Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Policy Punctuations
Do democracies perform better than more autocratic political systems? Most existing literature focuses on single issues, such as maintaining the peace, avoiding famines, or promoting stable economic growth. The key to policy success for all these and other issues is adaptive policymaking in complex,...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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2019-06-01
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| Series: | International Review of Public Policy |
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| Online Access: | https://journals.openedition.org/irpp/318 |
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| _version_ | 1841551175988543488 |
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| author | Bryan D. Jones Derek A. Epp Frank R. Baumgartner |
| author_facet | Bryan D. Jones Derek A. Epp Frank R. Baumgartner |
| author_sort | Bryan D. Jones |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Do democracies perform better than more autocratic political systems? Most existing literature focuses on single issues, such as maintaining the peace, avoiding famines, or promoting stable economic growth. The key to policy success for all these and other issues is adaptive policymaking in complex, dynamic environments. Relying on theory and empirical tests from policy process studies, we focus on extreme policy punctuations as indicators of maladaptive policymaking. We conceive of a continuum from the most open democracies to the most closed authoritarian systems, with intermediate forms of less open democracies, hybrid regimes, and less closed authoritarian systems. Based on a review of the existing literature, we extract four factors that seem to affect maladaptive and hence more punctuated policymaking: friction imposed by formal rules and informal norms on the policymaking process, the absence of incentives to address problems, centralization in policymaking, and lack of diversity in channels of information. Many of these factors cluster, so it is difficult to discern their specific effects, but our approach allows a start at doing so. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-38bdceb3c57a4c45bd1a28cecbb68c23 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2679-3873 2706-6274 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2019-06-01 |
| publisher | OpenEdition |
| record_format | Article |
| series | International Review of Public Policy |
| spelling | doaj-art-38bdceb3c57a4c45bd1a28cecbb68c232025-01-09T16:26:03ZengOpenEditionInternational Review of Public Policy2679-38732706-62742019-06-01172610.4000/irpp.318Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Policy PunctuationsBryan D. JonesDerek A. EppFrank R. BaumgartnerDo democracies perform better than more autocratic political systems? Most existing literature focuses on single issues, such as maintaining the peace, avoiding famines, or promoting stable economic growth. The key to policy success for all these and other issues is adaptive policymaking in complex, dynamic environments. Relying on theory and empirical tests from policy process studies, we focus on extreme policy punctuations as indicators of maladaptive policymaking. We conceive of a continuum from the most open democracies to the most closed authoritarian systems, with intermediate forms of less open democracies, hybrid regimes, and less closed authoritarian systems. Based on a review of the existing literature, we extract four factors that seem to affect maladaptive and hence more punctuated policymaking: friction imposed by formal rules and informal norms on the policymaking process, the absence of incentives to address problems, centralization in policymaking, and lack of diversity in channels of information. Many of these factors cluster, so it is difficult to discern their specific effects, but our approach allows a start at doing so.https://journals.openedition.org/irpp/318policy punctuationsdemocracyauthoritarianismpublic budgets |
| spellingShingle | Bryan D. Jones Derek A. Epp Frank R. Baumgartner Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Policy Punctuations International Review of Public Policy policy punctuations democracy authoritarianism public budgets |
| title | Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Policy Punctuations |
| title_full | Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Policy Punctuations |
| title_fullStr | Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Policy Punctuations |
| title_full_unstemmed | Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Policy Punctuations |
| title_short | Democracy, Authoritarianism, and Policy Punctuations |
| title_sort | democracy authoritarianism and policy punctuations |
| topic | policy punctuations democracy authoritarianism public budgets |
| url | https://journals.openedition.org/irpp/318 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT bryandjones democracyauthoritarianismandpolicypunctuations AT derekaepp democracyauthoritarianismandpolicypunctuations AT frankrbaumgartner democracyauthoritarianismandpolicypunctuations |