There are striking regularities in the budgetary process. The evidence from over half of the non-defense agencies indicates that the behavior of the budgetary process of the United States government results in aggregate decisions similar to those produced by a set of simple decision rules that are linear and temporally stable. For the agencies considered, certain equations are specified and compared with data composed of agency requests (through the Bureau of the Budget) and Congressional appropriations from 1947 through 1963. The comparison indicates that these equations summarize accurately aggregate outcomes of the budgetary process for each agency.

In the first section of the paper we present an analytic summary of the federal budgetary process, and we explain why basic features of the process lead us to believe that it can be represented by simple models which are stable over periods of time, linear, and stochastic. In the second section we propose and discuss the alternative specifications for the agency-Budget Bureau and Congressional decision equations. The empirical results are presented in section three. In section four we provide evidence on deviant cases, discuss predictions, and future work to explore some of the problems indicated by this kind of analysis. An appendix contains informal definitions and a discussion of the statistical terminology used in the paper.

This paper examines the theory of political legitimacy through the framework of psychological learning theory and the theory of cognitive dissonance. The concepts of primary and secondary reinforcement in cases of learning permit a general understanding of the growth of positive affect toward a political system. Cognitive dissonance theory allows us to understand how this general positive affect built up by a regime's actions produces the sub-set of attitudes called political legitimacy. In order to build a theory of political legitimacy on these foundations, it is necessary to conceive of government policy-making as a case of producing successful learning throughout a population.

The diffuse, largely irrational nature of political legitimacy has made it difficult for political scientists to handle the concept systematically. That systems are or are not “legitimate” has been asserted numerous times, though often the precise definition of legitimacy employed has been at best vague and the indices of legitimacy unclearly stated. This paper attempts to meet the problem by setting forth a theory and a set of implicit indices of political legitimacy. After the general model has been explicated, I will specify several problems in the manipulation of political legitimacy. Finally, I will look at the relationship of governmental structure to these problems.

Before consideration of the model two preliminary tasks must be performed: a definition of legitimacy and justification for discussing it. We may define political legitimacy as the quality of “oughtness” that is perceived by the public to inhere in a political regime.

The purpose of this article is to compare the Inter-Nation Simulation (INS)—developed by Harold Guetzkow and his colleagues at North-western University and now employed in a number of universities throughout the country—to verbal theories of international relations. It will not be a discussion of the methodological foundations of the simulation but an analytical comparison, primarily on the level of middle-range theory, of the substantive assumptions contained in INS with contemporary international relations theory.

Although the primary purpose of this article is to compare the two bodies of theory, it will inevitably raise questions concerning the validity of the Inter-Nation Simulation model and the value of simulation as a general approach to theory. In terms of the former question, it is necessary to remember that the simulators themselves are theorists, albeit a special type. Consequently, the comparison is more a reliability check on simulation and verbal theorists than a validity check on either. The lack of congruence between the assumptions of the simulation and the assumptions of the verbal theorists does not necessarily indicate that the simulation model lacks validity, since the verbal theorist has no monopoly on valid hypotheses.

If the author's assumption that simulation is a way of theorizing about international relations is correct, the following comparison should yield some idea about the value of simulation in building a firm theoretical basis for a science of international relations. Forced to be abstract as well as explicit and parsimonious, those using simulation must approach the task of theorizing with a different operational code than the verbal theorists.

How can a religious minority organize most effectively to protect its interests without weakening the distinction between religion and politics by which advocates of a secular state justify equal treatment for the minority? As in Europe earlier in the century, this problem is again acute in some of the so-called “New Nations” of Asia and Africa where national integration is far from complete and religion is still the primary mode of self-identification among many of its communicants. If a minority faith is geographically concentrated so as to constitute a majority in certain extensive areas, it is likely to seek independence, merger with an adjacent state of the same religion, or at least provincial autonomy if its members believe that their religious identity is threatened by assimilation.

Of the great world religions, Islam provides the most difficult case of adjustment to minority status by separation of religion from the state. The leaders of the Muslim minority of British India finally set the objective of separate national independence in 1940 after they had concluded that they could not rely upon constitutional guarantees to safeguard their rights against the Hindu majority. But the creation of Pakistan in 1947 left a substantial though scattered Muslim population of some forty million in the Indian Republic, ten percent of the latter's people. Suspected by many Hindus of further divisive intentions, how was this group to act within the framework of parliamentary and at least ostensibly secular democracy?

Compared with most political institutions, the American party system has endured for a long time. The parties as organizations and symbols have become so much a part of our thinking about politics that we generally overlook the possibility of their eventual decline. One of the parties indeed has existed nearly as long as the republic itself; it thus antedates all but a few of the modern nations of the Western world. The basic form of the party system—two major, decentralized, ideologically diffuse parties—has remained generally intact throughout its lifespan. The system of parties as a principle of political organization has been extended in some form to every level and branch of government. When the persistence of the party system has been most in jeopardy—as in the period of the Civil War—it has managed always to reestablish itself. On the criteria of duration, constancy of form, degree of penetration of other political institutions and response to stress, the record of the party system has been one of marked success.

This is not to say that there has been no variability in this performance. Constraints were present from the very beginning of party life in this country and have continued—with changing levels of severity—over the years. The failure of the parties to become part of the formal constitutional structure reflects a lack of full legitimation which has proved difficult to overcome.

It is noteworthy that the recent spate of writings in the field of “political development” has shown a pronounced tendency to omit consideration of Latin America. Thus the “communications” and “bureaucracy” volumes in the SSRC political development series are totally innocent of Latin American data, as is an excellent recent treatment of—of all things!—the political behavior of the military in developing areas.

The Latin Americanists, for their part, have largely stressed those key features of the area's politics which have long remained constant—executive predominance, military intervention, and the influence of the peculiarities of Hispanic culture. At the same time, it is clear that the social changes usually collectively termed “modernization”—urbanization, technological borrowing, and the development of mass communications grids—together with their political correlate, the expansion of the political community to include hitherto excluded social elements, are proceeding in Latin America too. Accordingly, it becomes desirable to reexamine the “statics” of Latin American politics in the light of the “dynamics” of the processes of political development and social mobilization.

The present article attempts this reexamination with respect to the most characteristic feature of Latin American politics, the coup d'état and the establishment of a de facto military government.

A priori, mutually contradictory theses about the relations of the military coup to social development can be constructed—and indeed the literature on the subject abounds in such contradictory theses, evidence to support each of which is always available.

This is a study of the relationship between local political organization, candidate recruitment, and representation in the United States House of Representatives. It seeks to ascertain the effects which different systems of recruitment have upon the kinds of men who enter public life and the public policies they espouse. A case study of metropolitan Chicago is used to demonstrate the utility of this kind of analysis. The objective is to distinguish distinct systems of recruitment in the Chicago area, describe the factors associated with each, and note the consequences of each for representation in Congress.

Politicians and political scientists alike have long recognized the impact of the local political environment on the attitudes and behavior of community residents. V.O. Key demonstrated in a variety of contexts the striking persistence of distinctive community political traditions. The extensive discussion of the “suburban conversion” hypothesis has turned in part on the question of the influence of the local community on partisan attitudes. A number of studies of voting behavior have shown that majority views in a community have a disproportionate advantage in gaining and holding adherents. There is, in short, good reason to suspect that the local community has a significant influence on social attitudes and political behavior. Why is this so? How does the Republican “atmosphere” in Elmira affect the votes of individual Elmirans? How are community political traditions maintained through decades of changing community composition? Why does the minority party in a community fail to mobilize many of the voters who are predisposed toward it? What explanation of these sorts of community influence seems most adequate?—this is the question to be examined in this paper.

In America, interest groups operate within the democratic frame of reference. Like all political organizations, they are accorded more legitimacy when they can show that they are representative of the attitudes and values of a particular segment of the population. Consequently, the leaders of interest groups frequently spend a great deal of time explaining just how democratic their organizations are. If one examines the testimony of interest group leaders at state and national legislative hearings, he is likely to find that much of it is begun with an introductory statement explaining that the leadership of the testifying group is merely the voice of the membership. The personal values of the interest group leader are played down, and his function as representative (as distinguished from delegate) is exaggerated.

On the other hand, relatively few political interest groups have systematic and formalized means of ascertaining the desires of members. We know that most of the devices used to solicit member opinion are not very effective. Truman has shown that the affairs of most interest groups are run on a day-to-day basis by a fraction of the total membership. The mass of the membership takes a relatively passive role with regard to the formation of public policies by the organization.

Communication between leaders and followers is spasmodic and cannot provide efficient guidelines for the actions of leaders. Whether or not leadership of an organization seeks to become a manifestation of Michel's iron law of oligarchy, the realities of communication within an organization suggest that most of the communication undertaken by leaders will be with other members of the leadership clique rather than with the larger body of followers in the group.

An ongoing political system requires a continuing process of recruitment in order to maintain the small but active cadre of citizens who assume the primary responsibility for the operation of the system. These political activists are involved in recruiting the official leadership, campaigning for their election, and sometimes serve as governors of the system themselves. In American politics, the recruitment of political activists is effected through processes which political scientists have only recently begun to investigate in depth. Most of the studies of recruitment to positions of political activism have investigated the social backgrounds and the patterns of recruitment of public officials. Not as much attention has been directed toward the personnel who operate the local political party organizations, and the processes of their recruitment. Our data add to the literature about political party activists at the lower echelons of the party organizations by reporting the findings of research conducted among local party officials in selected locales in North Carolina and Massachusetts. These local party officials constitute the lowest level of party officialdom in their respective party organizations. We have investigated the process of their recruitment to their party positions, and have used the data to test a model of political recruitment. Several questions guiding our research included: What are the social correlates of recruitment to local party positions? What are the patterns and channels of recruitment? What triggers political party activism—is there an identifiable “threshold” or “political opportunity structure” which serves as an indicator of political party activism? Are recruitment patterns and channels related to role definitions? We have also examined the relationship between the recruitment pattern of the party worker and his orientation to his job as party worker.

Contrary to some belief, there are some, and possibly many, conditions under which survey research techniques can be put to use in the study of judicial decision-making. The present note reports on the successful use of such a technique in the collection and analysis of data drawn directly from the judicial bench of the State of Hawaii. In this case the plan to utilize survey techniques arose out of consideration of a problem that has plagued students of judicial decision-making from the beginning, i.e., the problem of getting direct information about those judicial attitudes and orientations which might reasonably be expected to function as determinants of judicial decisions.

In an earlier study of the impact of judicial role orientation upon judicial decision-making, I tried to handle the problem of taking independent measures of actual judicial attitudes and orientations which could then be related to judicial decisions. My approach at the time was to use accessible and measurable law students as stand-ins for actual judges. In contrast to this approach most of the political “judicial behavioralists,” while collecting data on actual functioning judges, do not attempt to solve the problem in any way. For these scholars continue to reason tautologically from information contained mainly in judicial votes and secondarily in judicial opinions, leaving us with such essential conclusions, in effect, as: “conservative” decisions are made by “conservative” judges, etc. Who is to say which is the worst procedure: the “judicial behavioralists,” which collects irrelevant data from relevant persons; or my own, which collects relevant data from irrelevant persons?

Despite advice to the contrary, I decided to try my hand at direct surveys of a judiciary, i.e., the one closest at hand.