Jacoby And Schneider - Variability State Policy Priorities Empirical Analysis - 2001.

Southern Political Science Association

Variability in State Policy Priorities: An Empirical Analysis Author(s): William G. Jacoby and Saundra K. Schneider Reviewed work(s): Source: The Journal of Politics, Vol. 63, No. 2 (May, 2001), pp. 544-568 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Southern Political Science Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2691764 .Accessed: 30/01/2013 21:17
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Variabilityin State Policy Priorities: An Empirical Analysis

WilliamG. Jacoby and Saundra K. Schneider
University of South Carolina
This article examines variability in policy priorities across the American states; that is, the ways that state governments allocate resources to meet societal needs. Specifically, our analysis uses 1992 data on stateprogramexpendituresto produce a comprehensive geometric representationor model-of state policy priorities for that year. This model is parsimonious, powerful, and substantively meaningful. The structure of state policy priorities is manifested as a sharp contrast between programsthat deliver particularizedbenefits and those that supply collective goods. Furthermore, we show that policy priorities arelargely determined by public opinion and interest group activity within the respective states. Therefore, our analysis not only operationalizes successfully a critical aspect of the policy process; it also makes a useful contributionto the study of state politics.

American state governments are confrontedby a variety of social problems, political issues, and constituent demands. In order to dealwith these concerns, they must develop a wide range of public policies. But some states devote a great deal of attention to problems that are ignored or downplayed in other states. As a result, the exact package of policies varies markedlyfrom one state to the next (Gray 1999; Nathan 1996; Rivlin 1992). Within states, program resources are allocated on the basis of the priorities that publicofficials accord to different issues and problems. Such governmentalpriorities constitute a fundamental and critical aspect of the American policy-making process (Baumgartner and Jones 1993). But they are not well understood and have seldom been investigated systematically in the research literature on state politics (Ringquist and Garand 1999). The purpose of this article is to examine the variabilityin policy priorities across the American states. We are particularlyinterested in the ways that state
Special thanks to James C. Garand,Kim Q. Hill, and David Lowery.This project could not have been completed without their help. We also thank Ann O'M. Bowman, Jerrell D. Coggburn, and Gerald C. Wright for their comments on earlier versions of this paper. Other materials relating to this paper(supplemental reports, scale scores, data, and the SAS/ IML code for performing the unfolding analysis) are available directly from the authors and also on their web sites: www.cla.sc.edu/gint/faculty/jacoby or www.cla.sc.edu/gint/faculty/schneider
THE JOURNAL OF POLITICS, Vol. 63, No. 2, May 2001, Pp. 544-568 ? 2001 Blackwell Publishers, 350 Main St., Maiden, MA 02148, USA, and 108 Cowley Road,...