Marjorie Sarbaugh-Thompson - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Marjorie Sarbaugh-Thompson

Palgrave Macmillan US eBooks, 2004

Term limits advocates envisioned a legislature populated by elected officials who would look like... more Term limits advocates envisioned a legislature populated by elected officials who would look like “mom and pop from the corner grocery store,” and would want to “put in a couple of years of public service and then return to the private sector” (California Journal, 1991, p. 490). These citizen legislators they reasoned would neither be driven by reelection concerns nor beholden to special interests. They would be a more representative cross-section of people (Detroit Free Press, October 12, 1992). Term limits opponents feared that instead of rectifying the ills of special interest influence and creating greater representation, high turnover and lack of experience would rob the legislature of expertise needed to counteract the power of the executive branch, lobbyists, and others in the political system (Detroit Free Press, April 2, 1992 and Milliken, 1992). So while both sides anticipated that term limits would attract amateur legislators, some saw this as an asset and others as a liability.

Palgrave Macmillan US eBooks, 2004

Imagine at least two candidates either of whom might win a majority of the votes cast by actively... more Imagine at least two candidates either of whom might win a majority of the votes cast by actively involved citizens—a competitive election. In reality, candidates for state legislatures often run unopposed in primary elections that attract less than 20 percent of the voters. General elections attract more voters, but few are competitive with most candidates winning by a landslide. In this chapter we explore some of the reasons that state legislative electoral reality falls short of the competitive ideal, and we investigate whether term limits increase electoral competition.

Social Science Quarterly, 2021

The Political and Institutional Effects of Term Limits, 2004

Committees play an important role in policymaking (Francis, 1985), especially in states like Mich... more Committees play an important role in policymaking (Francis, 1985), especially in states like Michigan where committee chairs and caucus leaders control the flow of bills through the committees (Hamm et al., 1999). In addition to the formal power committees have in policymaking, committee members influence policy through their expertise, experience, and their network of contacts. Often members’ occupational background and other pre-legislative experience and expertise are considered when leaders assign them to a committee. In legislatures with high levels of continuity in committee assignments across sessions, committee members become experts through training by interest groups and staff and by listening to testimony and working on a wide range of issues in the policy area (Porter, 1974). Committee members’ expertise leads other legislators to rely on them for information about complex issues sent to the floor by their committee. Finally, legislators frequently ask to serve on committees with jurisdiction over policy issues crucial to their district or to key constituents, making them a conduit for knowledgeable, interested local actors to influence policy-making. Thus, not surprisingly, some people, including interest groups (Sarbaugh-Thompson et al., 2002), consider committees to be where the action is in a legislature.

State Politics & Policy Quarterly, 2001

Term limits provide a rare opportunity to employ pre- and post-intervention research designs to i... more Term limits provide a rare opportunity to employ pre- and post-intervention research designs to investigate the effects of turnover in legislatures. This article describes a study of term limits in Michigan that takes advantage of this opportunity. With eight states implementing term limits in 2002 or soon thereafter, there are opportunities for other scholars to replicate all or parts of the study described here. The payoffs for such projects in terms of generating systematic answers to the impacts of legislative turnover and term limits are considerable.

Organization Science, 1998

S arbaugh-Thompson and Feldman report on the impacts of an early multiyear trial with electronic ... more S arbaugh-Thompson and Feldman report on the impacts of an early multiyear trial with electronic mail. As organizations become increasingly distributed in time and space, will dependence on electronic communication change the balance between formal and casual conversation among workers? If so, what are the long-term consequences for organizational life? The current study will pique the interest of researchers interested in these and related questions.

State Politics & Policy Quarterly, 2010

By measuring U.S. term limits dichotomously, investigators ignore the vast differences among laws... more By measuring U.S. term limits dichotomously, investigators ignore the vast differences among laws limiting state legislative service. Furthermore, this measurement problem increases the risk of false negatives and confounds the effects of term limits with those of the citizen initiative. To address this, I propose two sets of continuous measures of term-limitedness. The first set compares mandated turnover after term limits to turnover in the 1980s, the decade before term limits began sweeping elected officials from office. A second set adjusts the first set to reflect the potential for legislators to cycle repeatedly between legislative chambers when only their consecutive years of service are limited. These continuous measures outperformed a dichotomous designation of term limits in two tests, suggesting that the proposed measures can reduce the risk of false negatives about term limits in U.S. multi-state research and that they are more robust in the face of confounding effects f...

Decentralized, market-based service systems provide services recipients with opportunities to cho... more Decentralized, market-based service systems provide services recipients with opportunities to choose services and service providers. Yet, for some service recipients, finding and ar-ranging for services is so difficult that they do not receive the services they need. Collabora-tion between service providers and service recipients may reduce the costs and confusion of decentralized service delivery. This study explores the effects of interagency collaboration and collaboration between agencies and families on families ’ experiences finding and ar-ranging service to help them and their children with disabilities. It uses data collected from 317 randomly sampled families participating in the State of Michigan’s Early On program (Part C of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act). Higher levels of interagency col-laboration were associated with increases in the quantity and quality of services provided. Different forms of collaboration between agencies and families were associat...

Global Encyclopedia of Public Administration, Public Policy, and Governance

PSN: State Politics & Policy (Topic), 2010

Using quantitative and open-ended interview responses from four Michigan House sessions, this stu... more Using quantitative and open-ended interview responses from four Michigan House sessions, this study examines legislators' attitudes toward two traditional tensions in political representation: whether elected officials should respond to constituent preferences or rely on their own judgment and whether elected officials should serve their district or the common good. In particular we ask: do state legislators identify with a traditional role orientation on each of these dimensions? The findings demonstrate that the answer is a qualified yes. We then explore personal or district characteristics of legislators that make them more inclined to identify with each of the role orientations. Finally, we link these role orientations to the priority legislators place on specific behaviors, such as consulting different local and state sources for information, studying legislation, and bringing home money and projects for the district.

Both proponents and opponents of term limits foresaw this reform altering the relationship betwee... more Both proponents and opponents of term limits foresaw this reform altering the relationship between legislators and organized interests, but in very different ways. For proponents, term limits promised to reduce the influence of interest groups by undermining both the opportunities and incentives for the development of mutually supportive and self-serving relationships between legislators and lobbyists. For opponents, term limits were a recipe for enhancing group influence. By forcing out experienced legislators and foreclosing the opportunities for their successors to develop comparable expertise over time, term limits would make legislators more dependent upon lobbyists while simultaneously leaving them less able to assess the credibility of information or its sources.

How do legislators accumulate power and influence when their time in office is limited? Other sch... more How do legislators accumulate power and influence when their time in office is limited? Other scholars argue that politically ambitious legislators accumulate influence over time by building friendships or demonstrating their expertise. Legislative term limits truncate this pathway to power. So what makes someone influential in a term-limited legislature? Using network analysis, we explore how patterns of influence, friendship, and substantive expertise evolved over the implementation of term limits in the Michigan legislature. We gathered data for these analyses in 370 face-to-face interviews across 13 years of research.Our data include colleagues named as influential, those named as especially good friends, and those listed as sources of information on two specific substantive issues. These data allow us to portray the size and configuration of the influence, friendship and consulting networks within each of the chamber and to compare the structure of these relationships between c...

This paper explores the implications for democratic policy making and school governance of collec... more This paper explores the implications for democratic policy making and school governance of collective bargaining with teachers. Based on a case study of the 1992 Teachers Strike in Detroit, Michigan, the research examines the relationships among actors involved in the strike and in its settlement. Findings of this research suggest that the strike derailed a reform movement and led to election of a new school board that encouraged the superintendent to resign. Citizens gained some limited attention to their concerns through involvement of the clergy, civic leaders, and the county executive's office. The research suggests that multilateral collective bargaining offers more opportunities for citizen representation in school policy making than does the traditional bilateral bargaining model. (EH) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * **********************...

ABSTRACT Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Michigan, 1992. Includes bibliographical references (leav... more ABSTRACT Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Michigan, 1992. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 333-339). Photocopy.

If elected officials do not act in the best interests of their constituents, they will be voted o... more If elected officials do not act in the best interests of their constituents, they will be voted out of office—or at least that’s a common assumption. This threat at the ballot box supposedly motivates legislators to respond to their constituents’ needs and concerns. Special interests, however, may sabotage legislators’ responsiveness to their constituents by providing the money that reelection-seeking legislators need to campaign for office. Some scholars argue that professional, career legislators are more susceptible to this financial temptation (Mitchell, 1991). Therefore, they argue that if term limits attract a “new breed” of citizen legislators, constituents’ interests instead of special interests will dominate elected officials’ agendas.

American Review of Politics, 2001

Palgrave Macmillan US eBooks, 2004

Term limits advocates envisioned a legislature populated by elected officials who would look like... more Term limits advocates envisioned a legislature populated by elected officials who would look like “mom and pop from the corner grocery store,” and would want to “put in a couple of years of public service and then return to the private sector” (California Journal, 1991, p. 490). These citizen legislators they reasoned would neither be driven by reelection concerns nor beholden to special interests. They would be a more representative cross-section of people (Detroit Free Press, October 12, 1992). Term limits opponents feared that instead of rectifying the ills of special interest influence and creating greater representation, high turnover and lack of experience would rob the legislature of expertise needed to counteract the power of the executive branch, lobbyists, and others in the political system (Detroit Free Press, April 2, 1992 and Milliken, 1992). So while both sides anticipated that term limits would attract amateur legislators, some saw this as an asset and others as a liability.

Palgrave Macmillan US eBooks, 2004

Imagine at least two candidates either of whom might win a majority of the votes cast by actively... more Imagine at least two candidates either of whom might win a majority of the votes cast by actively involved citizens—a competitive election. In reality, candidates for state legislatures often run unopposed in primary elections that attract less than 20 percent of the voters. General elections attract more voters, but few are competitive with most candidates winning by a landslide. In this chapter we explore some of the reasons that state legislative electoral reality falls short of the competitive ideal, and we investigate whether term limits increase electoral competition.

Social Science Quarterly, 2021

The Political and Institutional Effects of Term Limits, 2004

Committees play an important role in policymaking (Francis, 1985), especially in states like Mich... more Committees play an important role in policymaking (Francis, 1985), especially in states like Michigan where committee chairs and caucus leaders control the flow of bills through the committees (Hamm et al., 1999). In addition to the formal power committees have in policymaking, committee members influence policy through their expertise, experience, and their network of contacts. Often members’ occupational background and other pre-legislative experience and expertise are considered when leaders assign them to a committee. In legislatures with high levels of continuity in committee assignments across sessions, committee members become experts through training by interest groups and staff and by listening to testimony and working on a wide range of issues in the policy area (Porter, 1974). Committee members’ expertise leads other legislators to rely on them for information about complex issues sent to the floor by their committee. Finally, legislators frequently ask to serve on committees with jurisdiction over policy issues crucial to their district or to key constituents, making them a conduit for knowledgeable, interested local actors to influence policy-making. Thus, not surprisingly, some people, including interest groups (Sarbaugh-Thompson et al., 2002), consider committees to be where the action is in a legislature.

State Politics & Policy Quarterly, 2001

Term limits provide a rare opportunity to employ pre- and post-intervention research designs to i... more Term limits provide a rare opportunity to employ pre- and post-intervention research designs to investigate the effects of turnover in legislatures. This article describes a study of term limits in Michigan that takes advantage of this opportunity. With eight states implementing term limits in 2002 or soon thereafter, there are opportunities for other scholars to replicate all or parts of the study described here. The payoffs for such projects in terms of generating systematic answers to the impacts of legislative turnover and term limits are considerable.

Organization Science, 1998

S arbaugh-Thompson and Feldman report on the impacts of an early multiyear trial with electronic ... more S arbaugh-Thompson and Feldman report on the impacts of an early multiyear trial with electronic mail. As organizations become increasingly distributed in time and space, will dependence on electronic communication change the balance between formal and casual conversation among workers? If so, what are the long-term consequences for organizational life? The current study will pique the interest of researchers interested in these and related questions.

State Politics & Policy Quarterly, 2010

By measuring U.S. term limits dichotomously, investigators ignore the vast differences among laws... more By measuring U.S. term limits dichotomously, investigators ignore the vast differences among laws limiting state legislative service. Furthermore, this measurement problem increases the risk of false negatives and confounds the effects of term limits with those of the citizen initiative. To address this, I propose two sets of continuous measures of term-limitedness. The first set compares mandated turnover after term limits to turnover in the 1980s, the decade before term limits began sweeping elected officials from office. A second set adjusts the first set to reflect the potential for legislators to cycle repeatedly between legislative chambers when only their consecutive years of service are limited. These continuous measures outperformed a dichotomous designation of term limits in two tests, suggesting that the proposed measures can reduce the risk of false negatives about term limits in U.S. multi-state research and that they are more robust in the face of confounding effects f...

Decentralized, market-based service systems provide services recipients with opportunities to cho... more Decentralized, market-based service systems provide services recipients with opportunities to choose services and service providers. Yet, for some service recipients, finding and ar-ranging for services is so difficult that they do not receive the services they need. Collabora-tion between service providers and service recipients may reduce the costs and confusion of decentralized service delivery. This study explores the effects of interagency collaboration and collaboration between agencies and families on families ’ experiences finding and ar-ranging service to help them and their children with disabilities. It uses data collected from 317 randomly sampled families participating in the State of Michigan’s Early On program (Part C of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act). Higher levels of interagency col-laboration were associated with increases in the quantity and quality of services provided. Different forms of collaboration between agencies and families were associat...

Global Encyclopedia of Public Administration, Public Policy, and Governance

PSN: State Politics & Policy (Topic), 2010

Using quantitative and open-ended interview responses from four Michigan House sessions, this stu... more Using quantitative and open-ended interview responses from four Michigan House sessions, this study examines legislators' attitudes toward two traditional tensions in political representation: whether elected officials should respond to constituent preferences or rely on their own judgment and whether elected officials should serve their district or the common good. In particular we ask: do state legislators identify with a traditional role orientation on each of these dimensions? The findings demonstrate that the answer is a qualified yes. We then explore personal or district characteristics of legislators that make them more inclined to identify with each of the role orientations. Finally, we link these role orientations to the priority legislators place on specific behaviors, such as consulting different local and state sources for information, studying legislation, and bringing home money and projects for the district.

Both proponents and opponents of term limits foresaw this reform altering the relationship betwee... more Both proponents and opponents of term limits foresaw this reform altering the relationship between legislators and organized interests, but in very different ways. For proponents, term limits promised to reduce the influence of interest groups by undermining both the opportunities and incentives for the development of mutually supportive and self-serving relationships between legislators and lobbyists. For opponents, term limits were a recipe for enhancing group influence. By forcing out experienced legislators and foreclosing the opportunities for their successors to develop comparable expertise over time, term limits would make legislators more dependent upon lobbyists while simultaneously leaving them less able to assess the credibility of information or its sources.

How do legislators accumulate power and influence when their time in office is limited? Other sch... more How do legislators accumulate power and influence when their time in office is limited? Other scholars argue that politically ambitious legislators accumulate influence over time by building friendships or demonstrating their expertise. Legislative term limits truncate this pathway to power. So what makes someone influential in a term-limited legislature? Using network analysis, we explore how patterns of influence, friendship, and substantive expertise evolved over the implementation of term limits in the Michigan legislature. We gathered data for these analyses in 370 face-to-face interviews across 13 years of research.Our data include colleagues named as influential, those named as especially good friends, and those listed as sources of information on two specific substantive issues. These data allow us to portray the size and configuration of the influence, friendship and consulting networks within each of the chamber and to compare the structure of these relationships between c...

This paper explores the implications for democratic policy making and school governance of collec... more This paper explores the implications for democratic policy making and school governance of collective bargaining with teachers. Based on a case study of the 1992 Teachers Strike in Detroit, Michigan, the research examines the relationships among actors involved in the strike and in its settlement. Findings of this research suggest that the strike derailed a reform movement and led to election of a new school board that encouraged the superintendent to resign. Citizens gained some limited attention to their concerns through involvement of the clergy, civic leaders, and the county executive's office. The research suggests that multilateral collective bargaining offers more opportunities for citizen representation in school policy making than does the traditional bilateral bargaining model. (EH) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * **********************...

ABSTRACT Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Michigan, 1992. Includes bibliographical references (leav... more ABSTRACT Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Michigan, 1992. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 333-339). Photocopy.

If elected officials do not act in the best interests of their constituents, they will be voted o... more If elected officials do not act in the best interests of their constituents, they will be voted out of office—or at least that’s a common assumption. This threat at the ballot box supposedly motivates legislators to respond to their constituents’ needs and concerns. Special interests, however, may sabotage legislators’ responsiveness to their constituents by providing the money that reelection-seeking legislators need to campaign for office. Some scholars argue that professional, career legislators are more susceptible to this financial temptation (Mitchell, 1991). Therefore, they argue that if term limits attract a “new breed” of citizen legislators, constituents’ interests instead of special interests will dominate elected officials’ agendas.

American Review of Politics, 2001