From metaphors to measures: observable indicators of gradual institutional change

Abstract

Scholarship on social policy has recently emphasised the importance of gradual processes of institutional change. However, conceptual work on the identification of processes such as drift, conversion and layering has not produced clear empirical indicators that distinguish these processes from one another, posing major problems for empirical research. We argue that, in order to improve the validity of its empirical findings, scholarship on gradual change should – and can – pay more attention to issues of measurement and detection. We then contribute to this goal by clearly articulating observable indicators for several mechanisms of gradual institutional change and validating them against extant empirical work on political economy.

Social Accountability and Institutional Change: The Case of Citizen Oversight of Police

“…The issues of whether (1) COAs impact policing outcomes and (2) such impacts vary by type of COA are long‐standing concerns in the literature on citizen oversight of police (see De Angelis, Rosenthal, and Buchner ; Walker ; Walker and Archbold ). Our study not only responds in the affirmative to both these questions from the prior literature but also (3) theoretically extends the state‐of‐the‐art of social accountability impact evaluation research by combining the social accountability framework (Fox ) from the development studies literature and the gradual change framework from political science (Mahoney and Thelen ; Rocco and Thurston ). Thus, our approach not only bridges two literatures that have at times been disconnected from each other but also offers a considerable advantage in terms of parsimony in terms of the variables.…”

“…With a broad scope of authority and low discretion, the disparity in PHCs is likely to diminish, owing to the supplanting of institutions—this type of change is referred to as “displacement” in the gradual change framework literature (see appendix A; Rocco and Thurston ). With a broad scope of authority and high discretion, the disparity in DCAs is likely to diminish, owing to the enhanced opportunities for reinterpretation of institutions pertaining to DCAs—referred to as “conversion” (Rocco and Thurston ). With a narrow scope of authority and high discretion, the disparity in DCAs is likely to reduce incrementally—referred to as “layering” (Rocco and Thurston )—because of amendments to existing institutions pertaining to DCAs.…”

“…With a broad scope of authority and high discretion, the disparity in DCAs is likely to diminish, owing to the enhanced opportunities for reinterpretation of institutions pertaining to DCAs—referred to as “conversion” (Rocco and Thurston ). With a narrow scope of authority and high discretion, the disparity in DCAs is likely to reduce incrementally—referred to as “layering” (Rocco and Thurston )—because of amendments to existing institutions pertaining to DCAs. Finally, with a narrow scope of authority and low discretion, the disparity in PHCs may become more pronounced because of a failure to update institutions pertaining to the use of deadly force (i.e., “drift”; see appendix A).…”

“…In this article, we examine the effectiveness of COAs as a means of changing institutional outcomes in policing—in this case, racial disparities in arrest rates and homicides of citizens by law enforcement officers—in the United States. We do this by combining the gradual change framework (Rocco and Thurston ) with the social accountability framework (Fox ) to guide our empirical strategy and model building…”

Ideas and Institutional Conversion Through Layering: The Case of Israeli Immigration Policy

“…Palier ; Falleti ) provide evidence for the importance of ideas in explaining the various modes of gradual institutional change. Furthermore, Rocco and Thurston (), who examine empirical indicators of conversion, layering, and drift, also note that agents of change can use intellectual resources in order to promote or prevent change. However, all these authors only note the importance of ideas and do not theorize how they affect policy (Schmidt ).…”