Luckovich

Thoughts on Political Science

Ezra Klein has a fantastic article in today's Washington Post about last week's American Political Science Association conference in D.C. (if you can't access the link, you might have to sign up, but it's free).  Klein walks away with four simple findings that political scientists wish to convey to the general public.  All very interesting, but he misses a few details:

1. Presidential speeches don't make a big difference.  Not true.  Although presidential speeches don't move public opinion closer to a presidents' preferences, they can have a major impact on policy outcomes in a different way.  By making a major speech on a certain issue, a president raises the importance and visibility of the issue.  Legislators respond to this increased issue salience by shifting their stated policy preferences closer towards the publics.  By making an issue super-important, presidents can increase the political costs of having policy preferences greatly at odds with the general public.  A presidential speech can make a big difference, but not in the way we generally assume.  For more, check out Who Leads Whom? by Brandice Canes-Wrone.

2. 'Citizen legislators' empower the very special interests they're meant to fight.  This conclusion by University of Wisconsin political scientist David Canon is counter-intuitive and fascinating: "If you have a bunch of rookies in there who don't have much experience, you're basically turning power over to the permanent government in that town: the staffers and the lobbyists the newcomers end up relying on."

3. Lobbyists don't run the show.  Obviously true, but misleading.  Lobbyists may not be able to change a legislator's vote, but they can have profound influence on policy outcomes.  By the time a bill comes to vote, it has already passed though a myriad of hurdles.  Starting with the agenda-setting stage, lobbyists and interest groups affect outcomes by gaining access: they provide expertise and information to policy makers, update people about political incentives, and even write legislation.  For the same reason that major corporations give money to both sides of the partisan divide, lobbyists do have an impact.

4. Politicians should talk to political scientists.  Hard to argue with this one.  Rigorous analysis of politics increasingly reveals that all the little tactical stuff consuming politics and media probably doesn't matter nearly as much as the larger structural factors like unemployment, health, and education, etc.  Although this sends a great message--policy makers can stop fretting and get down to business--it's not that simple.  Tactical details like speeches, ads, debates, etc. might be necessary but not sufficient.  Raising tons of money and never making gaffes probably doesn't guarantee a candidate's victory, but a candidate who doesn't play along probably won't get very far.  I think policy makers should put more emphasis on rigorous scientific thinking, but I understand that strong incentives exist to obsess over mundane horserace politics.

Agglomeration Is Forever

It's difficult to predict the future, but futurists and commentators who prophesied the demise of the city were way off.  Way back in 1954 Arthur C. Clarke predicted extreme globalization due to advances in communications technology.  More recently Thomas Friedman's book The World Is Flat saw location becoming increasingly irrelevant in economic activity.

There are two compelling reasons why the world will probably never be reduced to a "point" or become "flat" (pick your metaphor).  Firstly, increasingly expensive energy will severely curb the great driver of globalization: cheap international shipping.  Even though many products are made abroad very cheaply, increased transportation costs will change the economic calculus, bringing some production back.  Barring the development of teleporters, transportation costs will always create incentives to cluster at least some economic activity, which brings us to point number two: cities.

The discipline of urban economics (or economic geography) has long understood the huge benefits of clustering economic activity and labor.  The logic of the city revolves around the idea of increasing returns: a city is greater than the sum of its parts because of agglomeration effects.  These effects are numerous and include things like pooled creativity among workers, more mobile labor force, location of production closer to location of consumption, etc. etc.  For a good description of the role cities play in the global economy, check out The World Is Spiky by Richard Florida.

Why History Matters

Political scientist Sven Steinmo has a pretty concise list:

"There are at least three important ways in which history matters.  First, political events happen within a historical context, which has a direct consequence for the decisions or events.  An early example of this is the seminal work of Alexander Gershenkron who argued that when a country industrializes necessarily affects how it industrializes.  He shows us why late-comers cannot go through the same long trial-and-error process followed by early developers.  In other words the process of industrialization is essentially different for late developers than for early developers.  This is a huge insight that is easily missed in large-scale quantitative, cross-national comparisons, which very often pool data across continents and time periods and treat the time/place as inconsequential (or assume that it will 'wash out' of the analysis)."  

"The second reason history matters is that actors or agents can learn from experience.  Historical institutionalists understand that behavior, attitudes and strategic choices take place inside a particular social, political, economic and even cultural contexts.  Rather than treating all political action as if fundamentally the same irrespective of time, place or context, historical institutionalists explicitly and intentionally attempt to situate their variables in the appropriate context."

"Finally ... expectations are also moulded by the past.  While some might point to America's adventure in Iraq as a simple product of power politics and/or the demand for oil, a historical institutionalist would more likely look to the patterns of past wars for an understanding of why this country reacted in the way it did to the 9/11 bombings.  Certainly they were mistaken, but there should be little doubt that America's past successes in Germany and Japan -- to say nothing of their perceived victory over Communism at century's end -- led policy-makers in the Administration to believe that they could assert American power and bring successful capitalism and democracy to a former dictatorship."

Why Sci Fi?

I love science fiction, maybe because I'm a huge nerd, but also because sci fi deals with interesting concepts (social arrangements, trends, technology, etc.) in an extremely accessible way.  Sci fi isn't shackled by the requirement of believability, so concepts and ideas can be dealt with explicitly and without subtlety.  A lot of sci fi occurs in the future, which makes commentary on contemporary concepts and issues much easier: the reader doesn't have to analyze and speculate on their own about about the impact of current trends or technologies.

Here's a great list of some major works in science fiction, although a few big ones like Dune and Foundation are conspicuously absent.

Note: Unfortunately sci fi isn't known for it's cover art.

Fight Apathy Or Don't

We tend to consider political apathy a bad thing: lack of information leads to irrational beliefs and voting decisions, low levels of participation decreases trust in government.  Apathy reduces the manpower and psychic energy devoted towards important political issues.

So does apathy have any possible redeeming qualities?  Political scientists Richard Niemi and Herbert Weisberg raise a few interesting points:

"For one thing, not voting might be a 'correct vote' for some citizens who are cross-pressured. If a person cares only about two issues and passionately takes the Republican position on one (say, affirmative action) and equally strongly takes the Democratic position on the other (say abortion), would it not be 'rational' for that person to abstain? ... indifference and noninvolvement contribute to the smooth operation of a democracy. [Bernard] Berelson made the point nearly fifty years ago when he noted that we have a variety of conflicting expectations. For example, we expect individuals to care deeply about elections, but afterwards we expect reconciliation. With that in mind, he asks rhetorically, 'how could a mass democracy work if all the people were deeply involved in politics?' "

Prejudice and Metaphysics

I was really hoping not to discuss the "Park51" mosque, especially after Politico essentially ended my interest in the story by showing that building the mosque was a long-shot even before the bigoted backlash ignited a media frenzy.  But Stanley Fish has an interesting take on the issue, using the example of the Oklahoma City bombing to reveal insightful truths:

"In the brief period between the bombing and the emergence of McVeigh, speclation had centered on Arab terrorists and the culture of violence that was said to be woven into the fabric of the religion of Islam. 

But when it turned out that a white guy (with the help of a few friends) had done it, talk of "culture" suddenly ceased and was replaced by the vocabulary and mantras of individualism: each of us is a single, free agent; blaming something called "culture" was just a way of off-loading responsibility for the deeds we commit; in America, individuals, not groups, act; and individuals, not groups, should be held accountable." 

We tend to consider high-level philosophical beliefs (like whether human beings are possessed of free will) as relatively stable for individuals; deep-seated epistemological and ontological beliefs underpin our more mundane preferences (e.g. politics) and indeed even our identity.  Not so: the Oklahoma City example is startling because it reveals how transitory deep philosophical beliefs can be.  The abrupt shift from a structural to an agency explanation after Oklahoma City leads us to question how fundamental these questions really are. 

Social psychology and sociology have long provided compelling explanations for such behavior changes with concepts like the ingroup/outgroup bias.  The Oklahoma City example is scary because it utterly trivializes our beliefs and forces us to confront the harsh truth that much of our behavior is capricious and governed by unconscious structural factors.  Even metaphysics, the most cherished manifestation of objective, self-aware reasoning is apparently not beyond the reach of our animal spirits. 


The biological and evolutionary basis for prejudice is well known, but metaphysical beliefs are not normally viewed as a mechanism through which unconscious prejudice operates.  Perhaps we should all re-evaluate some things with that in mind.

Information Nexus

1. America's Ten Dead Cities
2. A Universe Not Made For Us
3. Earth's Resources: How Much Is Left?
4. Tony Judt (1948-2010)
5. Short Story: Architecture Sci-Fi

Knowledge (With Cartoons)

Combining a lecture-style synthesis of what's currently hip in social science with cartoons and flow charts makes "21st Century Enlightenment" an wonderful short video.  The pace is quite frantic, but well worth the cognitive investment.  Caffeine recommended for viewing:



On second thought the title should have been "The Sum of All TED Talks (With Cartoons)".

Methods and Goals

Normative beliefs about public policy can usually be broken down into two components, goals and methods.  Goals focus on ends, or how the world should be in some hypothetical future, while methods deal with be best way to get there.  Ideological disputes are often confusing because this division is not at all clear.

Though counter-intuitive, it doesn't always work to simply jump immediately to the final goal.  If you raise your kid with the ethic of "do whatever you want, as long as it makes you happy," or "being happy is all that matters," the kid might not learn the value of delayed satisfaction and discipline.  A kid instilled with the ethic of "it doesn't matter what you do, as long as you give your best and try your hardest" will likely have happier outcomes overall.

When making predictions about a policy's future impact, one side often favors a more comprehensive perspective (accounting for methods), while the other side focuses only on final outcomes (goals).  For example, school busing opponents see racial equality as the final goal and see busing as directly opposed to that goal.  Conversely, proponents see that the method of school busing will result in a final outcome closer to the actual goal.

Both Republicans and Democrats hold dear positions that are overly goal-oriented and method-blind.  Republicans oppose aggressive anti-trust regulation, based on their goal of free-market capitalism.  They fail to see that the method of anti-trust regulation breaks up monopolies and results in more efficient free-markets overall.  Democrats, on the other hand, frequently oppose environmentalist policies such as nuclear energy and genetically modified foods on grounds that these policies are opposed to the final goal of a civilization in perfect harmony with nature.  In both cases the comprehensive policies are more pragmatic and tangibly beneficial; final-outcome policies obsess over transcendental ideals and frequently hold back improvements.

Generally it is better to support policies that include methods and process, because often adding nuance and complexity will result in more accurate predictions and outcomes closer to the stated goals.  However, complicated and counter-intuitive policies may be difficult to explain and promote.  Additionally, simple transcendental ideals can have an inspirational effect on social movements that could be greatly beneficial.

Building A True-Cost Economy

Guess what?  The prices we use to measure the value of goods don't accurately reflect their true value.  Surprised?  While it's probably impossible to internalize every cost into a good's price, there are certain well-known costs that are systemically left out:

People might think they're getting a sweet deal by paying less for gasoline, for example, but in fact these externalized costs are assumed by someone, somewhere, in various forms.  This raises serious concerns about fairness, especially when dealing with corporations, which have a massive incentive to externalize as much as possible to reduce the sticker price of their products.

Quantum Poker in Star Wars

Hardcore Star Wars aficionados may be familiar with Sabacc, the fictional poker-like card game popular with lowly spice smugglers and interplanetary tycoons alike.  Without delving too much into the nerdy arcana, players receive cards grouped by value (1-15 plus 16 face cards) and suit (Coins, Flasks, Sabres, Staves).  There are several rounds of betting, the pot going to the player with the strongest hand based on a specific hierarchy.  The main feature of the game is the shifting nature of the cards: while in a player's hand, every card may randomly change its value and suit based on a predetermined probability distribution.  During each round of betting, players have the option to place cards face down on the table.  This action locks in the card's value and suit, preventing further shifts.

So why is this relevant?  Sabacc provides a perfect real-world analogy for the concept of quantum superposition, or the condition of an object existing in several mutually-exclusive states simultaneously.  Emerging from modern particle physics, quantum superposition is perhaps best known by the famous thought experiment Schrödinger's Cat.  A key feature of quantum superposition is its collapse: whenever the superpositioned object is measured, its strange quantum condition ends and a single observable state emerges.  Returning to the Sabacc analogy, we can view a player as holding cards that exist in a probabilistic superposition.  Due to the random shifting, each card possesses not one value, but rather a probability distribution of every possible value.  Placing a card on the table collapses this distribution into a single value and suit.

The concept of quantum superposition, once relegated to the netherworld of quantum mechanics, is seeing an explosion of applications.  Most interesting is the fledgling field of quantum game theory, which allows for the quantum superposition of strategies by players, in addition to regular pure and mixed strategies.  For more information about quantum superposition and its exciting new applications, check out episode three of the Math For Primates podcast.

Environmentalism

The vast majority of my personal exposure to environmentalism--it values, beliefs, and culture--comes from sources that are mostly urban and east of the Mississippi river.  Through working this summer with multiple government agencies in Wyoming (Forest Service, State Parks, etc.), I've become acquainted with a different flavor of environmentalism, one uniquely Western and more grounded in natural resources and the idea of "use."

Exposure to use-oriented western environmentalism has supplied contrast to my mental framework of what environmentalism is.  By use-oriented environmentalism I mean the holding of environmentalist preferences for instrumental reasons: for example limiting fishing, logging, or hunting because it is economically rational in the long-run.  Conversely, the same policies might be supported by environmentalists driven by some existential view about the inherent sanctity of nature.

This distinction is not new.  The idea of conservation was a precursor to the modern environmental movement, but now that the cleavage exists, it increasingly seems that use-oriented environmentalism, grounded in economic rationality, is more connected to reality.  It is more flexible in its methods and better suited to attract mainstream support.  Most current environmental challenges are in fact process issues.  Everybody agrees that the problems should be solved, yet conflict emerges over potential solutions.  Use-oriented environmentalism is free from the baggage of a problem-obsessed ideological edifice and generates action solely within the solution domain.  Ideological environmentalism, although useful when facing unpleasant trade-offs, currently limits too greatly the range of "acceptable" solutions and may in fact be hindering progress on some issues, for example opposition to nuclear energy and genetically modified crops.

The science of ecology, biology, and physics unquestionably support a radically activist environmental policy.  Environmental issues are the single most important topic receiving society's attention; a framework of ecology and environmental physics underpins most other societal issues, and effective environmental solutions will trickle-up and benefit all aspects of society.  Despite these facts, staunch environmentalists must be cunning and strategic.  Promoting use-oriented policies, and describing issues in use-oriented terms, may be a more effective way of achieving environmentalist ends.

News Fast

I've been working in Wyoming with minimal access to internet and news, and the lack of information about current affairs has been an interesting experience.  Most of the coverage in daily newspapers is of unimportant events that won't develop into anything of note.  Observing an event for only a day or two doesn't allow for any filtering: most news is simply background "noise."  Checking the news after substantial time away is a much more meaningful experience (versus the daily grind) because it allows for important events to reveal themselves.

Dominating The News Cycle