C. Regulatory Impacts and Program Fluidity
V. SUMMARY OBSERVATIONS
We initiated this exploration with a simple question Do national actions im- pacting on state administrative agencies contribute to policy fluidity or turbulence within the agencies'7 We pursued the query both conceptually and empirically
From a conceptual standpoint, state agencies (and their administrative heads) were positioned in both their intergovernmental and mtragovernmental contexts Intergovernmentally, state government was posited as a vertical plane with extensive state-national, state-local, and interstate relations In presenting a verbal (and visual) model of interjurisdictional interactions we relied on the con- cepts of federalism (FED), intergovernmental relations (IGR), and mtergovern-
Intergovernmental Interdependences 61 mental management (IGM). These concepts underlay distinctions among three types of public officials operating intragovernmentally within the plane of state governance—PEGs (elected generalists), AAGs (appointed generalists), and PPPs (policy professionals). The three types of officials were also acknowledged as active in the intergovernmental arena.
This conceptual approach guided the empirical analysis, which relied on seven ASAP data sets covering 30 years of mail questionnaire surveys of state agency heads. The four most recent surveys (1978-1994) provided the data bases to identify consistent patterns and trends and to look for confirmation (or rejec- tion) of the hypothesis that national actions are linked to state agency policy change.
State agency policy change, referenced as fluidity or turbulence, was mea- sured by asking the agency heads the extent of change in program and policy priorities over the prior four-year period. Two major types of instruments of national impacts on the states were measured: federal aid, and national legal/
regulatory actions.
Federal aid is a historic, significant, and extensively employed method of intergovernmental collaboration. It is the hallmark instrument of "cooperative federalism." National legal/regulatory methods impacting the states have gener- ated considerable attention and debate over the past two decades. Extensive use of these instruments of intergovernmental relations has earned the dubious appel- lation, "coercive federalism."
We charted several trends from the 1960s to the 1990s in three main fea- tures of federal aid—dependency, diversity, and complexity. National presence and impacts through federal aid escalated rapidly from the 1960s to the 1970s.
Since the 1970s, however, the general features and several specific characteristics of federal aid to state agencies have remained remarkably stable. One interpreta- tion of this stability is that federal aid programs, policies, and patterns are largely insulated from the prominent political rhetoric and blunt political efforts aimed at macro- as well as microsystem changes in intergovernmental fiscal relations.
Our test of the hypothesis linking federal aid to state agency policy fluidity broadly paralleled the insulation interpretation. We found only modest or frag- mentary evidence of correlations between federal aid features and agency policy fluidity. Only among the relatively few state agencies with the highest levels of federal aid dependency did we find higher levels of policy fluidity. Even here, however, the association was not strong and definitive.
An auxiliary but noteworthy finding accompanied the results of the aid- fluidity analysis. Our hypothesis testing uncovered the strong functional fragmen- tation forces that characterize the nature of state-level public administration. We observed that for all practical purposes, the executive branch (singular) is a non- existent entity in state government. Rather, state administration is composed of agencies analogous to corporate holding companies. These findings and interpre-
62 Wright and Cho tations are hardly new or original (Alien, 1949; Fesier, 1955, 1967; Ransone, 1956; Weinberg, 1977). Furthermore, there are recent offsetting developments and trends that lend greater coherence to state administration than has long been imagined (ACIR, 1985; Bowman and Kearney, 1986; Bowling and Wright, 1998a,b; Brough, 1992; Brudney et al., 1999; Garnett, 1980; Van Horn, 1993).
One interpretation relevant to the fragmentation issue comes from the gen- eral acceptance of the null hypothesis regarding the aid-fluidity association. The functionalism and fragmentation present in state administration are not precipi- tated by federal aid features. Intragovernmental forces within the state plane of governance seem to be stronger forces contributing to the unwieldy character of state administration.
Our analyses of regulatory federalism and its link to state agency policy fluidity parallel the findings of federal aid impacts. Despite the attention garnered and appellations assigned to regulatory federalism, our findings involving na- tional regulatory impacts on the states push us toward acceptance of the null hypothesis. We searched hard-to-find fragmentary hints that the degree and/or direction of national regulatory impacts might be linked to state agency policy/
program shifts. We examined regulatory impacts at three levels, or layers. The dominant results were in favor of accepting the conclusion of no association.
Where do these analyses and findings leave us? What larger or broader interpretations are suggested? Three provisional conclusions can be offered, each of which deserves, in our estimation, further thoughtful exploration.
First, our findings, if valid and reliable, call into question the state-level consequences of national policy instruments, i.e., federal aid and regulatory ac- tions. Is it possible that the significance and efficacy of national policies and programs have been overrated? Is there more smoke than fire, more rhetoric than reality in the complaints of state officials over national intergovernmental policy intrusiveness? These questions cast doubt on much of the received wisdom in- volving state-national relations, but to paraphrase Justice Holmes, we need to question the obvious more than we need to investigate the obscure.
A second conclusion, also provisional, is the obverse of the first. Ques- tioning the scope and significance of national impacts on the states returns us to V. O. Key's query about state autonomy. We rephrased it to ask: Are there auton- omous state administrative establishments? The degree(s) of structural and pol- icy fragmentation in state administrative arrangements and the apparent ab- sence of consequential national impacts incline us toward an affirmative response.
State agencies, under this interpretation, are not extensions or subordinates of either national patrons or national policy prescriptions. Instead, the varied state agencies constitute administrative streams of identity, integrity, reliability, and resiliency that are appropriately (or inappropriately) channeled by potent state- level forces.
Intergovernmental Interdependences 63 Prominent among the state power vectors are the agencies themselves and their administrative leaders Key's notion of autonomous state politics is supple mented and perhaps strengthened by this conclusion about autonomous state ad- ministration As Friedrich (1940 50) noted over a half-century ago, "bureaucracy [administration] is the core of modern government " In comparison to many political systems of the world, the 50 American states reasonably qualify as
"modern" governments
There is a third and rather radical conclusion we might draw from the find ings reported in the body of this essay We have relied heavily on analyzing, reporting, and interpreting results that tend to confirm the null hypothesis We cannot explain variations in state program/policy fluidity with variations in na- tional impacts via federal aid or regulatory actions Suppose, however, that the cumulative character of national impacts on state agencies over the past one, two, or five decades has been so substantial that national actions have greatly reduced the variations within and among state administrative operations (Rose, 1973) In other words, interstate, intrastate, and intra-agency variations may be so modest or minor that there is little vanance to be explained1 This could lead to the same empirical findings we found so prevalent, namely, the absence of correlations between national impacts and state policy fluidity (The same conclusion could also result, of course, from an invalid or unreliable measure of policy fluidity )
Whatever interpretations or conclusions are favored from among those stated above, one matter is clear There are important and significant research questions that remain to be pursued in attempting to explain state administrative differences using national policy instruments
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We wish to acknowledge assistance and support of this research provided by the Earhart Foundation of Ann Arbor Michigan and the Institute tor Research in Social Science at the University of North Carolina
REFERENCES
Abney, G , and Lauth, T P (1986) The Politics of State and Cit\ Administration, State University of New York Press, Albany
ACIR (Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations) (1977) Improving Federal Grants Management, Government Printing Office, Washington, DC
ACIR (1978) Categorical Grants Their Role and Design, Government Printing Office, Washington, DC
64 Wnght and Cho
ACIR (1984) Regulatory Federalism Policy Process Impact and Reform, Government Pnnting Office, Washington, DC
ACIR (1985) The Question of State Government Capability, Government Pnnting Office, Washington, DC
ACIR (1993) Federal Regulation of State and Local Governments The Mixed Record of the 1980s, Government Pnnting Office, Washington, DC
ACIR (1995) Characteristics of Federal Grant in Aid Programs to State and Local Governments Grants Funded in 1995, Government Pnnting Office, Washington, DC
Alien, R S , ed (1949) Our Sovereign State, Vanguard Press, New York
Bowling, C J , Wright, D S (1998a) Public administration in the fifty states a half- century revolution, State and Local Government Review, SO(Wmter) 50-62 Bowling, C J , Wright, D S (1998b) Change and continuity in state administration
administrative leadership across four decades, Public Administration Review, 58(Sept/Oct) 429-444
Bowman, A O , and Kearney, R C (1986) The Resurgence of the States, Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ
Brough, R K (1992) Total quality management in state government, Journal of State Government, 65(Jan-March) 4-8
Brudney, J L , Herbert, F T , and Wright, D S (1999) Reinventing government in the American states measuring and explaining administrative reform, Public Admims tratwn Review, 59(Jan/Feb) 19-30
Chubb, J E (1985a) Federalism and the bias for centralization, The New Direction in American Politics (J E Chubb and P E Peterson, eds), Brookmgs Institution, Washington, DC, pp 273-306
Chubb, J E (1985b) Excessive regulation the case of federal aid to education, Political Science Quarterly, lOO(Summer) 287-311
Chubb, J E (1985c) The political economy of federalism, American Political Science Review, 79(Sept) 994-1015
Conlan, T J (1986) Federalism and competing values in the Reagan Administration, Pubhus The Journal of Federalism, 16(Wmter) 29-48
Conlan, T J , Riggle, J D , and Schwartz, D E (1995) Deregulating federalism^ The politics of mandate reform in the 104th Congress, Pubhus The Journal of Federal- ism, 25 (Summer) 23-40
Derthick, M (1970) The Influence of Federal Grants Public Assistance in Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA
Elazar, D J (1984) American Federalism A View from the States, 3rd ed , Harper and Row, New York
Elhng, R C (1992) Public Management in the States A Comparative Study ofAdmmis trative Performance and Politics, Praeger, Westport, CT
Fesler, J W , ed (1955) The Forty Eight States Their Tasks as Policy Makers and Admin istrators, American Assembly, Columbia University, New York
Fesler, J W , ed (1967) The 50 States and Their Local Governments, Alfred A Knopf, New York
Friedrich, C J (1941) Constitutional Government and Democracy, Ginn and Company, revised ed , New York
Intergovernmental Interdependences 65
Garnett, J L (1980) Reorganizing State Government The Executive Branch, Westview Press, Boulder, CO
Grodzms, M (1960a) American political parties and the American system, Western Politi cal Quarterly 13(Fall) 974-998
Grodzms, M (1960b) The federal system, Goals for Americans The Report of the P re si dent's Commission on National Goals, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ pp 265-282
Haas, P J (1984) The Causes and Effects of Administrative Expansionism State Bureau cratic Attitudes Toward Budgetary Growth, Ph D dissertation, Department of Polit ical Science, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
Hanus, J J , ed (1981) The Nationalization of State Government, D C Heath, Lexmgton, MA
Ingram, H (1977) Policy implementation through bargaining the case of federal grants- m aid Public Policy, 25(Fall) 499-526
Jenks, S S , and Wright, D S (1993) An agency-level approach to change(s) in the administrative functions of American state governments, State and Local Govern ment Review 25(Sprmg) 78-86
Kettl, D R (1983) The Regulation of Federalism, Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, LA
Key, V O (1956) American State Politics An Introduction, Alfred A Knopf, New York Kincaid, J (1990) From Cooperative to Coercive Federalism, Annals 509(May) 6-152 Kmcaid, J (1993) From cooperation to coercion in American federalism housing, frag-
mentation, and preemption, 1980-1992, Journal Law Politics 9 333-430 Kmcaid, J (1996) From dual to coercive federalism in American intergovernmental rela-
tions, Globahzatwn and Decentralization Institutional Contexts Policy Issues and Intergovernmental Relations in Japan and the United States (J S Jun and D S Wright, eds) Georgetown University Press, Washington, DC, pp 21-47 Kunde, J (1987) The politics of excellence managing more with less in the Western
states Paper presented at the Western Governors' Association
Lowi, T J (1970) Decision making vs policy making toward an antidote for technoc racy, Public Administration Review 30(May/June) 314-325
Lowi, T J (1972) Four systems of policy, politics, and choice, Public Administration Review 32(May/June) 298-310
MacDonald, A F (1928) Federal Aid A Study of the American Subsidy System, Crowell, New York
Peterson, P E (1979) Redistributive policies and patterns of citizen participation in local politics in the USA, Decentralist Trends in Western Democracies, (L J Sharpe, ed) Sage Publications, Beverly Hills, CA
Peterson, P E (1981) City Limits, University of Chicago Press, Chicago
Peterson, P E,Rabe,B G,andWong, K K (1986) When Federalism Works, Brookmgs Institution, Washington, DC
Peterson, P E (1995) The Price of Federalism, Brookmgs Institution, Washington, DC Pressman, J L (1975) Federal Programs and City Politics, University of California
Press, Berkeley, CA
Ransone, C B Jr (1956) The Office of Governor in the United States, University of Alabama Press, University AL
66 Wnght and Cho
Robinson, J E (1998) The role of the independent political executive in state governance stability in the face of change, Public Administration Review 5 8 (March/April) 119- 128
Rose, D D (1973) National and local forces in state politics the implications of multi- level policy analysis, American Political Science Review 67(Dec) 1162-1173 Rosenthal, A (1989) Governors and Legislators Contending Powers, CQ Press, Wash-
ington, DC
Thompson, F (1993) Introduction critical challenges to state and local public service,"
Revitalizing State and Local Public Service (F Thompson, ed ), Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA, pp 1 -40
Van Horn, C E , ed (1993) The State of the States, CQ Press, Washington, DC Walker, D B (1997) Devolution a big deal or only one dynamic in the system *? Paper
presented at the annual meeting of the New England Political Science Association, New London, CT, May 3, 1997
Webb, S (1911) Grants-In-Aid A Criticism and a Proposal, Longmans Green, London Wemberg, M W (1977) Managing the State, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA
Wright, D S (1968) Federal Grants-m-Aid Perspectives and Alternatives American Enterprise Institute, Washington, DC
Wnght, D S (1990) Federalism, intergovernmental relations, and intergovernmental management historical reflections and conceptual comparisons, Public Admimstra twn Review 50(March/Apnl) 168-178
Wright, D S (1997) Understanding intergovernmental relations, Classics of Public Ad- mmistration (J M Shafntz and A C Hyde, eds), Harcourt Brace, Fort Worth, TX pp 578-594
Wright, D S (1998) Federalism, intergovernmental relations, and intergovernmental management the ongms, emergence, and maturation of three concepts, Handbook of Public Administration (J Rabin and others, eds), Marcel Dekker, New York, pp 381-447
Yoo, J W , and Wright, D S (1993) Public policy and intergovernmental relations mea- suring perceived change(s) in national influence—the effects of the federalism de- cade, Policy Studies Journal 21 (Winter) 687-699
Yoo, J W , and Wnght, D S (1994) Public administration education and formal adminis- trative position do they make a difference7, Public Administration Review 54(July/
Aug) 357-363
Zimmerman, J F (1995) State-Local Relations A Partnership Approach, Praeger, New York, 2d ed