Post-Election Wrap Up with Craig Volden News On Monday, Nov. 12, Batten students gathered in the Great Hall of Garrett Hall for a post-election wrap-up led by Batten’s Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL). This was not a typical Batten Hour with the exception that food was served. Rather, the event was reminiscent of a game of musical chairs. Every eight minutes, students moved to a new table, where CEL Director Craig Volden, Operations Director Greer Kelly, CEL researchers and interns, along with Professor of Practice of Public Policy Gerald Warburg, discussed the implications of last Tuesday's midterm election results.
The Significance of Batten Hosting Fifth District Debate News The non-partisan debate was moderated by Batten Professors Craig Volden and Gerald Warburg.
Party Calls and Reelection in the US Senate Research Minozzi and Volden advance the idea that a substantial portion of partisan voting activity in Congress is a simple call to unity that is especially easily embraced by ideological extremists. If correct, Minozzi and Volden’s findings should extend from the House to the Senate, despite differences in institutional structures and in tools at the disposal of party leaders across the two chambers.
Legislative Effectiveness in the United States Senate Research Just like members of the House, US senators vary in how effective they are at lawmaking. We create Legislative Effectiveness Scores for each senator in each of the 93rd–113th Congresses (1973–2015). We use these scores to explore common claims about institutional differences in lawmaking between the House and the Senate.
Leadership in American Politics Research In the polarized governing environment of American politics today, the problem of leadership becomes ever more pressing and ever more vexed. What defines leadership, what determines its importance and effectiveness, and how does it differ from one sphere of influence to another: these are the questions Leadership in American Politics addresses in an effort to clarify the causes and consequences of the actions that public leaders take.
In Congress, Even Lawmakers’ Degrees Are a Partisan Issue: How higher education is shaping the House of Representatives Research
Spatial Models of Legislative Effectiveness Research Spatial models of policymaking have evolved from the median voter theorem to the inclusion of institutional considerations such as committees, political parties, and various voting and amendment rules. Such models, however, implicitly assume that no policy is better than another at solving public policy problems and that all policy makers are equally effective at advancing proposals.
Ideology, Learning, and Policy Diffusion: Experimental Evidence Research We introduce experimental research design to the study of policy diffusion in order to better understand how political ideology affects policymakers’ willingness to learn from one another’s experiences. Our two experiments–embedded in national surveys of U.S. municipal officials–expose local policymakers to vignettes describing the zoning and home foreclosure policies of other cities, offering opportunities to learn more. We find that: (1) policymakers who are ideologically predisposed against the described policy are relatively unwilling to learn from others, but (2) such ideological biases can be overcome with an emphasis on the policy’s success or on its adoption by co-partisans in other communities.
Ideology, Learning, and Policy Diffusion: Experimental Evidence Research We introduce experimental research design to the study of policy diffusion in order to better understand how political ideology affects policymakers’ willingness to learn from one another’s experiences. Our two experiments–embedded in national surveys of U.S. municipal officials–expose local policymakers to vignettes describing the zoning and home foreclosure policies of other cities, offering opportunities to learn more.
Failures: Diffusion, Learning, and Policy Abandonment Research Studies of the diffusion of policies tend to focus on innovations that successfully spread across governments. Implicit in such diffusion is the abandonment of the previous policy.
Updating the Outdated: Craig Volden Seeks to Fix Research Model Errors News Research into public policy diffusion has exploded in the last 20 years. Scholars and thinkers have published hundreds of studies tracking the spread of policies from government to government. With countless dollars and thousands of hours invested, could it be that their studies are wrong? That’s what Batten School Professor Craig Volden seeks to find out.