Doctoral Dissertation Research: "Economizing Attention: Agendas and the Influence of Bureaucracy in American Policymaking"

这个项目考察了联邦官僚机构作为政府的“天线”所扮演的角色。官僚机构在向民选政府部门发出有关重要政策问题的信号时，弥补了它们的注意力限制。这项研究解决了两个主要问题：1.官僚机构对政策问题发出的信号对国会和总统的政策议程有什么影响？2.注意力和权威性政治决策如何影响联邦官僚机构发出信号的内容和动态？发展了一种官僚影响理论，该理论将注意力的匮乏和机构组织与政策议程的内容和动态联系起来。使用时间序列技术，考察了联邦官僚机构和民选政府部门内部和之间的政策议程的实质和波动性。该项目的理论化开发了一个新的框架和一套独特的研究问题，为超越目前官僚机构在民主治理中的作用的理论化状态的新的调查途径铺平了道路。这项研究设计生成了一组独特的数据，这些数据与二战以来联邦机构的议程设置有关。这些数据集将有利于研究官僚机构的学者，以及那些在总统行政和国会决策等相关子领域工作的人。

This project examines the role of the federal bureaucracy as the "antennae" of government. The bureaucracy compensates for the attention limits of the elected branches of government in sending them signals about important policy problems. The research addresses two primary questions: 1. What effect does bureaucratic signaling about policy problems have on the policy agendas of Congress and the President? 2. How does attention and authoritative political decisions affect the content and dynamics of signaling by the federal bureaucracy? A theory of bureaucratic influence is developed that relates scarcity of attention and institutional organization to the content and dynamics of policy agendas. Using time series techniques, the substance and volatility of policy agendas in and between the federal bureaucracy and elected branches of government are examined. The theorizing in this project developed a new framework and a unique set of research questions that pave the way for new avenues of inquiry that moves beyond the state of current theorizing on the role of bureaucracy in democratic governance. The research design generates a unique set of data related to agenda setting in federal agencies since the Second World War. These data sets will benefit scholars studying bureaucracies as well as those working in related subfields such as presidential administration and congressional policymaking.