Kindred spirits or intergovernmental competition? The innovation and diffusion of energy policies in the American states (1990–2008)

Abstract

The innovation of environmental policies and their subsequent diffusion throughout the American states has been the subject of significant academic attention. Using an event history analysis, a traditional geographic model for policy diffusion is tested against a model where states learn from peer groups, defined by political culture. There is evidence for state learning within peer groups but less support for diffusion across state borders. Policy characteristics, environmental conditions, economic resources, and political constraints and opportunities are tested as drivers of differences in policy adoption. More than any other factor, politics and political culture explains the adoption of energy and climate-change policies. These results also suggest that restricted models that test geographical mechanisms of policy diffusion likely omit important characteristics that are correlated across states, leading to biased findings regarding the geographical state diffusion models in the extant literature.

Subnational climate entrepreneurship: innovative climate action in California and São Paulo

“…The state level is responsible for the majority of policy innovation and activity related to climate change both in the USA (Rabe 2008;Matisoff and Edwards 2014) and in Brazil (Romeiro and Parente 2011). The states of California and São Paulo, in particular, are somewhat unique in this respect.…”

Instrument constituencies and the supply side of policy innovation: the social life of emissions trading

“…Matisoff andEdwards 2014, Schaffrin et al 2014) could try to find ways of treating policy instruments as historical entities whose appearance is bound to change over time, and they could further acknowledge the agency of instrument constituencies as a mechanism in its own right. The recent surge of innovation-oriented approaches in policy practice and policy analysis risks foregoing its full potential of developing a better analytical grip on the dynamics of policymaking in a globally connected and highly knowledge-intensive political world, if it does not attend to social processes of knowledge production, the unique dynamics that accrue within specific models and methods, and the politics linked with their articulation and expansion.…”

Hacia una teoría ideacional de la difusión institucional. La adopción y adaptación del presidencialismo en América Latina durante el siglo XIX

“…Es imposible dar cuenta de la producción sobre difusión de políticas en apenas un párrafo. De todos modos, vale la pena mencionar algunos ejemplos para ilustrar la enorme variedad de procesos de difusión que han venido siendo estudiados durante los últimos años: transferencias condicionadas (Sugiyama, 2011), procesos de privatización de la seguridad social (Brooks, 2005), mecanismos de financiación de hospitales (Gilardi et al, 2009), políticas y tecnologías de regulación en los capitalismos contemporáneos (Levi-Faur, 2005), tratados bilaterales de inversión (Elkins et al, 2006), privatización de telecomunicaciones (Schmitt, 2011), políticas económicas promercado (Simmons y Elkins, 2004), instrumentos de política ambiental (Tews et al, 2003), políticas laborales en la Unión Europea (Casey y Gold, 2005), políticas antilavado de dinero en países en desarrollo (Sharman, 2008), control del tabaquismo (Shipan y Volden, 2006) y políticas energéticas en los Estados Unidos (Matisoff y Edwards, 2014).…”