Alphabet Soup (R

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Alphabet Soup (RDAPSAUNDPWBUSAIDDFIDNSF)
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Group Mandate

• What should APSA do?
• What do we want donors to do?
• Will they do it?

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APSA-1

• Problem Peer review is insufficient to weed out
  inappropriate uses of data by scholars (not to
  mention policy makers).
• Solutions
• Task Force to establish standards for how
  research addresses validity, methodology, data
  availability.
• Seek NSF funding for studying the Laitin
  question under what conditions are politicians
  swayed by scholarly findings?

4
APSA-2

• Problem Data is badly cited!!
• Solutions
• Exhortation to journals regarding citation
  standards.
• New (electronic) journal on new data
• Valuable in its own right (compare to. . .PS?)
• Easier for users to cite.
• More likely to show up in citation indices (which
  is what we REALLY care about).

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APSA-3

• Clearinghouse for expertise
• To facilitate scholars in at the ground floor of
  impact evaluation, program design.
• For policy (expert) advice
• Organize capacity building on indicators/concepts
  related to democracy/governance. For
  practitioners AND donor officials.
• Research project under what conditions do
  scholars influence policy?

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What can donors do for us? - 1

• Moneymoneymoneymoneymoney
• From foundations, multilaterals, bilaterals,
  other govt agencies, NSF. ALL are possible.
• For pure data collection and research projects
  that might require new data.
• Direct research opportunities directly coincide
  with donor needs (randomized evaluation of
  democracy interventions at the local level).
• Indirect research opportunities Contact with
  new problems/puzzles.

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What can donors do for us? - 2

• Here are a few of our favorite things. Mary
  Poppins approach to fundraising
• Data on
• Media (ownership, content, circulation, etc.).
• DecentraIization, ethnicity and ethnic
  composition of parliaments.
• Modes and outcomes of informal adjudication
• Political party funding
• De jure vs. de facto (implementation of laws and
  regs)
• Modes of political activism

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What can donors do for us? - 3

• Projects on
• Patronage and clientelism
• Political consequences (e.g., instability) of
  globalization or climate change.
• Collective mobilization to influence politics
  (e.g., parties, civil society, etc.).
• Why projects? Large conceptual obstacles to
  better indicators (e.g., democracy).

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What are donors most likely to help with?

• Most donors
• Data with immediate normative appeal
• Media easy
• Informal adjudication harder
• De jure vs. de facto harder
• Data that is immediately usable for programming
• More scientific donors (at least to some
  extent) can be persuaded by appeal of less
  programmatic data.
• WB (15 million internal research fund)