite progressively replacing terrestrial broadcasting. Mobile access will be enhanced, may see consolidation and will compete with copper access. Bundling of services by service providers is likely to give way to device based integration of applications by consumers, with personal devices playing a central role. The internet is at the heart of these transformations, both in terms of demand for enhanced access and “innovation without permission” in relation to applications and content. If these changes become widespread they will fundamentally alter the nature of competition with access to “platform independent” applications and content on the internet replacing competitive models based on access to infrastructure. In this paper we argue that current communications and media policy is a barrier to the next phase of convergence. Specific barriers to change include: 1) inflexible and inefficient spectrum allocations; 2) platform specific universal service requirements; 3) obstacles to the shut-down of legacy services and networks and the creation of new ones. We propose a number of ways in which regulatory policy needs to change. The long history of legacy networks and services and the institutions that have developed around them - over a century for copper based fixed telephony and over 70 years for terrestrial TV broadcasting - make the required changes challenging. The challenges go beyond the responsibilities of sector specific regulation and involve broader public policy and political choice. They also require a shift of focus from promoting competition within traditional value chains to allowing disruptive innovation. As John Maynard Keynes set out in The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money the challenge may lie “not in the new ideas, but in escaping the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds.”