Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-8ctnn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-04T23:33:12.019Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Principals, Bureaucrats, and Responsiveness in Clean Air Enforcements

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

B. Dan Wood
B. Dan Wood
Affiliation:
University of Houston
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

A principal-agent perspective has been employed in recent studies to rediscover the importance of democratic hierarchies in shaping public bureaucratic outputs. I test the robustness of the hierarchy model for explaining outputs from an agency that has often been cast in the image of bureaucratic independence, the Environmental Protection Agency. Examining the effect of the Reagan presidency on EPA outputs for clean air, Box-Tiao models are constructed to explain shifts in the vigor of air pollution enforcements between 1977 and 1985. The analysis shows that the influence of elected institutions is limited when an agency has substantial bureaucratic resources and a zeal for their use. Moreover, under these conditions, bureaucracy can even move outputs in directions completely opposite from what a model of hierarchy would predict. The implication is that for some agencies it is necessary to give greater consideration to the agent in explaining implementation outcomes through time.

Type
Articles
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 82 , Issue 1 , March 1988 , pp. 213 - 234
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1988

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Andrews, Richard N. L. 1984. Deregulation: The Failure at EPA. In Environmental Policy in the 1980s, ed. Vig, Norman J. and Kraft, Michael E.. Washington: Congressional Quarterly.Google Scholar
Arthur Anderson & Co. 1979. Cost of Government Regulation Study: Executive Summary. New York: Business Roundtable.Google Scholar
Beck, Nathaniel. 1982. Presidential Influence on the Federal Reserve in the 1970's. American Journal of Political Science 26:415–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bendor, Jonathan, and Moe, Terry. 1985. An Adaptive Model of Bureaucratic Politics. American Political Science Review 79:755–74.Google Scholar
Bendor, Jonathan, and Moe, Terry. 1986. Agenda Control, Committee Capture, and the Dynamics of Institutional Politics. American Political Science Review 80:1187–1208.Google Scholar
Box, George E. P., and Jenkins, Gwilyn M.. 1976. Time Series Analysis: Forecasting and Control. Rev. ed. San Francisco: Holden-Day.Google Scholar
Box, George E. P., and Tiao, G. C.. 1975. Intervention Analysis with Applications to Economic and Environmental Problems. Journal of the American Statistical Association 70:70–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, Donald T., and Stanley, Julian C.. 1966. Experimental and Quasi-Experimental Designs for Research. Chicago: Rand-McNally.Google Scholar
Chubb, John E. 1985. The Political Economy of Federalism. American Political Science Review 79:994–1015.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cook, Thomas D., and Campbell, Donald T.. 1979. Quasi-Experimentation: Design and Analys Issues for Field Settings. Chicago: Rand-McNalGoogle Scholar
Cordia, Louis J., and Hinish, James J. Jr., 1981. Environmental Protection Agency. In Mandate for Leadership, ed. Heatherly, Charles L.. Washington: Heritage Foundation.Google Scholar
Council on Environmental Quality. 1981. Environmental Quality,1981. Washington: GPO.Google Scholar
Council on Environmental Quality. 1984. Environmental Quality, 1984. Washington: GPO.Google Scholar
Crandall, Robert W. 1982. The Environment. Regulation 6:29–32.Google Scholar
Freeman, John R. 1983. Granger Causality and the Time Series Analysis of Political Relationships. American Journal of Political Science 27:327–58.Google Scholar
Gottron, Martha V. 1982. Regulation, Process, an Politics. Washington: Congressional Quarterly.Google Scholar
Heclo, Hugh. 1977. A Government of Strangers. Washington: Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Kaufman, Herbert. 1981. The Administrative Behavior of Federal Bureau Chiefs. Washington: Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Kirschten, Dick. 1983. Administration Using Carter Era Reform to Manipulate Levers of Government. National Journal 15:732–36.Google Scholar
Kraft, Michael E. 1984. A New Environmental Policy Agenda: The 1980 Presidential Campaign and Its Aftermath. In Environmental Policy in the 1980s, ed. Vig, Norman J. and Kraft, Michael E.. Washington: Congressional Quarterly.Google Scholar
McCleary, Richard, and Hay, Richard A. Jr., 1980. Applied Time Series Analysis for the Social Sciences. Beverly Hills: Sage.Google Scholar
Moe, Terry M. 1982. Regulatory Performance and Presidential Administration. American Journal of Political Science 26:197–224.Google Scholar
Moe, Terry M. 1984. The New Economics of Organization. American Journal of Political Science 28:739–77.Google Scholar
Moe, Terry M. 1985. Control and Feedback in Economic Regulation: The Case of the NLRB. American Political Science Review 79:1094–1116.Google Scholar
Niskanen, William A. 1971. Bureaucracy and Representative Government. Chicago: Aldine.Google Scholar
Niskanen, William A. 1975. Bureaucrats and Politicians. Journal of Law and Economics 18: 617–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Office of Management and Budget. 1981. Budget of the United States Government. Washington: GPO.Google Scholar
Rourke, Francis E. 1984. Bureaucracy, Politics, and Public Policy. 3rd ed. Boston: Little, Brown.Google Scholar
Scholtz, John T., and Wei, Feng-heng. 1986. Regulatory Enforcement in a Federalist System. American Political Science Review 80:1249–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, James D. 1967. Organizations in Action: Social Science Basis of Administrative Theory. New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
U.S. Congress. House. 1982. EPA Oversight: One Year Review. Joint Hearings before certain sub-committees of the Committee on Government Operations, the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and the Committee on Science and Technology. 97th Cong., 2nd sess.Google Scholar
U.S. Congress. Senate. Committee on the Environment and Public Works. 1981. Oversight Hearings. 97th Cong., 1st sess.Google Scholar
U.S. Congress. House. Task Force on Energy and the Environment, Committee of the Budget. 1982. Fiscal Year 1983 Budget Proposals for Energy, Environmental, and National Resources Programs. 97th Cong., 2nd sess.Google Scholar
Waterman, Richard. 1987. Reagan and the Environmental Protection Agency: Revolution and Counter-Revolution. Paper delivered at the annual meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association, Chicago.Google Scholar
Weidenbaum, Murray L. 1979. The Future of Business Regulation. New York: Amacom.Google Scholar
Weingast, Barry R., and Moran, Mark J.. 1983. Bureaucratic Discretion or Congressional Control: Regulatory Policymaking by the Federal Trade Commission. Journal of Political Economy 91:765–800.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wenner, Lettie M. 1984. Judicial Oversight of Environmental Regulation. In Environmental Policy in the 1980s, ed. Vig, Norman J. and Kraft, Michael E.. Washington: Congressional Quarterly.Google Scholar
Wood, B. Dan. 1987. Principals, Agents, and Federalism: The Case of Clean Air Enforcements. Ph.D. diss. University of Houston.Google Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.