Publications

Agenda-setting shapes the problems that occupy the sustained attention of those who craft laws and policy, and the heuristics and solutions used to address those problems. An extensive political science literature has elucidated agenda formation...

Administrative agencies have undertaken an increasingly substantial role in policymaking. Yet the influence-seeking that targets these agencies remains poorly understood. Reporting exceptions under the Lobbying Disclosure Act allow many of the most...

 

 My late colleague Samuel Huntington wrote of an impending clash of civilizations, but it might be more apt to consider the specter that confronts us as a clash of empires. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the threats that Putin has broadcast across...

Observers and practitioners of artificial intelligence (AI) have proposed an FDA-style licensing regime for the most advanced AI models, or ’frontier’ models. In this paper, we explore the applicability of approval regulation – that is, regulation of a...

Building trust in public health agencies like the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has become a key government priority. Understanding the roots of FDA mistrust is important if the agency is to develop targeted messaging and reforms aimed at...

The study of agenda setting has become curiously disconnected from democratic theory and democratization. Following Schattschneider, Dahl, and recent developments in political theory, I call for its reintegration in theoretical and empirical realms. The...

How can historical perspective be brought to the quantitative social sciences? The question has proven immensely popular, but answers that deal squarely with historical context and narrative remain elusive. An important recent book by Gregory Wawro and...

The Covid-19 pandemic highlighted the need to examine public trust in the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) vaccine approval process and the role of political influence in the FDA’s decisions. Ensuring that the FDA is itself trustworthy is...

Committee formation in early American legislatures happened when those assemblies were inundated with petitions, a relationship unexamined in institutional political science. We develop a model where a floor creates committees to respond to topic-specific...