PLSC 083 Lobbying the Federal Government

Baumgartner

December 3, 2001

Last week of class: review

NOTE: Final grades and term papers can be picked up in my office, 107 Burrowes, during the period when this class would normally have its final exam scheduled: Monday Dec 10, 2:30 to 4:30. Drop by my office. I’ll have cookies or something. Get your term paper and tell me how you did this semester. Burrowes is right in front of Pattee Library on the mall.

NOTE: For those interested in being a PLSC major, I volunteer to be your advisor, or I will help you choose someone else if you’re sick of me!

NOTE: In May 2005 I’ll promise to come to graduation if someone here reminds me.

Monday: A checklist for your papers

The basics:

• Cover page
• Page numbers (you’d be surprised)
• Section dividers, headings, and introductions for each section of the paper.
• Citations throughout
• Bibliography (cited references only)

The more important issues:

· Theoretical issues in the introduction: discuss in class what the major issues are

• Break the theory down into several different components each of which can be analyzed with data. (That is, move from a general theory to a series of hypotheses.)
• Introduce your case and show how it can be used to evaluate the theory.
• Explain the evidence from the case in sequence, showing how it relates to each part of the theory. Refer constantly back and forth from theory to evidence. So-and-so’s theory, if correct, would lead us to expect x in this case. A review of the activities of groups a, b, and c shows y. Then give details of what the groups did. In this aspect, it appears that the theory is incomplete… Move on to the next element of the theory. Do this for each part. Always make the reader know what part of the theory we are looking for, and what kind of evidence would be in favor and what kind would be against. There may be two competing theoretical perspectives: even better if you lay them out: Theory A would lead us to expect x, but theory B would lead us to expect y. In this case we observe x, so therefore it appears that A is correct here….
• Summarize at the end of your review of the case.
• Evaluate the usefulness of the theory. What parts were validated, what parts were disconfirmed, etc.
• Evaluate the limits of your study. Was your case unusual? Would the theory more likely be true in other cases? Can you say anything from Wolpe and Levine or other readings, other cases studied in class, where the theory you disconfirm would have been confirmed? Can you say why?
• Evaluate the normative implications of your findings. Are democratic values well served by what you observed. Be tough. Compare your observations with an ideal, perfect, representative system. Don’t be afraid to conclude that the system is imperfect. Explain what makes it so; consider how that could be fixed.
• Check your paper for internal consistency, grammar, spelling, organization, references to relevant readings done in class, citations for all uses of other people’s work, and the completeness and accuracy of the list of references.
• Have your roommate (or someone else) read it for you while you still have time to correct mistakes. Fix those things. Hand it in.

Wednesday: A discussion and review

Comments and questions on any topic you like. I’d suggest these:

Roles of groups. Is Schattschneider right? Olson? Truman? Did you conclude that things are good or bad normatively? What are the most normatively troubling implications of what you’ve studied this semester? What are the most normatively benign?

In the cases debated from Wolpe and Levine, did those illustrate policy subsystems at work, policy networks, conflict expansions, or what? Did the side with public opinion typically win? Did groups manufacture public opinion, or what that set ahead of time?

What was the value of Light?

What should a freshman seminar focus on? Did this class have a good mix of substance and other issues?