Christopher R Berry
Biographic Data
| ID | 3602173 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Christopher R Berry |
| GIVEN NAMES | Christopher R |
| FAMILY NAME | Berry |
| SIGNATURE | BERRY C R |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Chicago |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-6978-9183 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 16 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 877 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 16 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2005 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 11 |
Modeling Theories of Women's Underrepresentation in Elections
Research on women candidates in American elections uncovers four key facts: Women (i) are underrepresented among candidates, (ii) are underrepresented among office holders, (iii) perform better in office, and (iv) win open seats at equal rates to men. Scholars offer two types of explanations: Women are less willing to run than men, due to differential costs or a gap in self‐perceived qualification, or voters discriminate at the ballot box. We for…
Theory and Credibility: Integrating Theoretical and Empirical Social Science
A clear and comprehensive framework for bridging the widening gap between theorists and empiricists in social science The credibility revolution, with its emphasis on empirical methods for causal inference, has led to concerns among scholars that the canonical questions about politics and society are being neglected because they are no longer deemed answerable. Theory and Credibility stakes out an opposing view—presenting a new vision of how, wor…
Theory and Credibility: Integrating Theoretical and Empirical Social Science
The credibility revolution, with its emphasis on empirical methods for causal inference, has led to concerns among scholars that the canonical questions about politics and society are being neglected because they are no longer deemed answerable. This book stakes out an opposing view—presenting a new vision of how, working together, the credibility revolution and formal theory can advance social scientific inquiry. The book covers the conceptual f…
Distributive Politics and Legislator Ideology
This article examines the relationship between legislative centrism (or conversely, extremism) and the distribution of federal outlays. A substantial body of theoretical work suggests that legislators closer to the chamber median are more attractive and willing candidates to engage in vote buying and hence should receive a disproportionate share of distributive benefits. We investigate this prediction empirically with panel data covering 27 years…
Cardinals or Clerics? Congressional Committees and the Distribution of Pork
Journalistic and academic accounts of Congress suggest that important committee positions allow members to procure more federal funds for their constituents, but existing evidence on this topic is limited in scope and has failed to distinguish the effects of committee membership from selection onto committees. We bring together decades of data on federal outlays and congressional committee and subcommittee assignments to provide a comprehensive a…
All Else Equal in Theory and Data (Big or Small)
The forms of explanation that dominate political science research in the formal theory and causal inference traditions are closely connected. Specifically, each makes essential use of different, but related, kinds of all-else-equal claims. The emergence of “big data ” has already begun to alter the landscape of empirical social science by making new sources of information (and, thus, new phenomena) amenable to quantitative analysis. But neither t…
Election Timing and Public Policy
There are nearly half a million elected officials in American local governments, and the timing of local elections varies enormously even within the same state. Some local elections are held simultaneously with major federal and state races, while others are held at times when no higher level elections coincide. We analyze the effect of election timing by exploiting a 1980s change in the California Election Code, which allowed school districts to…
The Jackie (and Jill) Robinson Effect: Why Do Congresswomen Outperform Congressmen
If voters are biased against female candidates, only the most talented, hardest working female candidates will succeed in the electoral process. Furthermore, if women perceive there to be sex discrimination in the electoral process, or if they underestimate their qualifications for office, then only the most qualified, politically ambitious females will emerge as candidates. We argue that when either or both forms of sex-based selection are prese…
Agency Design and Distributive Politics
A Bridge to Somewhere: Mapping State and Congressional Ideology on a Cross‐institutional Common Space
Researchers face two major problems when applying ideal point estimation techniques to state legislatures. First, longitudinal roll‐call data are scarce. Second, even when such data exist, scaling ideal points within a single state is an inadequate approach. No comparisons can be made between these estimates and those for other state legislatures or for Congress. Our project provides a solution. We exploit a new comparative dataset of state legis…
After Enactment: The Lives and Deaths of Federal Programs
While many scholars have focused on the production of legislation, we explore life after enactment. Contrary to the prevailing view that federal programs are indissoluble, we show that programmatic restructurings and terminations are commonplace. In addition, we observe significant changes in programmatic appropriations. We suggest that a sitting congress is most likely to transform, kill, or cut programs inherited from an enacting congress when …
The President and the Distribution of Federal Spending
Scholarship on distributive politics focuses almost exclusively on the internal operations of Congress, paying particular attention to committees and majority parties. This article highlights the president, who has extensive opportunities, both ex ante and ex post, to influence the distribution of federal outlays. We analyze two databases that track the geographic spending of nearly every domestic program over a 24-year period-the largest and mos…
Imperfect Union: Representation and Taxation in Multilevel Governments
Imperfect Union offers the first political theory of special purpose jurisdictions, which constitute the most common form of local government in the United States today. Collectively, special purpose governments have more civilian employees than the federal government and spend more than all city governments combined. The proliferation of special purpose jurisdictions has fundamentally altered the nature of representation and taxation in local go…
Piling On: Multilevel Government and the Fiscal Common‐Pool
This article discusses the common‐pool problems that arise when multiple territorially overlapping governments share the authority to provide services and levy taxes in a common geographic area. Contrary to the traditional Tiebout model in which increasing the number of competing governments improves efficiency, I argue that increasing the number of overlapping governments results in “overfishing” from the shared tax base. I test the model empiri…
Accountability and Local Elections: Rethinking Retrospective Voting
For too long, research on retrospective voting has fixated on how economic trends affect incumbent' electoral prospects in national and state elections. Hundreds of thousands of elections in the United States occur at the local level and have little to do with unemployment or inflation rates. This paper focuses on the most prevalent: school boards. Specifically, it examines whether voters hold school board members accountable for the performance …
The divergence of human capital levels across cities
The Jackie (and Jill) Robinson Effect: Why Do Congresswomen Outperform Congressmen
If voters are biased against female candidates, only the most talented, hardest working female candidates will succeed in the electoral process. Furthermore, if women perceive there to be sex discrimination in the electoral process, or if they underestimate their qualifications for office, then only the most qualified, politically ambitious females will emerge as candidates. We argue that when either or both forms of sex-based selection are prese…
The President and the Distribution of Federal Spending
Scholarship on distributive politics focuses almost exclusively on the internal operations of Congress, paying particular attention to committees and majority parties. This article highlights the president, who has extensive opportunities, both ex ante and ex post, to influence the distribution of federal outlays. We analyze two databases that track the geographic spending of nearly every domestic program over a 24-year period-the largest and mos…
Accountability and Local Elections: Rethinking Retrospective Voting
For too long, research on retrospective voting has fixated on how economic trends affect incumbent' electoral prospects in national and state elections. Hundreds of thousands of elections in the United States occur at the local level and have little to do with unemployment or inflation rates. This paper focuses on the most prevalent: school boards. Specifically, it examines whether voters hold school board members accountable for the performance …
The divergence of human capital levels across cities
After Enactment: The Lives and Deaths of Federal Programs
While many scholars have focused on the production of legislation, we explore life after enactment. Contrary to the prevailing view that federal programs are indissoluble, we show that programmatic restructurings and terminations are commonplace. In addition, we observe significant changes in programmatic appropriations. We suggest that a sitting congress is most likely to transform, kill, or cut programs inherited from an enacting congress when …
A Bridge to Somewhere: Mapping State and Congressional Ideology on a Cross‐institutional Common Space
Researchers face two major problems when applying ideal point estimation techniques to state legislatures. First, longitudinal roll‐call data are scarce. Second, even when such data exist, scaling ideal points within a single state is an inadequate approach. No comparisons can be made between these estimates and those for other state legislatures or for Congress. Our project provides a solution. We exploit a new comparative dataset of state legis…
Cardinals or Clerics? Congressional Committees and the Distribution of Pork
Journalistic and academic accounts of Congress suggest that important committee positions allow members to procure more federal funds for their constituents, but existing evidence on this topic is limited in scope and has failed to distinguish the effects of committee membership from selection onto committees. We bring together decades of data on federal outlays and congressional committee and subcommittee assignments to provide a comprehensive a…
Piling On: Multilevel Government and the Fiscal Common‐Pool
This article discusses the common‐pool problems that arise when multiple territorially overlapping governments share the authority to provide services and levy taxes in a common geographic area. Contrary to the traditional Tiebout model in which increasing the number of competing governments improves efficiency, I argue that increasing the number of overlapping governments results in “overfishing” from the shared tax base. I test the model empiri…
Election Timing and Public Policy
There are nearly half a million elected officials in American local governments, and the timing of local elections varies enormously even within the same state. Some local elections are held simultaneously with major federal and state races, while others are held at times when no higher level elections coincide. We analyze the effect of election timing by exploiting a 1980s change in the California Election Code, which allowed school districts to…
Distributive Politics and Legislator Ideology
This article examines the relationship between legislative centrism (or conversely, extremism) and the distribution of federal outlays. A substantial body of theoretical work suggests that legislators closer to the chamber median are more attractive and willing candidates to engage in vote buying and hence should receive a disproportionate share of distributive benefits. We investigate this prediction empirically with panel data covering 27 years…
Modeling Theories of Women's Underrepresentation in Elections
Research on women candidates in American elections uncovers four key facts: Women (i) are underrepresented among candidates, (ii) are underrepresented among office holders, (iii) perform better in office, and (iv) win open seats at equal rates to men. Scholars offer two types of explanations: Women are less willing to run than men, due to differential costs or a gap in self‐perceived qualification, or voters discriminate at the ballot box. We for…
All Else Equal in Theory and Data (Big or Small)
The forms of explanation that dominate political science research in the formal theory and causal inference traditions are closely connected. Specifically, each makes essential use of different, but related, kinds of all-else-equal claims. The emergence of “big data ” has already begun to alter the landscape of empirical social science by making new sources of information (and, thus, new phenomena) amenable to quantitative analysis. But neither t…
The divergence of human capital levels across cities
Accountability and Local Elections: Rethinking Retrospective Voting
For too long, research on retrospective voting has fixated on how economic trends affect incumbent' electoral prospects in national and state elections. Hundreds of thousands of elections in the United States occur at the local level and have little to do with unemployment or inflation rates. This paper focuses on the most prevalent: school boards. Specifically, it examines whether voters hold school board members accountable for the performance …
Piling On: Multilevel Government and the Fiscal Common‐Pool
This article discusses the common‐pool problems that arise when multiple territorially overlapping governments share the authority to provide services and levy taxes in a common geographic area. Contrary to the traditional Tiebout model in which increasing the number of competing governments improves efficiency, I argue that increasing the number of overlapping governments results in “overfishing” from the shared tax base. I test the model empiri…
Imperfect Union: Representation and Taxation in Multilevel Governments
Imperfect Union offers the first political theory of special purpose jurisdictions, which constitute the most common form of local government in the United States today. Collectively, special purpose governments have more civilian employees than the federal government and spend more than all city governments combined. The proliferation of special purpose jurisdictions has fundamentally altered the nature of representation and taxation in local go…
Agency Design and Distributive Politics
A Bridge to Somewhere: Mapping State and Congressional Ideology on a Cross‐institutional Common Space
Researchers face two major problems when applying ideal point estimation techniques to state legislatures. First, longitudinal roll‐call data are scarce. Second, even when such data exist, scaling ideal points within a single state is an inadequate approach. No comparisons can be made between these estimates and those for other state legislatures or for Congress. Our project provides a solution. We exploit a new comparative dataset of state legis…
After Enactment: The Lives and Deaths of Federal Programs
While many scholars have focused on the production of legislation, we explore life after enactment. Contrary to the prevailing view that federal programs are indissoluble, we show that programmatic restructurings and terminations are commonplace. In addition, we observe significant changes in programmatic appropriations. We suggest that a sitting congress is most likely to transform, kill, or cut programs inherited from an enacting congress when …
The President and the Distribution of Federal Spending
Scholarship on distributive politics focuses almost exclusively on the internal operations of Congress, paying particular attention to committees and majority parties. This article highlights the president, who has extensive opportunities, both ex ante and ex post, to influence the distribution of federal outlays. We analyze two databases that track the geographic spending of nearly every domestic program over a 24-year period-the largest and mos…
Election Timing and Public Policy
There are nearly half a million elected officials in American local governments, and the timing of local elections varies enormously even within the same state. Some local elections are held simultaneously with major federal and state races, while others are held at times when no higher level elections coincide. We analyze the effect of election timing by exploiting a 1980s change in the California Election Code, which allowed school districts to…
The Jackie (and Jill) Robinson Effect: Why Do Congresswomen Outperform Congressmen
If voters are biased against female candidates, only the most talented, hardest working female candidates will succeed in the electoral process. Furthermore, if women perceive there to be sex discrimination in the electoral process, or if they underestimate their qualifications for office, then only the most qualified, politically ambitious females will emerge as candidates. We argue that when either or both forms of sex-based selection are prese…
All Else Equal in Theory and Data (Big or Small)
The forms of explanation that dominate political science research in the formal theory and causal inference traditions are closely connected. Specifically, each makes essential use of different, but related, kinds of all-else-equal claims. The emergence of “big data ” has already begun to alter the landscape of empirical social science by making new sources of information (and, thus, new phenomena) amenable to quantitative analysis. But neither t…
Distributive Politics and Legislator Ideology
This article examines the relationship between legislative centrism (or conversely, extremism) and the distribution of federal outlays. A substantial body of theoretical work suggests that legislators closer to the chamber median are more attractive and willing candidates to engage in vote buying and hence should receive a disproportionate share of distributive benefits. We investigate this prediction empirically with panel data covering 27 years…
Cardinals or Clerics? Congressional Committees and the Distribution of Pork
Journalistic and academic accounts of Congress suggest that important committee positions allow members to procure more federal funds for their constituents, but existing evidence on this topic is limited in scope and has failed to distinguish the effects of committee membership from selection onto committees. We bring together decades of data on federal outlays and congressional committee and subcommittee assignments to provide a comprehensive a…
Theory and Credibility: Integrating Theoretical and Empirical Social Science
A clear and comprehensive framework for bridging the widening gap between theorists and empiricists in social science The credibility revolution, with its emphasis on empirical methods for causal inference, has led to concerns among scholars that the canonical questions about politics and society are being neglected because they are no longer deemed answerable. Theory and Credibility stakes out an opposing view—presenting a new vision of how, wor…
Theory and Credibility: Integrating Theoretical and Empirical Social Science
The credibility revolution, with its emphasis on empirical methods for causal inference, has led to concerns among scholars that the canonical questions about politics and society are being neglected because they are no longer deemed answerable. This book stakes out an opposing view—presenting a new vision of how, working together, the credibility revolution and formal theory can advance social scientific inquiry. The book covers the conceptual f…
Modeling Theories of Women's Underrepresentation in Elections
Research on women candidates in American elections uncovers four key facts: Women (i) are underrepresented among candidates, (ii) are underrepresented among office holders, (iii) perform better in office, and (iv) win open seats at equal rates to men. Scholars offer two types of explanations: Women are less willing to run than men, due to differential costs or a gap in self‐perceived qualification, or voters discriminate at the ballot box. We for…
Political science (14 works) · Electoral Systems and Political Participation (12 works) · Law (12 works) · Politics (11 works) · Public Administration (10 works) · Economics (9 works) · Law (9 works) · Public Administration (9 works) · Computer Science (7 works) · Demographic economics (4 works)