Geology Reference
In-Depth Information
from increases in the proportion of movement conservatives elected to Congress and appointed in the Executive
Branch between 1980 and 2004 produced leaders on the Hill and in the White House that rejected scientific advice
and evidence as relevant
to decision making (Mooney, 2005; Krugman, 2007; Bartels, 2008
—
especially
Chapter 6).
The 1994 United States congressional elections produced a change in government control that went beyond a
mere shift in party control in the House of Representatives for the first time in 48 years. Each subsequent election
through 2006 increased the influence of movement conservatism, and the presidential elections of 2000
produced unified Republican control of the United States government for the first time since 1954. The core
of this majority was formed around a movement conservatism ideology. Movement conservatives rejected the
consensus position in effect for the prior generation of politicians that expert advice based on peer-reviewed
science was good for the country, and therefore worthy of a special position in the policy process that remained
outside of politics. Elevating scientists above politics had been the position of progressive republicans and
democrats at the beginning of the twentieth century (Harrison, 2004). By mid-century, this consensus position
was nearly universal, and was reflected in the landmark regulatory environmental protection legislation passed in
the late 1960s and 1970s.
This model of government response to policy problems had been developed between the wars, perfected
during World War II, and continued afterward. A series of successful government sponsored engineering
projects demonstrated and then reinforced the utility of this approach for a generation of legislators and
their constituents. Examples of the government consensus that scientific and technical advice should be
set above politics and would benefit the nation were seeninawidevarietyofprojectssuchasconstruction
of the Boulder dam (1931
1935)
3
andtheTennesseeValleyAuthoritybegunin1933(Barry,1998);thesecret
wartime efforts that led to development of RADAR and the atomic bomb (Rhodes, 1986; Conant, 2002),
discovery of an effective polio vaccine in 1955 (Oshinsky, 2006), and the mission to put a man on the
moon within a decade (Murray and Cox, 1989). Congressional action to promote clean air, water, and
environmental reclamation in the early 1970s was the final expression of a phase in the policy cycle when
politicians believed that government could fix problems, and that technical expertise was rightly kept above
politics. A different consensus developed following the 1980 presidential elections, one that stemmed from the
belief that government was part of the problem in society, and that government science was one of the bigger
components of the problem. An examination of the phases in the policy cycle and their characteristics is useful
at this point.
-
Phases in the Policy Cycle
R
ecently the examination of policy in 50-year time periods has generated a better understanding of the policy cycle
(Baumgartner and Jones, 1993). Examination of 50
100 years in a policy cycle is most instructive in understanding
the public disposition of coal fires. There are five phases in the policy process that are useful when examining
a policy cycle greater than 50 years. They are Policy Innovation, Consolidation, Monopoly, Collapse, and
Replacement.
-
Policy Monopoly
Policy monopoly is the most well understood of these five phases of the policy cycle. During this phase,
there is electoral consensus on what the public policy problem is, its extent, and the best approach to how it
should be addressed (Baumgartner and Jones, 1993). The policy monopoly phase is typically characterized
by low conflict in the legislature, incremental budgeting, and a large role in decision making for the
bureaucracy (Ripley and Franklin, 1990). In effect, political controversy is eliminated from policy decisions
by mutual agreement from both majority and minority politicians. Policy outcomes benefiting constituents
can be produced in a policy monopoly with regularity as well as low expenditure of time and political capital
on the part of politicians.
3
The dam was renamed in honor of former President Herbert Hoover by a congressional resolution signed by President Harry Truman in
1947. Hoover had been a mining engineer working in China and Europe where he engaged in humanitarian relief efforts during wartime
before returning to the United States to serve as Commerce Secretary for Presidents Harding and Coolidge and run for president himself
in 1928.
