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We explore budget data from twenty-nine Western countries from 1948 to 2012 to investigate the impact of partisan control of government on spending patterns. We use a variety of empirical methods, but the central element of analysis is to code spending allocations as "consistent" or "inconsistent" based on the partisanship of the majority party in government. Looking across the board, we show that inconsistent allocations occur at almost exactly the same rate as consistent ones. The implication is that budgets are best understood not as an expression of partisan priorities but as a reaction to changing contextual circumstances.

Spain"s newspapers are characterised by strong partisan identities. We demonstrate that the two leading newspapers nonetheless show powerful similarities in the topics of their coverage over time. The media system is strongly related to the policy process and it shows similar levels of skew (attention focuses on just a few topics) and friction (attention lurches rapidly from topic to topic) as others have shown for policy processes more generally. Further, media attention is significantly related to parliamentary activities. Oral questions in parliament track closely with media attention over time. Our assessment is based on a comprehensive database of all front-page stories (over 95,000 stories) in El Paı´s and El Mundo, Spain"s largest daily newspapers, and all 7,446 oral questions from 1996 to 2009. The paper shows that explanations of friction and skew in governmental activities should incorporate media dynamics as well. Political leaders are clearly sensitive to media salience.

Processus budgétaire au sein de la Commission européenne. Un test du modèle de l'équilibre ponctué Dans cet article, nous testons le modèle du « punctuated equilibrium » à travers le processus budgétaire de la Commission européenne. Comparativement aux États-Unis et à certains États membres de l'Union européenne, la littérature s'est très peu intéressée aux conséquences de l'architecture institutionnelle de l'UE sur son processus budgétaire. Par exemple, nous ne savons pas si les préférences hétérogènes des États membres sont susceptibles de créer des tensions ou des opportunités de mise à l'agenda au sein de la Commission européenne. Cet article décrit dans un premier temps les processus budgétaires européens depuis 1957 en tenant des phases d'élargissement. Puis, une seconde section est consacrée à la présentation des données empiriques mobilisées pour tester les modèles de friction, d'incrémentalisme budgétaire et d'équilibre ponctué. Dans une dernière partie, les résultats admettent clairement que les processus budgétaires de l'Union européenne confirment l'existence d'un modèle de type équilibre ponctué à l'instar de ceux déjà observés aux États-Unis et au sein de certains États membres.

Do patterns of policy attention at the state level influence agenda setting in Washington over the short term? We examine this question by first developing a series of hypotheses about such linkages. We test these conjectures with a data set pooling measures of policy attention at the national and state levels for several years and several policy areas. We find little evidence that changes in state policy agendas in the aggregate influence national patterns of policy attention. Adapted from the source document.

The mobilization of organized interests is affected not only by social and economic 'supply' factors but also by government-related 'demand' factors. The authors assess the impact of government activity on the mobilization of interests by examining how federal policy activity stimulates lobbying activity in the states. Empirically, they do this by introducing the federal hearings data used by Leech et al. into the model of state lobbying registrations used by Gray et al. The authors find that congressional hearings in a particular issue area have significant -- albeit complex -- effects on the mobilization of state interest organizations in that same area. Adapted from the source document.

The mobilization of organized interests is affected not only by social and economic "supply" factors but also by government-related "demand" factors. The authors assess the impact of government activity on the mobilization of interests by examining how federal policy activity stimulates lobbying activity in the states. Empirically, they do this by introducing the federal hearings data used by Leech et al. into the model of state lobbying registrations used by Gray et al. The authors find that congressional hearings in a particular issue area have significant—albeit complex— effects on the mobilization of state interest organizations in that same area.