- The Oxford Handbook of Classics In Public Policy and Administration
- List of Figures
- List of Tables
- List of Contributors
- What Makes a Classic?: Identifying and Revisiting the Classics of Public Policy and Administration
- Herbert A. Simon, Administrative Behavior: A Study of Decision-Making Processes in Administrative Organization
- David B. Truman, The Governmental Process: Political Interests and Public Opinion
- Robert K. Merton et al., A Reader in Bureaucracy
- Harold D. Lasswell, The Decision Process: Seven Categories of Functional Analysis
- C. Wright Mills, The Power Elite
- Charles E. Lindblom, “The Science of Muddling Through”
- Thomas R. Dye, Politics, Economics and the Public: Policy Outcomes in the American States
- Herbert Kaufman, The Forest Ranger: A Study in Administrative Behavior
- E. E. Schattschneider, The Semi-Sovereign People: A Realist’s View of Democracy in America
- V. O. Key, Jr., Public Opinion and American Democracy
- Michel Crozier, The Bureaucratic Phenomenon
- Theodore J. Lowi, “American Business, Public Policy, Case Studies and Political Theory”
- Aaron Wildavsky, The Politics of the Budgetary Process
- Mancur Olson, The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups
- Theodore J. Lowi, The End of Liberalism: The Second Republic of the United States
- Jack L. Walker, “The Diffusion of Innovations among the American States”
- Albert O. Hirschman, Exit, Voice and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States
- Graham T. Allison, The Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis
- George J. Stigler, “The Theory of Economic Regulation”
- Michael D. Cohen, James G. March, and Johan P. Olsen, “A Garbage Can Model of Organizational Choice”
- Anthony Downs, “Up and Down with Ecology: The ‘Issue-Attention’ Cycle”
- Carol H. Weiss, Evaluation Research: Methods for Studying Programs and Policies
- Jeffrey L. Pressman and Aaron B. Wildavsky, Implementation
- Oliver E. Williamson, Markets and Hierarchies: Analysis and Antitrust Implications
- Hugh Heclo, “Issue Networks and the Executive Establishment”
- Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Service
- Richard Rose, Do Parties Make a Difference?
- John W. Kingdon, Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies
- Mathew D. McCubbins and Thomas Schwartz, “Congressional Oversight Overlooked: Police Patrols versus Fire Alarms”
- Terry M. Moe, “The New Economics of Organization”
- Mathew D. McCubbins, Roger G. Noll, and Barry R. Weingast, “Administrative Procedures as Instruments of Political Control”
- Paul A. Sabatier, “An Advocacy Coalition Framework of Policy Change and the Role of Policy-Oriented Learning Therein”
- Fritz W. Scharpf, “The Joint-Decision Trap: Lessons from German Federalism and European Integration”
- James Q. Wilson, Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do and Why they Do it
- Elinor Ostrom, Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action
- Christopher Hood, “A Public Management for All Seasons?”
- Ian Ayres and John Braithwaite, Responsive Regulation: Transcending the Deregulation Debate
- Frank R. Baumgartner and Bryan D. Jones, Agendas and Instability in American Politics
- Robert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community: Empirical Foundations, Causal Mechanisms, and Policy Implications
- Peter A. Hall and David Soskice, Varieties of Capitalism: The Institutional Foundations of Comparative Advantage
- Index
Abstract and Keywords
This chapter comments on Anthony Downs’s 1972 seminal paper “Up and Down with Ecology: The ‘Issue-Attention’ Cycle,” which tackles the concept of “public” or “issue” attention. Focusing on domestic policy, particularly environmental policy in the United States, Downs describes a process called “issue-attention cycle,” by which the public gains and loses interest in a particular issue over time. This chapter summarizes studies that directly put Downs’s propositions to the test, laying emphasis on research that probes the existence of and interrelationships among the public attention cycle, media attention cycle, and government attention cycle. It then reviews the main arguments put forward by Downs before concluding with a discussion of promising avenues for future research as well as important theoretical and methodological questions that need further elucidation.
Keywords: Anthony Downs, environmental policy, United States, issue-attention cycle, public attention cycle, media attention cycle, government attention cycle, domestic policy
Kuhika Gupta is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Centre for Energy, Security, and Society at the University of Oklahoma. She studies public policy, with a special interest in comparative public policy, risk and public policy, and energy policy. Her research has appeared in journals such as Policy Studies Journal and Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis.
Hank C. Jenkins-Smith is a George Lynn Cross Research Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Oklahoma. His research and published work focus on theories of the public policy process, the politics of technical and natural risks, and the nature of the belief systems that guide technical and political decisions. He currently serves on the Council of the American Political Science Association and on the US National Council for Radiation Protection.
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- The Oxford Handbook of Classics In Public Policy and Administration
- List of Figures
- List of Tables
- List of Contributors
- What Makes a Classic?: Identifying and Revisiting the Classics of Public Policy and Administration
- Herbert A. Simon, Administrative Behavior: A Study of Decision-Making Processes in Administrative Organization
- David B. Truman, The Governmental Process: Political Interests and Public Opinion
- Robert K. Merton et al., A Reader in Bureaucracy
- Harold D. Lasswell, The Decision Process: Seven Categories of Functional Analysis
- C. Wright Mills, The Power Elite
- Charles E. Lindblom, “The Science of Muddling Through”
- Thomas R. Dye, Politics, Economics and the Public: Policy Outcomes in the American States
- Herbert Kaufman, The Forest Ranger: A Study in Administrative Behavior
- E. E. Schattschneider, The Semi-Sovereign People: A Realist’s View of Democracy in America
- V. O. Key, Jr., Public Opinion and American Democracy
- Michel Crozier, The Bureaucratic Phenomenon
- Theodore J. Lowi, “American Business, Public Policy, Case Studies and Political Theory”
- Aaron Wildavsky, The Politics of the Budgetary Process
- Mancur Olson, The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups
- Theodore J. Lowi, The End of Liberalism: The Second Republic of the United States
- Jack L. Walker, “The Diffusion of Innovations among the American States”
- Albert O. Hirschman, Exit, Voice and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States
- Graham T. Allison, The Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis
- George J. Stigler, “The Theory of Economic Regulation”
- Michael D. Cohen, James G. March, and Johan P. Olsen, “A Garbage Can Model of Organizational Choice”
- Anthony Downs, “Up and Down with Ecology: The ‘Issue-Attention’ Cycle”
- Carol H. Weiss, Evaluation Research: Methods for Studying Programs and Policies
- Jeffrey L. Pressman and Aaron B. Wildavsky, Implementation
- Oliver E. Williamson, Markets and Hierarchies: Analysis and Antitrust Implications
- Hugh Heclo, “Issue Networks and the Executive Establishment”
- Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Service
- Richard Rose, Do Parties Make a Difference?
- John W. Kingdon, Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies
- Mathew D. McCubbins and Thomas Schwartz, “Congressional Oversight Overlooked: Police Patrols versus Fire Alarms”
- Terry M. Moe, “The New Economics of Organization”
- Mathew D. McCubbins, Roger G. Noll, and Barry R. Weingast, “Administrative Procedures as Instruments of Political Control”
- Paul A. Sabatier, “An Advocacy Coalition Framework of Policy Change and the Role of Policy-Oriented Learning Therein”
- Fritz W. Scharpf, “The Joint-Decision Trap: Lessons from German Federalism and European Integration”
- James Q. Wilson, Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do and Why they Do it
- Elinor Ostrom, Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action
- Christopher Hood, “A Public Management for All Seasons?”
- Ian Ayres and John Braithwaite, Responsive Regulation: Transcending the Deregulation Debate
- Frank R. Baumgartner and Bryan D. Jones, Agendas and Instability in American Politics
- Robert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community: Empirical Foundations, Causal Mechanisms, and Policy Implications
- Peter A. Hall and David Soskice, Varieties of Capitalism: The Institutional Foundations of Comparative Advantage
- Index
