Christopher Hood, Henry Rothstein, and Robert Baldwin
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780199243631
- eISBN:
- 9780191599507
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199243638.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
Why does the regulation of risks to human health and safety vary so dramatically from one policy domain to another? Why are some risks regulated aggressively and others responded to only modestly? Is ...
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Why does the regulation of risks to human health and safety vary so dramatically from one policy domain to another? Why are some risks regulated aggressively and others responded to only modestly? Is there any logic to the techniques we use in risk regulation? This book addresses these important questions by systematically examining variety amongst risk regulation regimes across policy domains, analysing the significant driving forces shaping those regimes, and identifying the causes of regulatory failure and success. In order to do so, the book develops a systems‐based concept of a ‘risk regulation regime’, which enables comparative description and analysis of the rules, institutional arrangements, and cultures that are bound up with the handling of risk within and between regimes. Using that framework, the book analyses how regimes and their constituent components are differentially shaped by three major driving forces—namely, the pressures exerted by market failure, by public opinion, and by organized interests inside and outside the state apparatus—and blame‐avoidance responses of regimes in the face of pressures for greater openness. The book applies the method to analyse a range of risk regulation regimes that cross the divide between ‘natural’ and ‘socially created’, state‐created and market‐created, ‘voluntary’ and ‘involuntary’, high‐tech and low‐tech, individually, and corporately produced risks. Those regimes include the release of paedophiles into the community, air pollution, local road safety, radon, pesticides, and dangerous dogs. The analysis reveals both variations and paradoxes that can neither be identified by single case studies, nor be easily explained by macro‐oriented approaches to understanding risk regulation. The Government of Risk shows how such an approach is of high policy relevance as well as of considerable theoretical importance.Less
Why does the regulation of risks to human health and safety vary so dramatically from one policy domain to another? Why are some risks regulated aggressively and others responded to only modestly? Is there any logic to the techniques we use in risk regulation? This book addresses these important questions by systematically examining variety amongst risk regulation regimes across policy domains, analysing the significant driving forces shaping those regimes, and identifying the causes of regulatory failure and success. In order to do so, the book develops a systems‐based concept of a ‘risk regulation regime’, which enables comparative description and analysis of the rules, institutional arrangements, and cultures that are bound up with the handling of risk within and between regimes. Using that framework, the book analyses how regimes and their constituent components are differentially shaped by three major driving forces—namely, the pressures exerted by market failure, by public opinion, and by organized interests inside and outside the state apparatus—and blame‐avoidance responses of regimes in the face of pressures for greater openness. The book applies the method to analyse a range of risk regulation regimes that cross the divide between ‘natural’ and ‘socially created’, state‐created and market‐created, ‘voluntary’ and ‘involuntary’, high‐tech and low‐tech, individually, and corporately produced risks. Those regimes include the release of paedophiles into the community, air pollution, local road safety, radon, pesticides, and dangerous dogs. The analysis reveals both variations and paradoxes that can neither be identified by single case studies, nor be easily explained by macro‐oriented approaches to understanding risk regulation. The Government of Risk shows how such an approach is of high policy relevance as well as of considerable theoretical importance.
Markus Crepaz
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- May 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199289172
- eISBN:
- 9780191711084
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199289172.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Economy
This chapter examines two central questions: how widespread is public support for multiculturalism policies? and what is the impact of the adoption of MCPs on public support for the welfare state? ...
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This chapter examines two central questions: how widespread is public support for multiculturalism policies? and what is the impact of the adoption of MCPs on public support for the welfare state? In so doing, it seeks to ask whether countries with stronger MCPs have seen an erosion in public support for redistribution, in comparison with countries with low levels of MCPs. These issues are examined by analysing responses to opinion surveys which attitudes about multiculturalism, interpersonal trust, and support for the welfare state among the publics of Western democracies. The analysis finds no evidence for the view that adopting MCPs erodes trust, solidarity or public support for the welfare state.Less
This chapter examines two central questions: how widespread is public support for multiculturalism policies? and what is the impact of the adoption of MCPs on public support for the welfare state? In so doing, it seeks to ask whether countries with stronger MCPs have seen an erosion in public support for redistribution, in comparison with countries with low levels of MCPs. These issues are examined by analysing responses to opinion surveys which attitudes about multiculturalism, interpersonal trust, and support for the welfare state among the publics of Western democracies. The analysis finds no evidence for the view that adopting MCPs erodes trust, solidarity or public support for the welfare state.
Michael Keating
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780199240760
- eISBN:
- 9780191599644
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199240760.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
Nationality claims are often seen as zero‐sum politics involving incompatible conceptions of the polity. Nationalism and self‐determination are seen as equivalent to separatism. Rethinking the ...
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Nationality claims are often seen as zero‐sum politics involving incompatible conceptions of the polity. Nationalism and self‐determination are seen as equivalent to separatism. Rethinking the concepts of nationality, self‐determination, and sovereignty and placing them in a historic context allows us to treat them as more tractable and as a form of politics. This is done through a study of the UK, Spain, Belgium, and Canada. Traditions of shared sovereignty are rediscovered. Analysis of the demands of minority nationalisms shows that these do not always entail separate statehood. Public opinion is more open than often assumed. Asymmetrical constitutional arrangements provide a means of accommodating plural national claims. The emerging European polity is a model for a post‐sovereign order in which legal pluralism and constitutional diversity can accommodate multiple nationality claims.Less
Nationality claims are often seen as zero‐sum politics involving incompatible conceptions of the polity. Nationalism and self‐determination are seen as equivalent to separatism. Rethinking the concepts of nationality, self‐determination, and sovereignty and placing them in a historic context allows us to treat them as more tractable and as a form of politics. This is done through a study of the UK, Spain, Belgium, and Canada. Traditions of shared sovereignty are rediscovered. Analysis of the demands of minority nationalisms shows that these do not always entail separate statehood. Public opinion is more open than often assumed. Asymmetrical constitutional arrangements provide a means of accommodating plural national claims. The emerging European polity is a model for a post‐sovereign order in which legal pluralism and constitutional diversity can accommodate multiple nationality claims.
Scott B. Blinder
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199217977
- eISBN:
- 9780191711541
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199217977.003.0010
- Subject:
- Political Science, American Politics
President Bush and administration officials sought to persuade the domestic public, lawmakers in Washington, and the international community of the need to take military action against Saddam ...
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President Bush and administration officials sought to persuade the domestic public, lawmakers in Washington, and the international community of the need to take military action against Saddam Hussein's regime, even after the decision to go to war had apparently been made. Using the power of the presidential bully pulpit and sending high-ranking officials to the airwaves and speech circuits, the administration spared no effort to make the case for ‘disarming’ Saddam, by force if necessary. But was ‘going public’ — appealing to the American public to try to increase support for the president's preferred policy — a necessary or even useful step on the president's road to Baghdad? This chapter argues that ‘going public’ was useful in at least one sense: improving the president's chances of success in the Congress.Less
President Bush and administration officials sought to persuade the domestic public, lawmakers in Washington, and the international community of the need to take military action against Saddam Hussein's regime, even after the decision to go to war had apparently been made. Using the power of the presidential bully pulpit and sending high-ranking officials to the airwaves and speech circuits, the administration spared no effort to make the case for ‘disarming’ Saddam, by force if necessary. But was ‘going public’ — appealing to the American public to try to increase support for the president's preferred policy — a necessary or even useful step on the president's road to Baghdad? This chapter argues that ‘going public’ was useful in at least one sense: improving the president's chances of success in the Congress.
Christopher Hood, Henry Rothstein, and Robert Baldwin
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780199243631
- eISBN:
- 9780191599507
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199243638.003.0006
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
Explores the logic of basing risk regulation on mass popular opinion and explores the extent and conditions in which state regulation of risk reflects general public opinion. The chapter draws ...
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Explores the logic of basing risk regulation on mass popular opinion and explores the extent and conditions in which state regulation of risk reflects general public opinion. The chapter draws together existing empirical evidence about public attitudes towards the nine case‐study risks and presents a substantial and original analysis of the salience of those risks in UK newspapers over 12 years to 1998. Analysis suggests that public opinion is certainly a shaper of risk regulation regimes, most obviously in relation to some standard‐setting activities, but it appears to be a constraint or support rather than the key driver. Regulatory activity appears to be better explained by the contingent alignment and relative strengths of other forces shaping regimes. Moreover, the chapter also identifies four important strategies employed by regulators for managing misalignments between public preferences and the preferences of policy experts or other organized interests.Less
Explores the logic of basing risk regulation on mass popular opinion and explores the extent and conditions in which state regulation of risk reflects general public opinion. The chapter draws together existing empirical evidence about public attitudes towards the nine case‐study risks and presents a substantial and original analysis of the salience of those risks in UK newspapers over 12 years to 1998. Analysis suggests that public opinion is certainly a shaper of risk regulation regimes, most obviously in relation to some standard‐setting activities, but it appears to be a constraint or support rather than the key driver. Regulatory activity appears to be better explained by the contingent alignment and relative strengths of other forces shaping regimes. Moreover, the chapter also identifies four important strategies employed by regulators for managing misalignments between public preferences and the preferences of policy experts or other organized interests.
Hugh Berrington and Rod Hague
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780199244034
- eISBN:
- 9780191599897
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199244030.003.0006
- Subject:
- Political Science, European Union
There has been a lack of analytical rigour in evaluating the historical pattern of British public opinion regarding association with Europe. An excellent framework for such evaluation was provided by ...
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There has been a lack of analytical rigour in evaluating the historical pattern of British public opinion regarding association with Europe. An excellent framework for such evaluation was provided by the American political scientist V.O. Key, in his book, Public opinion and American democracy (1961), which focused on five issues: first, the patterns of distribution of public opinion, as between consensus and discord; second, the structural distribution, in terms of social and geographical cleavages; third, the properties of opinions, or the intensity with they are held; fourth, the manner in which the formation of opinions takes place; fifth, their linkages with government policy. The chapter attempts a preliminary application of Key's schematic to the British case.Less
There has been a lack of analytical rigour in evaluating the historical pattern of British public opinion regarding association with Europe. An excellent framework for such evaluation was provided by the American political scientist V.O. Key, in his book, Public opinion and American democracy (1961), which focused on five issues: first, the patterns of distribution of public opinion, as between consensus and discord; second, the structural distribution, in terms of social and geographical cleavages; third, the properties of opinions, or the intensity with they are held; fourth, the manner in which the formation of opinions takes place; fifth, their linkages with government policy. The chapter attempts a preliminary application of Key's schematic to the British case.
Richard Sinnott
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198294764
- eISBN:
- 9780191600005
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019829476X.003.0002
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
Theories about European Community integration have passed through three phases. The first consisted of two ambitious initial formulations (transactionalism and neo‐functionalism) during the late ...
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Theories about European Community integration have passed through three phases. The first consisted of two ambitious initial formulations (transactionalism and neo‐functionalism) during the late 1950s and early 1960s. A short‐lived second phase, characterized by an intense revisionism, can be identified in the late 1960s. However, despite the theoretical progress made during this second phase, in which the importance of public opinion received a much greater recognition, integration theory suffered near‐fatal asphyxiation during the Euro‐stagnation of the 1970s. The current third phase is a revival of the first. This chapter considers these three phases, with brief digressions to deal with the related theories of disintegration and diversity. It then broadens the discussion to incorporate insights from the theory of international regimes and to review theoretical constructs used in previous empirical work on attitudes towards integration.Less
Theories about European Community integration have passed through three phases. The first consisted of two ambitious initial formulations (transactionalism and neo‐functionalism) during the late 1950s and early 1960s. A short‐lived second phase, characterized by an intense revisionism, can be identified in the late 1960s. However, despite the theoretical progress made during this second phase, in which the importance of public opinion received a much greater recognition, integration theory suffered near‐fatal asphyxiation during the Euro‐stagnation of the 1970s. The current third phase is a revival of the first. This chapter considers these three phases, with brief digressions to deal with the related theories of disintegration and diversity. It then broadens the discussion to incorporate insights from the theory of international regimes and to review theoretical constructs used in previous empirical work on attitudes towards integration.
Max Kaase and Kenneth Newton
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198294726
- eISBN:
- 9780191599590
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198294727.003.0004
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
This chapter reviews the finding of the ‘Beliefs in government’ project regarding the comparative development of public attitudes towards the welfare state in the countries of Western Europe: whether ...
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This chapter reviews the finding of the ‘Beliefs in government’ project regarding the comparative development of public attitudes towards the welfare state in the countries of Western Europe: whether the scope of government should contract, who are the main opinion‐formers, and how far their views are shared by the general public. The key question at issue is whether a new era of restricted or minimal government is on the horizon.Less
This chapter reviews the finding of the ‘Beliefs in government’ project regarding the comparative development of public attitudes towards the welfare state in the countries of Western Europe: whether the scope of government should contract, who are the main opinion‐formers, and how far their views are shared by the general public. The key question at issue is whether a new era of restricted or minimal government is on the horizon.
Max Kaase and Kenneth Newton
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198294726
- eISBN:
- 9780191599590
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198294727.003.0005
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
This chapter is divided into four sections. First, it examines attitudes of support or opposition to three agencies of international government which have the most importance for Western Europeans – ...
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This chapter is divided into four sections. First, it examines attitudes of support or opposition to three agencies of international government which have the most importance for Western Europeans – the UN, NATO and the EU – and how these attitudes have changed since the early 1950s. Second, it examines the problems of mass ignorance about international affairs, and how this affects the reliability of survey data. Third, it considers the structure of public opinion: whether it is inchoate, or organized coherently around distinct themes. Fourth, it considers the extent to which public is original or derivative, simply echoing elite views.Less
This chapter is divided into four sections. First, it examines attitudes of support or opposition to three agencies of international government which have the most importance for Western Europeans – the UN, NATO and the EU – and how these attitudes have changed since the early 1950s. Second, it examines the problems of mass ignorance about international affairs, and how this affects the reliability of survey data. Third, it considers the structure of public opinion: whether it is inchoate, or organized coherently around distinct themes. Fourth, it considers the extent to which public is original or derivative, simply echoing elite views.
Russell J. Dalton
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- May 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199268436
- eISBN:
- 9780191708572
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199268436.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Theory
Most democratic citizens today are distrustful of politicians, political parties, and political institutions. Where once democracies expected an allegiant public, citizens now question the very ...
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Most democratic citizens today are distrustful of politicians, political parties, and political institutions. Where once democracies expected an allegiant public, citizens now question the very pillars of representative democracy. This book documents the erosion of political support in virtually all advanced industrial democracies. Assembling a large array of cross-national public opinion data, this book traces the current challenges to democracy primary to changing citizen values and rising expectations. These dissatisfied democrats are concentrated among the young, the better educated, and the politically sophisticated. At the same time, the evidence debunks claims that such trends are a function of scandals, poor performance, and other government failures. Changing public opinion is born from the successful social modernization of these nations. A creedal passion for democracy is sweeping across the Western democracies, and people now expect more of their governments. This book concludes by examining the consequences of these changing images of government. The book finds that these expectations are making governing more difficult, but also fuelling demands for political reform. The choices that democracies may in response to these challenges lead to a further expansion of the democratic process and a new relationship between citizens and their government.Less
Most democratic citizens today are distrustful of politicians, political parties, and political institutions. Where once democracies expected an allegiant public, citizens now question the very pillars of representative democracy. This book documents the erosion of political support in virtually all advanced industrial democracies. Assembling a large array of cross-national public opinion data, this book traces the current challenges to democracy primary to changing citizen values and rising expectations. These dissatisfied democrats are concentrated among the young, the better educated, and the politically sophisticated. At the same time, the evidence debunks claims that such trends are a function of scandals, poor performance, and other government failures. Changing public opinion is born from the successful social modernization of these nations. A creedal passion for democracy is sweeping across the Western democracies, and people now expect more of their governments. This book concludes by examining the consequences of these changing images of government. The book finds that these expectations are making governing more difficult, but also fuelling demands for political reform. The choices that democracies may in response to these challenges lead to a further expansion of the democratic process and a new relationship between citizens and their government.
