Digital Commons Network^™

Litigation Reform: An Institutional Approach, Stephen B. Burbank, Sean Farhang

Sean Farhang

The program of regulation through private litigation that Democratic Congresses purposefully created starting in the late 1960s soon met opposition emanating primarily from the Republican party. In the long campaign for retrenchment that began in the Reagan administration, consequential reform proved difficult and ultimately failed in Congress. Litigation reformers turned to the courts and, in marked contrast to their legislative failure, were well-rewarded, achieving growing rates of voting support from an increasingly conservative Supreme Court on issues curtailing private enforcement under individual statutes. We also demonstrate that the judiciary’s control of procedure has been central to the campaign to retrench …

Using Social Norms As A Substitute For Law, Bryan H. Druzin

Bryan H. Druzin

The Conservatives’ 2015 Fiscal Charter: A Wanting Desire For Constitutional Change, Brian Christopher Jones, Paolo Sandro

Brian Christopher Jones

Public Actors In Private Markets: Toward A Developmental Finance State, Robert Hockett, Saule Omarova

Saule T. Omarova

The recent financial crisis brought into sharp relief fundamental questions about the social function and purpose of the financial system, including its relation to the “real” economy. This Article argues that, to answer these questions, we must recapture a distinctively American view of the proper relations among state, financial market, and development. This programmatic vision – captured in what we call a “developmental finance state” – is based on three key propositions: (1) that economic and social development is not an “end-state” but a continuing national policy priority; (2) that the modalities of finance are the most potent means of …

Health Care Reform In Russia And The United States, David A. Schultz, Olga Filatova

David A Schultz

Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights specifies that everyone has a right to adequate medical care. Yet what constitutes adequate medical care and how to deliver it is a problem states across the world confront as they face similar problems of rising costs, access, quality of service, and technological development. This article compares health care reform in the United States and the Russian Federation since 1990. Despite differences these two countries and their health care systems have, they show interesting parallels, convergences, and lessons in terms of how reform occurs.

Reclaiming Egalitarianism In The Political Theory Of Campaign Finance Reform, Frank Pasquale

Frank A. Pasquale

Recent advocacy for campaign finance reform has been based on an ideal of the democratic process which is unrealistic and unhelpful. Scholars should instead return to its egalitarian roots. This article examines how deliberative democratic theory became the main justification for campaign finance reform. It exposes the shortcomings of this deliberativist detour and instead models campaign spending as an effort to commodify issue-salience. Given this dominant function of money in politics, a more effective paradigm for reform is equalizing influence. Advocates of campaign regulation should return to the original principles of reformers; not an idealized vision of the democratic process, …

Voice Without Say: Why Capital-Managed Firms Aren’T (Genuinely) Participatory, Justin Schwartz

Justin Schwartz

Why are most capitalist enterprises of any size organized as authoritarian bureaucracies rather than incorporating genuine employee participation that would give the workers real authority? Even firms with employee participation programs leave virtually all decision-making power in the hands of management. The standard answer is that hierarchy is more economically efficient than any sort of genuine participation, so that participatory firms would be less productive and lose out to more traditional competitors. This answer is indefensible. After surveying the history, legal status, and varieties of employee participation, I examine and reject as question-begging the argument that the rarity of genuine …

Electoral Reforms, Vijaya Krushna Varma Mr

VIJAYA KRUSHNA VARMA Mr

Varma proposes new political and electoral reforms for better, healthy, strong and improved democracy

The Untouchables (Pakistan Observer), Shams Uz Zaman Mr.

Mr. Shams uz Zaman

Discuss the social and class differences in Pakistan.

General Elections - Voting On Single Day And In Single Phase, Vijaya Krushna Varma Mr

VIJAYA KRUSHNA VARMA Mr

The expanded banking system will help the Election Commission conduct voting for general elections on single day and in single phase. All elections from panchayats to Parliament can be conducted with the help of expanded banking system with minimum cost and without rigging and impersonate voting

Commentary: Critical Analysis Of Chiropractic At The Crossroads Or Are We Just Going Around In Circles., Dennis M. Richards

Dennis M Richards

This commentary presents critical analysis of a paper published by Dr John Reggars, and based, as he admitted, on his perceptions and opinions. Many of those are wrong. Others raise important questions. Sourced from a lecture presented by him at the 2010 annual conference of the Chiropractic and Osteopathic College of Australia (‘COCA’), this polemic is best understood in its historical and political contexts. COCA’s objects include political activity and Reggars is its vice president, which he failed to declare.

The Limits Of Debate Or What We Talk About When We Talk About Gender Imbalance On The Bench, Keith Bybee

Keith J. Bybee

What do we talk about when we talk about gender imbalance on the bench? The first thing we do is keep track of the number of female judges. Once the data has been gathered, we then argue about what the disparity between men and women in the judiciary means. These arguments about meaning are not freestanding. On the contrary, I claim that debates over gender imbalance occur within the context of a broader public debate over the nature of judicial decisionmaking. I argue that this public debate revolves around dueling conceptions of the judge as impartial arbiter and as politically …

The Difficult Problem Of Nonpoint Nutrient Pollution: Could The Endangered Species Act Offer Some Relief?, Zdravka Tzankova

Zdravka Tzankova

Nutrient pollution of rivers, streams, lakes, and estuaries is one of the preeminent water quality issues in the United States today, and poses a significant threat to the health of aquatic ecosystems. Agricultural nonpoint discharges, the runoff of nitrogen and phosphorous from animal manure and chemical fertilizers, are the primary sources of such nutrient pollution.

A pervasive and long-standing problem, nonpoint pollution, nutri- ent and otherwise, has proven to be one of the toughest challenges in contemporary environmental regulation. This situation is significantly attributable to the political and administrative dynamics of fragmented regulatory authority. The power to control such nonpoint …

Book Review: 'Living Legislation' By Jeffery A. Jenkins & Eric M. Patashnik (Eds), Brian Christopher Jones

Brian Christopher Jones

No abstract provided.

Altruism Trumping Privacy Hipaa, Privacy, Big Data Set Benefits, Douglas J. Henderson

DOUGLAS J HENDERSON

The United States Government must administer a publicly held cloud networked Big Data Set of Private Health Information (PHI) in order to utilize Big Data Analytics and allow free data mining of such PHI so that the health care industry can operate most cost effectively while also meeting the health care needs of the aging United States populace with the highest quality of care.

In The Jungle Of Cities [Review Of The Book Harold Washington And The Neighborhoods: Progressive City Reform In Chicago, 1983-1987], Nick Salvatore

Nick Salvatore

[Excerpt] At first glance such a spatial transformation of work may seem positive, as indeed it was for the largely white work force that left the city and staffed these new positions. But left behind geographically, economically, and socially were the largely black (and to a lesser extent, Mexican) working-class residents. It was at this juncture, with jobs disappearing and the urban social structure fragmented, that black Chicago, symbolized in the person of Harold Washington, finally assumed political power. In Harold Washington and the Neighborhoods, editors Pierre Clavel and Wim Wiewel have collected a group of essays that examine the …

Electoral And Political Reforms, Vijaya Krushna Varma Mr

VIJAYA KRUSHNA VARMA Mr

Varma proposes electoral and political reforms to reserve politics only to perfectionists who intend to dedicate their whole time and energy to serve the people of the country round the clock. It is imperative to consider these new political and electoral reforms for better, healthy and improved democracy to remove corruption, inequalities, unemployment and mis-governance.

The Changing Politics Of Diversity: Lessons From A Federal Technical Assistance Grant, Erica Frankenberg, Kathryn A. Mcdermott, Elizabeth Debray, Ann Blankenship

Kathryn A. McDermott

This paper begins with background information on the federal grant program, and on the scholarship that has informed our research. We then provide brief sketches of the eleven grantee districts and how they have used their federal funds. Our analysis focuses on how the school districts defined diversity, and how local politics were shaped by national factors like the economic recession. These policies fundamentally affect the distribution of educational and social opportunity within communities, and, in fact, may be even more subject to local variation and political dynamics than were earlier federal diversity efforts. We conclude that existing ambiguity about …

Lessons From A Federal Grant For School Diversity: Tracing A Theory Of Change And Implementation Of Local Policies, Elizabeth Debray, Kathryn A. Mcdermott, Erica Frankenberg, Ann Blankenship

Kathryn A. McDermott

In 2009, the U.S. Department of Education made grants to eleven school districts under the Technical Assistance for Student Assignment Plans (TASAP) program. The impetus for the program came mainly from the Council of Great City Schools, which was concerned that school districts would respond to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Parents Involved in Community Schools decision by dismantling policies intended to maintain diverse school enrollments. In this paper, we use data from interviews with federal and local participants to identify the theory of change behind TASAP and to determine the local effects of TASAP. The federal government’s intentions for the …

The Effects Of Female Cabinet Ministers On Female-Friendly Social Policy, Amy Atchison

Amy Atchison

A growing literature indicates that the representation of women in legislatures is positively associated with the passage of female-friendly social policy. However, there is little corresponding research concerning the effect of women in cabinet on female-friendly social policy. Yet, almost all advanced industrial democracies are parliamentary democracies, where policies typically originate within the cabinet and governments typically enjoy substantial control over the legislative process. Thus, to the extent that women promote female-friendly policy, women in cabinet positions should be ideally placed to do so, and indeed, possibly be more influential than women in legislatures. The purpose of this study is …

Voter Apathy And The 2011 Elections In Nigeria: A Research Report Commissioned By Independent National Electoral Commission(Inec) And Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (Fes), Ozy B. Orluwene Jp

Dr Ozy B.Orluwene,JP

No abstract provided.

Collective Choice, Justin Schwartz

Justin Schwartz

This short nontechnical article reviews the Arrow Impossibility Theorem and its implications for rational democratic decisionmaking. In the 1950s, economist Kenneth J. Arrow proved that no method for producing a unique social choice involving at least three choices and three actors could satisfy four seemingly obvious constraints that are practically constitutive of democratic decisionmaking. Any such method must violate such a constraint and risks leading to disturbingly irrational results such and Condorcet cycling. I explain the theorem in plain, nonmathematical language, and discuss the history, range, and prospects of avoiding what seems like a fundamental theoretical challenge to the possibility …

Can The Esa Address The Threats Of Atmospheric Nitrogen Deposition? Insights From The Case Of The Bay Checkerspot Butterfly, Zdravka Tzankova, Dena Vallano, Erika Zavaleta

Zdravka Tzankova

The Bay Checkerspot Butterfly reached its threatened status largely as a result of habitat loss through development. The species now benefits from the habitat pro- tection powers of the Endangered Species Act, yet the biggest new hazard to the survival of remaining Bay Checkerspot Butterfly populations may come from atmospheric nitrogen deposition. Driven by combustion and agricultural emissions, such deposition is an important cause of change in ecosystem structure and function, including potentially critical changes in the remaining Bay Checkerspot Butterfly habitat. We use the Bay Checkerspot Butterfly case to examine whether the Endan- gered Species Act, as it currently …

Don’T’ Know Much About History: Constitutional Text, Practice, And Presidential Power, David A. Schultz

David A Schultz

Assertions of presidential supremacy and power in affairs often invoke history, including events during the administration of George Washington, to defend their assertions. This article raises some questions regarding what we can learn from history for constitutional argument. It concedes generally that historical facts can support or buttress constitution argument, but more specifically it contends that acts undertaken by George Washington are problematic assertions for presidential power, especially those that assert “supremacist” or broad if not exclusive claims for presidential foreign policy authority. To do that, this article first describes how history is employed as constitutional argument for presidential power. …

The Political Consequences Of Legal Victories: Ballast Regulation And The Clean Water Act, Zdravka Tzankova

Zdravka Tzankova

Federal conservation policy has seen a new development recently: the use of the Clean Water Act (CWA) as a tool for regulating ballast water discharges from ships and, thereby, for preventing biological invasions caused by the discharge of nonindigenous organisms in ballast. Some outcomes of this new method for regulating ballast water discharge are obvious, others are much less so. Superimposing CWA regulatory authority on an already existing system of U.S. ballast law and regulation is likely to change the politics of ballast regulation. What do such changes in regulatory politics spell for the future of regulatory protections against biological …

The Mexican Kidnapping Industry: Does Federalism Hold The Government Hostage In Its Efforts To Combat Such Criminality?, Charles B. Bowers

Charles Bowers

No abstract provided.

The Intersection Of Judicial Attitudes And Litigant Selection Theories: Explaining U.S. Supreme Court Decision Making, Jeff L. Yates, Elizabeth Coggins

Jeff L Yates

Two prominent theories of legal decision making provide seemingly contradictory explanations for judicial outcomes. In political science, the Attitudinal Model suggests that judicial outcomes are driven by judges' sincere policy preferences -- judges bring their ideological inclinations to the decision making process and their case outcome choices largely reflect these policy preferences. In contrast, in the law and economics literature, Priest and Klein's well-known Selection Hypothesis posits that court outcomes are largely driven by the litigants' strategic choices in the selection of cases for formal dispute or adjudication -- forward thinking litigants settle cases where potential judicial outcomes are readily …

The Science And Politics Of Ecological Risk: Bioinvasions Policies In The Us And Australia., Zdravka Tzankova

Zdravka Tzankova

The US and Australia – western democracies with similar histories of public awareness on environmental issues and broadly comparable records of policy and regulatory action to safeguard environmental quality – have responded differently to one of the newest and most significant threats to marine bioidiversity: that of biological invasions mediated by the ballast water of commercial shipping. Each country has framed the same invasion risks differently for the purposes of policy and regulation: Australia has decided to use a more narrowly circumscribed, target-species-based approach whereas US policy and regulation takes a more comprehensive and precautionary approach. These somewhat surprising national …

Public Responses To Health Disparities: How Group Cues Structure Support For Government Intervention, Elizabeth Rigby, Joe Soss, Bridget Booske, Angela Rohan, Stephanie Roberts

Elizabeth Rigby

OBJECTIVE. To examine whether public support for government intervention to address health disparities varies when disparities are framed in terms of different social groups. METHOD. A survey experiment was embedded in a public opinion poll of Wisconsin adults. Respondents were randomly assigned to answer questions about either racial, economic, or education disparities in health. Ordered logit regression analyses examine differences across experimental conditions in support for government intervention to address health disparities. RESULTSs. Health disparities between economic groups received the broadest support for government intervention, while racial disparities in health received the least support for government intervention. These differences were …

Ethnicity And Public Service In Nigeria, Ozy B. Orluwene Jp

Dr Ozy B.Orluwene,JP

ABSTRACT This paper essentially examines the concept of ethnicity and public service in Nigeria. It posits that because of the monstrous proportion ethnicity assumed in Nigeria, it has remained a central turning point in the nation’s history. Its impact has further exacerbated problems of growth and development of Nigerian Public service and organizations.