Organizational History and Budgetary Punctuation

Robinson, Scott E.; Flink, Carla M.

doi:10.2139/ssrn.2127305

Cited by 8 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Our findings and expectations are consistent with two recent arguments put forth by Robinson and various collaborators in an important string of contributions (Robinson, ; Robinson & Caver, ; Robinson, Caver, Meier, & O'Toole, ; Robinson et al, ). This is the institutional argument: certain forms of institutional structure, such as centralization, may be more prone to generate punctuations than other structures.…”

Section: Hypothesessupporting

confidence: 93%

“…Our hypotheses are also consistent with the idea that, for any given series, punctuations may be more or less likely; they are a characteristic of the build‐up of pressure, to be sure, but also of how different sets of organizations deal with changes to their environments. Our findings, then, are consistent with Robinson et al's () institutional model although our explanation of the process is different and our empirical points of reference differ as well. In any case, our ideas help explain what could be seen as a contradiction so far apparent in the literature.…”

Section: Hypothesessupporting

confidence: 88%

“…In any case, our ideas help explain what could be seen as a contradiction so far apparent in the literature. No single dataset so far used in the literature allows a clear delineation of these different operating mechanisms, so we simply note here that our hypotheses about institutional capacity and issue complexity are consistent with Robinson et al's () idea of institutional memory.…”

Section: Hypothesessupporting

confidence: 80%

“…The most recent test of this idea is that institutional structures constitute a rival hypothesis to the “error‐accumulation” idea inherent in the friction model posited by Jones and Baumgartner (). Robinson et al () note in their study of Texas school district budgets that districts with more punctuations in their history can be predicted to have more in their future. They suggest that this contradicts the friction idea as in that formulation one would expect that the lack of a punctuation would suggest a build‐up of pressure, increasing the likelihood of a punctuation in the future.…”

Section: Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Complexity, Capacity, and Budget Punctuations

Epp¹,

Baumgartner²

2016

Policy Studies Journal

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The budgeting literature has long focused on "institutional friction" as a cause of ubiquitous punctuated equilibrium (PE) findings. A recent wave of scholarship looks to identify specific institutional mechanisms that affect the number of punctuations in policy outputs. We contribute to this growing body of research by focusing on the complexity of the institutional environment surrounding a policy area as well as that of the government as a whole. These factors have opposite effects: the more complex a policy area, the greater the likelihood of extreme spending changes. But, higher institutional capacity in general leads to greater stability. To test these ideas, we develop a novel index of budgetary change that balances the conceptual importance of extreme changes while analyzing the entire distribution of budget changes, not only the tails. In addition, we also demonstrate that findings are robust to a number of important distinctions, such as between series associated with slowly moving demographic trends or quickly moving stochastic events. We, therefore, demonstrate the robustness of important findings from the established literature, add a new measure of the dependent variable, and push the literature forward with a new focus on issue complexity and institutional capacity.

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Section: Hypothesessupporting

confidence: 93%

Section: Hypothesessupporting

confidence: 88%

Section: Hypothesessupporting

confidence: 80%

Section: Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Complexity, Capacity, and Budget Punctuations

Epp¹,

Baumgartner²

2016

Policy Studies Journal

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“…In broad terms, scholars have identified disproportionate information processing, institutional friction, and organizational history as reasons why policy subsystems experience more or less punctuated changes. Empirically, PET has been predominantly analyzed through examinations of distributions of policy changes, although there have been works that utilize multivariate analyses (Robinson, Flink, & King, ; Robinson, Caver, Meier, & O'Toole, 2007). Traditionally, these studies use public budgeting data—federal, state, local, and school district levels.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rethinking Punctuated Equilibrium Theory: A Public Administration Approach to Budgetary Changes

Flink¹

2015

Policy Studies Journal

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What stimulates policy change in organizations? Punctuated equilibrium theory (PET) posits that over time policy moves slowly, but also experiences large, rapid changes. Explanations for punctuations have centered on institutional friction and disproportionate information processing. Lacking in PET literature is a theoretical understanding of policy change aside from structural and cognitive limitations. Other organizational features can create friction to slow or accelerate the policy process. This study utilizes both public policy and public administration theory by applying a public administration approach to studying budgetary change. Leveraging this approach, this work analyzes the pattern and explanations of budgetary changes. Centering on two concepts understudied in PET literature-policy feedback and endogenous organizational change-data from hundreds of organizations are used to demonstrate how organization performance and personnel instability contribute to budgetary changes for core organization activity. Results indicate that high levels of performance and low levels of personnel instability lead to incremental changes.KEY WORDS: punctuated equilibrium theory, public policy process, public administration, public budgeting, organization performance, turnover 101 0190-292X V C 2015 Policy Studies Organization

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The Dynamic Model of Choice for Public Policy Reconsidered: A Formal Analysis With an Application to US Budget Data

Jensen

Mortensen

Serritzlew

2015

Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory

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It has been shown empirically across countries and political systems, and for different levels of government, that the distribution of budget changes follows a non-Gaussian distribution, a power function. This implies that budgets are very stable, yet occasionally are punctuated by very large changes. To explain this strong empirical generalization, Jones and Baumgartner (2005a) developed the Dynamic Model of Choice for Public Policy, which today is the dominant explanation of stability and change in public budgets. Based on formal analysis, this article investigates the implications and scope conditions of this model. Furthermore, using US budget data, the article reveals aspects of the model that do not closely fit the empirical pattern. The article concludes with an examination of three model revisions that may improve the fit between the model and the empirical distributions of budget decisions.

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Organizational History and Budgetary Punctuation

Cited by 8 publications

References 12 publications

Complexity, Capacity, and Budget Punctuations

Complexity, Capacity, and Budget Punctuations

Rethinking Punctuated Equilibrium Theory: A Public Administration Approach to Budgetary Changes

The Dynamic Model of Choice for Public Policy Reconsidered: A Formal Analysis With an Application to US Budget Data

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