State Politics and Policy

These articles focus on state politics and policy. The first, with Lawrence Grossback, examines the role of state legislative staff in policy making. Larry and I were both state legislative staffers in Minnesota while in graduate school. Based on our experience, and our read of the literature, we felt that while staff play an important and unique role in policy making, they are all but understudied by academics. The second paper, with Sean Nicholson-Crotty is related—building on some of the thoughts and discussions Larry and I had in the development of the first paper, adding Sean’s understanding of specific state policy areas. Here we argue that the study of policy diffusion should move beyond the standard geographic model of diffusion to incorporate more about the similarities, especially ideological, among states.

Articles:

Lawrence J. Grossback and David A.M. Peterson. 2004. “Understanding Institutional Change: Legislative Staff Development and the State Policymaking Environment,” American Politics Research 32(1): 26-51.

Lawrence J. Grossback, Sean Nicholson-Crotty and David A. M. Peterson. 2004. “Ideology and Learning in Policy Diffusion.” American Politics Research 32(5): 521-525.