Section on Intergovernmental Administration and Management

The SIAM Nominations Committee, chaired by Eric Zeemering and committee members Ann Bowman and Jay Rickabaugh, is seeking 3 candidates for the SIAM Executive Committee and nominees for the position of chair-elect.  The term for the Executive Committee is 2020-2023.  The chair-elect will serve a two year term (2020-2022) and then serve two years in the position of chair (2022-2024).  Please see our SIAM blog for the full list of current Executive Committee members as well as the bylaws governing elections.

Executive committee members are actively engaged in the governance and work of the section, often contributing service to the Section’s committees and events.  Together with the Chair, Chair-Elect, Secretary and Treasurer, Executive Committee members help guide SIAM’s ongoing contributions to the fields of intergovernmental administration and management.  The Chair facilitates the work of the section, chairs executive committee meetings and business meetings, and serves as a primary channel of communication with ASPA.

Please submit your nominations for the four Executive Committee Member positions to Eric Zeemering (eric.zeemering@uga.edu) on or before January 30, 2020.

The Nominations Committee will share a slate of nominees with the SIAM membership by January 15, 2020.  After this, the Nominating Committee will receive additional nominations through membership petition between January 15 and February 15, 2020.  Additional nominations during the petition period must be signed by 25 members of SIAM and accompanied by a statement from the nominee expressing interest and willingness to serve the Section.  Election ballots will be distributed to the membership after February 15 and election results will be announced at the annual business meeting at the ASPA conference in Anaheim, CA.

Young Scholars Research Outreach Program

One of the most important initiatives of State and Local Government Review is the Young Scholar Research Outreach Program (YS). The YS program engages beginning scholars, of any age, who may have completed excellent research as, for example, part of a dissertation project. These beginning scholars, however, may not have the experience or skill to present their excellent research in format suitable to merit publication in an academic refereed journal.

SLGR established a formal process to conduct an initial review of a manuscript submitted by a beginning scholar. The manuscript is submitted under the YS program then sent to two senior scholars who evaluate the potential for the manuscript to ultimately merit publication in SLGR. The senior scholars also provide detailed recommendation to guide the beginning scholar as he/she revises the manuscript.  The manuscript can then, if the SLGR Editor approves, be returned and receive consideration to be published through a formal review process.

SLGR has been able to publish many excellent articles (12 to date) that were initially submitted under the YS program.  Moreover, the YS program has generated considerable good will and visibility for SLGR among beginning scholars as well as senior scholars who welcome the opportunity to mentor beginning scholars.  While the YS program has some visibility among beginning scholars, many still are not aware of this valuable professional opportunity.  As such, Mike and Ed are working with SAGE to increase the awareness of the YS program.  We will appreciate your efforts to make beginning scholars at your institution aware of the YS program.

Special Issues

We are currently working on the development of two Special Issues for SLGR that would be published in 2020.  The tentative titles of the Special Issues are as follows:

“Addressing the ‘Urban-Rural Divide’ through Innovative, Place-Based Policies”

“Intergovernmental Politics and Policymaking in an Era of Hyper-partisanship”

The motivation prompting SLGR to publish the first Special Issue on the “urban-rural” divide in the U.S. is rooted in what one is seeing more often in newspaper headlines and the problems this “divide” has been creating.  The “divide” has been characterized by the decline of small farms, rural towns and small cities, and the rapid growth of many metropolitan areas.  Several things seem to be driving these differential growth rates, including changes in industrial structure (what we produce), changes in production technology (how we produce, particularly the increased pace of automation), and the growing importance of innovation, design and finance functions that favor major metropolitan areas.  One result has been the outmigration of the working-age population, especially younger workers, leaving an increasingly dependent population behind.  These changes, in turn, have hollowed out the retail and services sectors in these communities, reducing tax revenues and undermining local-government financial health and capacity.  Most importantly, this situation has resulted in a serious psychological and political fall-out where people in rural areas and small towns increasingly expressing feelings of being “left behind” and  resentment toward urban areas whose residents are perceived to have unfairly jumped to the front of the line to the American Dream.

Given this background, the purpose of the Special Issue is to identify innovative, place-based policies and practices that hold promise for stabilizing and revitalizing places along the urban-rural continuum, and especially for strengthening positive urban-rural linkages.  We hope to publish six to ten short essays (1,400 – 1,600 words each, plus graphics if appropriate), embedded within an issue-length paper on policies and practices for addressing the urban-rural divide.

Each essay will:

• Provide an overview of the policy area – the problem, challenge, or opportunity. Those areas described above are of particular interest, but other policy areas are welcome also.
• Describe one or more best-practice examples that could be replicated nationally or regionally.
• Explain the funding or financing implications of such replication (federal, state, local).
• Explain how the policy does one or more of the following: supports regional collaboration among public sector entities, encourages public-private partnerships, engages the grassroots, supports entrepreneurship, and builds local capacity.

The second Special Issue will examine issues related to the impact of hyper-partisanship at the state and national levels on local power and policy-making.  Some specific topics envisioned to appropriate for this Issue will include but not limited to:

• What are some of the characteristics pertaining to the recent trend in state preemption? Rather than focus on the range of issues – although this might be lightly addressed – a closer inspection of where these cases have occurred, whether litigation followed, litigation outcomes, affected city size (if precipitated by a local action), media response, diffusive effects, or some other aspect of the trend might be addressed.
• A survey of city managers conducted by Ann Bowman and Richard Kearney in 2010 highlighted the breakdown in communication and trust between state and local leaders over the previous decade. Is the recent rise in state preemption legislation related to this longer trend? Is this trend better understood as a separate phenomenon?
• How has hyper-partisanship affected state and local relations in the past? Were particular political tools invoked during past periods of hyper-partisanship to assert or reassert one level of government’s power over another?
• How and how much does the larger political environment matter to local leaders? Does the recent preemption legislation or past periods of local power constriction have the effects on localities and localism that academics suggest?
• How do local and/or state leaders perceive the recent centralizing trend brought about by state preemption? To what do they attribute this shift in power? Have they felt the shift, or is it more threat than reality?
• A movement to repeal state preemption legislation is currently underway. How extensive is this movement? Who leads these efforts? Where is this happening and why?
• Because much of the new preemption targets progressive local policies, the impact of preemption is presumably felt by advocates and practitioners in the private and non-profit sectors. Is this so? What areas and efforts have been directly affected? Has the current political environment altered relations between local leaders and advocates? In what ways?
• Several industry and ideologically-based interest groups and think-tanks have emerged as powerful players in the current political environment. ALEC, the National Restaurants Association, the Plastics Industry Association, the oil and gas industry, the National Rifle Association are a few of these groups. To what extent are these groups involved in recent preemption efforts? How does hyper-partisanship create conditions favorable to group influence?
• How have recent preemption cases played out in the courts? Do any trends appear from these court determinations? If so, is there a difference between how the courts are responding now than in the past (regarding questions of state v. local power)?

Governance Matters (GM)

New Governance Matters Editor Grant Rissler has been very busy over the last several months in identifying timely “hot” topics and producing several key articles that should be of significant interest and usefulness to both practitioners and academics.  Forthcoming articles include:

–“Getting to Know Millennial City Managers: Understanding How They Got Their Jobs, How

They Do Their Jobs, and What They Expect for the Future”

–“The Smart City as a Lean Startup”

In addition, he is currently working with authors on an article that would provide an “up-front,” “close,” and “critical” examination of local government websites; the article is likely to be followed up with a panel discussion of practitioners that would result in a SLGR podcast.  Another paper in the works focuses on the burgeoning efforts of local government to be more involved in solar power development.

Following in the footsteps of previous GM Editors (Bruce Perlman, Beverly Cigler, and Bob Blair), Professor Rissler endeavors to identify subject matter that can serve to stimulate dialogue among practitioners on critical, vexing issues that state and local officials are facing and hopefully will result in more informed decision making.   To that end, a number of GM articles have been the collective product of practitioners as well as those from academia.  Anyone thinking about submitting a manuscript for consideration to the GM section should contact Professor Rissler at risslerge@vcu.edu.

Reviews & Essays (R&E)

Professor Brianne Heidbreder continues to oversee the development of high-quality and well-received manuscripts for the Reviews & Essays Section of SLGR.  Forthcoming articles include:

–“Local Government Fragmentation: What Do We Know?”

–“Beyond Institutional Collective Action: Why Do Metropolitan Governments Not  Collaborate?”

–“A Multi-organizational Cooperation Framework for Neighborhood Disaster Resilience”

Readers are encouraged to cite R&E essays in their research and assign them to relevant graduate and undergraduate classes.  The essays provide an ideal vehicle for coming up to speed on important topics or highlighting themes in the literature that might be important for students.  The section editor seeks to recruit high profile scholars to contribute to the section in order to facilitate the goal of increasing citations to the journal.  Senior scholars and other potential contributors are encouraged to discuss topic ideas with Professor Heidbreder.  She can be reached at heidbr@ksu.edu.

Social Media

SLGR’s presence on social media continues to grow, adding new Facebook and Twitter followers throughout the Summer and Fall semesters. Please be sure to follow us to join the conversation, and tell your students and colleagues to join us as well.  We’re also glad to continue our relationship with the LSE (London School of Economics, US Centre) Blog by sharing research from the journal with a broader audience.  Since recent research in Political Science indicates that blogs are considered most important among new media, and webinars and online videos are valued (especially among women and graduate students) in terms of how PS academics use online tools, we are working to redesign and update our blog for a launch in 2020.  A recent graduate who has worked with other social media outlets in the field has volunteered to assist in this process of growing the blog in content and form, so we would love to hear more from you about what types of content you would find most valuable!

*The deadline has been extend to November 4th.

The Section on Intergovernmental Administration and Management invites scholars and practitioners to submit proposals for papers to be presented at the 7th annual Deil S. Wright Symposium. The symposium honors the career and contributions of Professor Deil S. Wright, who was a charter member of the Section and remained active until his passing in 2009. The Wright Symposium will be held on April 3, 2020 at the national conference of the American Society for Public Administration in Anaheim, CA.

The Section on Intergovernmental Administration and Management (SIAM) of the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) and the Section on Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations Section (FIRS) of the American Political Science Association (APSA) are very excited to collaborate on the Wright Symposium for 2020.   Although the disciplines of Public Administration and Political Science address similar research topics such as federalism, intergovernmental relations, state and local government, and public management, the two disciplines often speak past each other regarding research questions, theory, methodology, and policy areas. As a tribute to Professor Wright, who was also a long-time member of FIRS, SIAM and FIRS will collaborate on the Wright Symposium at the ASPA annual meeting in March 2020 and a short course at the APSA annual meeting in September 2020 to promote conversation and collaboration between Public Administration and Political Science scholars.

The goals of the 2020 SIAM-FIRS collaboration events follow:

1. Introduce Public Administration and Political Science scholars with shared research interests to facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration
2. Discuss similarities and differences between Public Administration and Political Science research on federalism and intergovernmental relations
3. Identify new research questions, theory, methodology, and policy areas to advance the interdisciplinary study of federalism and intergovernmental relations

The theme of the all-day 2020 Wright Symposium is “Future Directions in Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations Research.”  As presented above, the vision is that the Wright Symposium will not be a “business as usual” conference, but rather an opportunity for new conversations between scholars of Public Administration and Political Science who may not be in regular dialogue with one another.  As such, we desire paper and/or panel proposals that: 

• Identify similarities, differences, or new directions in Public Administration and Political Science research regarding prevalent subtopics, research questions, framing, terminology, theoretical approaches, methodology, and data sources
• Discuss and evaluate the strengths or limitations of the disciplinary perspectives of Public Administration and Political Science to explain past and current trends in federalism and intergovernmental relations
• Introduce new research questions, theory, or methodology based on disagreements or gaps between Public Administration and Political Science research on federalism and intergovernmental relations

In addition, potential paper or panel themes may include:

• Current or emerging trends in federalism and intergovernmental relations
• Contemporary trends in the politics and administration of major intergovernmental policies
• Impact of political institutions, political behavior, or recent economic and demographic shifts on intergovernmental relations, policy, management, and finance.
• Role of public finance on intergovernmental relations, policy, and management
• Impact of changes in the administrative state on federalism and intergovernmental relations
• Cross-national studies of federalism and intergovernmental relations, policy, and management
• Domestic or international policy areas involving federalism and intergovernmental relations
• Emergent policy issues facing metropolitan areas

Submission Guidelines

Individual Paper Proposals.  The committee welcomes individual paper proposals of 400 words or less. Proposed papers should feature high-quality theoretical, qualitative, or quantitative research.  Proposals should make their connection to the symposium theme direct and clear, and specifically discuss how their work advances the research on federalism and intergovernmental relations.

Full Panel Proposals.  The committee also welcomes the submission of complete panels consisting of four papers and a chair.  Panel submissions should bring together complementary papers that tackle compelling research questions or theoretical frameworks for federalism and intergovernmental relations.

Panel proposals should include a panel title and description (400 words or less), the panel chair, and four individual paper proposals (400 words or less each). Each paper proposal will be evaluated separately on whether it meets the criteria for individual paper submissions.

Panel chairs are encouraged to incorporate diverse participants in panels, whether in gender, race, institution, rank, disciplinary perspective, or methodology.

The program committee may alter panels to remove individual papers that do not meet review criteria or to add an individual paper submission that fits well with the panel, particularly if dropouts occur. The program committee plans to do so sparingly.

Submission Process

Proposals for the symposium should be submitted by email to Christine Palus (christine.palus@villanova.edu) by November 4, 2019.  We welcome proposals from members and nonmembers of SIAM and FIRS and will select papers that seek to advance the field of federalism and intergovernmental relations in a unique way as discussed above.

The Wright Symposium planning committee – Kim Nelson (UNC-Chapel Hill), Christine Palus (Villanova University), Philip Rocco (Marquette University), Chris Stream (UNLV) and Mona Vakilifathi (NYU), will review proposals and make decisions by October 22, 2019.  Questions can be directed to committee members.

Please circulate this call for papers among interested colleagues.

Wright Symposium Format

For this special joint endeavor, we will operate under a different set of “ground rules” for the actual symposium meeting.  In order to truly facilitate an engaging conversation as well as an agenda for future interdisciplinary and collaborative work on federalism and IGR, we hope that scholars will come ready to roll up their sleeves, share ideas, and engage with one another.   Participants will not be permitted to use PowerPoint, but rather are encouraged to approach presenting their work using a more casual and conversational style.

Publius and State and Local Government Review

The editors of Publius: the Journal of Federalism (sponsored by FIRS) and of State and Local Government Review (sponsored by SIAM) endorse and encourage the development of manuscripts for the ASPA Wright Symposium and APSA Short Course. Papers that are prepared and presented at these sessions and are suitable could be considered for submission to and publication in one of those journals.  Junior scholars are also encouraged to take advantage of SLGR’s Junior Scholars Program that supports the development and refinement of papers suitable for publication.

APSA Short Course: A short course at APSA in September 2020 will build on the Wright Symposium and continue the conversation about “Future Directions in Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations Research.” Additional details about the workshop will be released in the coming months.

Donald C. Stone Practitioner Award

The ASPA Section on Intergovernmental Administration & Management (SIAM) is soliciting nominations for the section’s annual Donald C. Stone Practitioner Award. Since 1981, SIAM has recognized outstanding practitioners for their contributions to intergovernmental management. The award will be presented at the 2020 annual ASPA meeting in Anaheim, CA. The principle criteria for the Practitioner award include:

• Significant contributions to the practice of intergovernmental relations over a substantial period of time.
• Contributions that have made an impact on the practice of intergovernmental management as a whole rather than only on a specific organization, institution, or function.

Donald C. Stone (1903-1995) was a major and beloved figure in twentieth-century public administration. He was the founder of the American Public Works Association (APWA), served as the first Director of the Public Administration Service, and was a principal architect of the Executive Office of the President (EOP) in 1939 based on the 1937 recommendations of the Brownlow Commission. He was the first Director of the Division of Administrative Management of the Bureau of the Budget within the EOP, worked as Director of Administration of the Marshall Plan in 1948, helped found the National Academy of Public Administration in 1967, and served as Dean of the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Pittsburgh.

Nominations should include the name and institutional affiliation of the nominee and of the nominator, a short statement explaining the nominee’s contributions to intergovernmental management commensurate with the criteria for the award, and contact information for both the nominee and the nominator. Nominees and nominators need not be members of SIAM.

Please submit your nominations electronically to award committee chair Todd Ely at todd.ely@ucdenver.edu. Any questions may also be directed to Dr. Ely. For the nomination to be considered by the committee, please submit your nomination before 5:00 pm, February 7, 2020.

Click here for a full list of past awardees.

Donald C. Stone Distinguished Scholar Award

The ASPA Section on Intergovernmental Administration & Management (SIAM) is soliciting nominations for the section’s annual Donald C. Stone Distinguished Scholar Award. Since 1981, SIAM has recognized distinguished scholars for their contributions to intergovernmental management. The award will be presented at the 2020 annual ASPA meeting in Anaheim, CA. The principle criteria for the Distinguished Scholar Award include:

• Significant contributions to the study of intergovernmental relations over a substantial period of time.
• Contributions that have made an impact on the study of intergovernmental management as a whole rather than only on a specific organization, institution, or function.

Nominations should include the name and institutional affiliation of the nominee and of the nominator, a short statement explaining the nominee’s contributions to intergovernmental management commensurate with the criteria for the award, and contact information for both the nominee and the nominator. Nominees and nominators need not be members of SIAM.

Please submit your nominations electronically to award committee chair Todd Ely at todd.ely@ucdenver.edu. Any questions may also be directed to Dr. Ely. For the nomination to be considered by the committee, please submit your nomination before 5:00 pm, February 7, 2020.

Click here for a full list of past awardees.

Donald C. Stone Best Student Paper Award

The ASPA Section on Intergovernmental Administration & Management (SIAM) is soliciting nominations for the section’s annual Donald C. Stone Best Student Paper Award. The award recognizes the best paper on federalism and intergovernmental relations written by a graduate student in the last year (2019). The award will be presented at the 2020 annual ASPA conference during the SIAM Business Meeting in Anaheim, CA. The award comes with $250 to support travel to the ASPA conference (April 3-7, 2020).

Nominations should include the name and institutional affiliation of the nominee and of the nominator and an electronic copy of the nominated paper (no more than 25 pages, double-spaced). Nominees and nominators need not be members of SIAM.

Please submit your nominations electronically to award committee chair Todd Ely at todd.ely@ucdenver.edu. Any questions may also be directed to Dr. Ely. For the nomination to be considered by the committee, please submit your nomination before 5:00 pm, January 3, 2020.

Please visit the SIAM website to learn more about SIAM.

CALL FOR PROPOSALS

**EXTENDED DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS**

State and Local Government Review

2020 Special Issue

“Addressing the ‘Urban-Rural Divide’ through Innovative, Place-Based Policies”

Michael J. Scicchitano, University of Florida, Editor

John Accordino, Virginia Commonwealth University, Guest Editor

This special issue on Addressing the “Urban-Rural Divide” seeks essays that document best practices in innovative place-based development that have the potential to inform federal, state or local public policy.

In recent years, newspaper headlines and commentators have bemoaned a growing “urban-rural divide,” characterized by the decline of small farms, rural towns and small cities, and the rapid growth of many metropolitan areas.  Regional economists and other scholars have identified several drivers of these differential growth rates, including changes in industrial structure (what we produce), changes in production technology (how we produce, particularly the increased pace of automation), and the growing importance of innovation, design and finance functions that favor major metropolitan areas.  A number of agglomeration economies in metro areas, including “thick labor pools” of highly educated and well-compensated talent, create self-perpetuating growth dynamics there.  (Moretti 2012)  Precisely because of these agglomeration economies, major metropolitan areas tend to be more resilient – to recover more quickly from economic downturns – than even smaller metropolitan places. (Muro and Whiton 2017)

At the same time, changes in industrial structure and production technology have reduced employment in the manufacturing and agriculture sectors, leading to often-dramatic employment losses in rural areas and smaller cities.   One result has been the outmigration of the working-age population, especially younger workers, leaving an increasingly dependent population behind.  These changes, in turn, have hollowed out the retail and services sectors in these communities, reducing tax revenues and undermining local-government financial health and capacity.  (Drabenstott 2010)

Sociologists, political scientists and others have documented the psychological and political fall-out of these trends, citing feelings of being “left behind” and the growth of a community “politics of resentment” toward urban areas whose residents are perceived to have unfairly jumped to the front of the line to the American Dream.  (Wuthnow 2018, Cramer 2016)  This resentment results in less trust of government, and therefore unwillingness to support even policies that might help such areas.  Attitude surveys that divide the population into “rural,” “suburban” and “urban” populations document these resentments. (Parker, et al. 2018)

Without contradicting these findings, some regional scholars have painted a more nuanced picture.  They point out that the categories “rural,” “urban” and “suburban” do not adequately describe the reality on the ground.  In fact, these geographic entities are not separate, but linked, somewhat, economically, socially, environmentally and culturally, and constitute something of a continuum.  The US Department of Agriculture describes nine gradients on this continuum, with over two-thirds of the “rural” population living either in or adjacent to a metro area, or in a county with one or more cities with a population of at least 20,000.  (Isserman 2001)

As Isserman (2001) points out, many rural areas are thriving economically, but they have been incorporated into metropolitan areas, and thus are no longer counted by the Census Bureau as “rural.”  Many of these erstwhile rural communities face challenges to their way of life caused not by decline, but by unmanaged growth, as metro areas continue to expand.  Even in regions that have suffered structural decline, some small cities and towns have found ways to marshal grassroots-based energy, connect local assets with opportunities, and revitalize. (Fallows and Fallows, 2018)   Stauber (2001) cites four types of rural area – urban periphery, sparsely populated, high amenity, and high poverty.  The latter include regions that have suffered long-term, structural poverty, such as the Mississippi Delta Region and Appalachia.  Each type of community faces different challenges.  If it is to be helpful, public policy must comprehend such differences.  Moreover, and notwithstanding the challenges that many rural areas face, the polarization of incomes and life prospects presents challenges both inside and outside of urban areas; public policy must comprehend this reality as well.

The United States, like other countries, is developing a 21^st century “system of cites” in response to changes in technology and industrial structure. Spatial shifts in economic activity and population are a consequence of this, but various scenarios are possible within this general picture.  Although global innovation, finance and communication centers seem destined to continue to grow and dominate, public policy could play important roles in connecting places within the economic hierarchy, and establishing the conditions for a high quality of life in places along the entire urban-rural continuum.  Both policies that stabilize places suffering structural decline, and policies that support and stimulate the development of new, innovative economic activities are necessary.

In light of both economic and political realities facing the United States today, it seems likely that only a strategic combination of sectoral, spatial and grassroots-based policies will be equal to the task.  Sectoral policies include (but are not limited to) business and entrepreneurship development, education and workforce development, food access, housing and health care support.  Spatial policies are important as well, particularly to confront and manage the shifting fortunes of places along the urban-rural continuum.  These include (but are not limited to) support for collaborative regional partnerships among localities that may consolidate services in structurally challenged regions, invest in new economic ventures, strengthen regional supply chains, or build infrastructure (including broadband) that stimulates economic activity by connecting hitherto disconnected places.   And to the greatest extent practicable, policies must be grassroots-based, supporting local entrepreneurship, community action, public-private partnerships, and local government capacity enhancement, thereby building local trust, confidence, and the capacity to take on more ambitious initiatives.

The purpose of this special issue is to identify innovative, place-based policies and practices that hold promise for stabilizing and revitalizing places along the urban-rural continuum, and especially for strengthening positive urban-rural linkages.  We seek to publish six to ten short essays (1,400 – 1,600 words each, plus graphics if appropriate), embedded within an issue-length paper on policies and practices for addressing the urban-rural divide.

Each essay will:

• Provide an overview of the policy area – the problem, challenge, or opportunity. Those areas described above are of particular interest, but other policy areas are welcome also.
• Describe one or more best-practice examples that could be replicated nationally or regionally.
• Explain the funding or financing implications of such replication (federal, state, local).
• Explain how the policy does one or more of the following: supports regional collaboration among public sector entities, encourages public-private partnerships, engages the grassroots, supports entrepreneurship, and builds local capacity.

Please provide a one-page proposal (no more than 250 words) that describes how your essay satisfies the four criteria above.  Please briefly describe the source(s) of information for your essay, e.g. secondary data, empirical research, personal experience.  You will need to document these in your essay.

Please note that the turnaround time on this project is short.  To ensure consideration, please submit your proposal no later than Friday, October 28, 2019.  Please send proposals to:

John Accordino, Guest Editor at jaccordi@vcu.edu

Edwin Benton, SLGR Managing Editor at jbenton@usf.edu

Please note the following dates:

Monday, October 28, 2019 – 250 word proposal due.
Wednesday, October 31, 2019 – decision on proposals and feedback to authors.
Monday, January 6, 2020 – full draft of essay due to State and Local Government Review.
Monday, February 10, 2020 – review from 3 reviewers and feedback to authors on essays.
Monday, March 9, 2020 – final, revised essay due to State and Local Government Review.
March/April 2020 (could be either the March or June Issue) – anticipated publication of special issue.

We encourage proposals from practitioners and from scholars in all academic disciplines, including but not limited to public administration, political science, sociology, economics, urban and regional planning, and geography.  We are particularly interested in essays that involve collaboration between academics and practitioners.

References

Cramer, Katherine J. 2016. The Politics of Resentment: Rural Consciousness in Wisconsin and the Rise of Scott Walker. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.

Drabenstott, Mark. April 13, 2010. Past Silos and Smokestacks: A Rural Development Proposal. The Daily Yonder, http://www.dailyyonder.com, accessed June 3, 2010.

Fallows, James and Deborah Fallows. 2018. Our Towns: A 100,000 Mile Journey into the Heart of America. New York: Pantheon Books.

Isserman, Andrew M. 2001. Competitive Advantages of Rural America in the Next Century. International Regional Science Review 24, 1:38-58.

Moretti, Enrico. 2012. The New Geography of Jobs. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

Muro, Mark and Jason Whiton. October 17, 2017. Big Cities, Small Cities – and the Gaps, Brookings. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2017/10/17big-cities-and-the-gaps/, accessed August 23, 2019.

Parker, Kim, Juliana Menasce Horowitz, Anna Brown, Richard Fry, D’Vera Cohn, and Ruth Igielnik. May 22, 2018. What Unites and Divides Urban, Suburban and Rural Communities. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2018/05/22/what-unites-and-divides-urban-suburban-and-rural-communities/, accessed August 6, 2019.

Stauber, Karl N. 2001. Why Invest in Rural America—And How? A Critical Public Policy Question for the 21st Century. Kansas City: Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.

Wuthnow, Robert. 2018. The Left Behind: Decline and Rage in Rural America. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.

CALL FOR PROPOSALS

State and Local Government Review

2020 Special Issue

“Addressing the ‘Urban-Rural Divide’ through Innovative, Place-Based Policies”

Michael J. Scicchitano, University of Florida, Editor

John Accordino, Virginia Commonwealth University, Guest Editor

This special issue on Addressing the “Urban-Rural Divide” seeks essays that document best practices in innovative place-based development that have the potential to inform federal, state or local public policy.

In recent years, newspaper headlines and commentators have bemoaned a growing “urban-rural divide,” characterized by the decline of small farms, rural towns and small cities, and the rapid growth of many metropolitan areas.  Regional economists and other scholars have identified several drivers of these differential growth rates, including changes in industrial structure (what we produce), changes in production technology (how we produce, particularly the increased pace of automation), and the growing importance of innovation, design and finance functions that favor major metropolitan areas.  A number of agglomeration economies in metro areas, including “thick labor pools” of highly educated and well-compensated talent, create self-perpetuating growth dynamics there.  (Moretti 2012)  Precisely because of these agglomeration economies, major metropolitan areas tend to be more resilient – to recover more quickly from economic downturns – than even smaller metropolitan places. (Muro and Whiton 2017)

At the same time, changes in industrial structure and production technology have reduced employment in the manufacturing and agriculture sectors, leading to often-dramatic employment losses in rural areas and smaller cities.   One result has been the outmigration of the working-age population, especially younger workers, leaving an increasingly dependent population behind.  These changes, in turn, have hollowed out the retail and services sectors in these communities, reducing tax revenues and undermining local-government financial health and capacity.  (Drabenstott 2010)

Sociologists, political scientists and others have documented the psychological and political fall-out of these trends, citing feelings of being “left behind” and the growth of a community “politics of resentment” toward urban areas whose residents are perceived to have unfairly jumped to the front of the line to the American Dream.  (Wuthnow 2018, Cramer 2016)  This resentment results in less trust of government, and therefore unwillingness to support even policies that might help such areas.  Attitude surveys that divide the population into “rural,” “suburban” and “urban” populations document these resentments. (Parker, et al. 2018)

Without contradicting these findings, some regional scholars have painted a more nuanced picture.  They point out that the categories “rural,” “urban” and “suburban” do not adequately describe the reality on the ground.  In fact, these geographic entities are not separate, but linked, somewhat, economically, socially, environmentally and culturally, and constitute something of a continuum.  The US Department of Agriculture describes nine gradients on this continuum, with over two-thirds of the “rural” population living either in or adjacent to a metro area, or in a county with one or more cities with a population of at least 20,000.  (Isserman 2001)

As Isserman (2001) points out, many rural areas are thriving economically, but they have been incorporated into metropolitan areas, and thus are no longer counted by the Census Bureau as “rural.”  Many of these erstwhile rural communities face challenges to their way of life caused not by decline, but by unmanaged growth, as metro areas continue to expand.  Even in regions that have suffered structural decline, some small cities and towns have found ways to marshal grassroots-based energy, connect local assets with opportunities, and revitalize. (Fallows and Fallows, 2018)   Stauber (2001) cites four types of rural area – urban periphery, sparsely populated, high amenity, and high poverty.  The latter include regions that have suffered long-term, structural poverty, such as the Mississippi Delta Region and Appalachia.  Each type of community faces different challenges.  If it is to be helpful, public policy must comprehend such differences.  Moreover, and notwithstanding the challenges that many rural areas face, the polarization of incomes and life prospects presents challenges both inside and outside of urban areas; public policy must comprehend this reality as well.

The United States, like other countries, is developing a 21^st century “system of cites” in response to changes in technology and industrial structure. Spatial shifts in economic activity and population are a consequence of this, but various scenarios are possible within this general picture.  Although global innovation, finance and communication centers seem destined to continue to grow and dominate, public policy could play important roles in connecting places within the economic hierarchy, and establishing the conditions for a high quality of life in places along the entire urban-rural continuum.  Both policies that stabilize places suffering structural decline, and policies that support and stimulate the development of new, innovative economic activities are necessary.

In light of both economic and political realities facing the United States today, it seems likely that only a strategic combination of sectoral, spatial and grassroots-based policies will be equal to the task.  Sectoral policies include (but are not limited to) business and entrepreneurship development, education and workforce development, food access, housing and health care support.  Spatial policies are important as well, particularly to confront and manage the shifting fortunes of places along the urban-rural continuum.  These include (but are not limited to) support for collaborative regional partnerships among localities that may consolidate services in structurally challenged regions, invest in new economic ventures, strengthen regional supply chains, or build infrastructure (including broadband) that stimulates economic activity by connecting hitherto disconnected places.   And to the greatest extent practicable, policies must be grassroots-based, supporting local entrepreneurship, community action, public-private partnerships, and local government capacity enhancement, thereby building local trust, confidence, and the capacity to take on more ambitious initiatives.

The purpose of this special issue is to identify innovative, place-based policies and practices that hold promise for stabilizing and revitalizing places along the urban-rural continuum, and especially for strengthening positive urban-rural linkages.  We seek to publish six to ten short essays (1,400 – 1,600 words each, plus graphics if appropriate), embedded within an issue-length paper on policies and practices for addressing the urban-rural divide.

Each essay will:

• Provide an overview of the policy area – the problem, challenge, or opportunity. Those areas described above are of particular interest, but other policy areas are welcome also.
• Describe one or more best-practice examples that could be replicated nationally or regionally.
• Explain the funding or financing implications of such replication (federal, state, local).
• Explain how the policy does one or more of the following: supports regional collaboration among public sector entities, encourages public-private partnerships, engages the grassroots, supports entrepreneurship, and builds local capacity.

Please provide a one-page proposal (no more than 250 words) that describes how your essay satisfies the four criteria above.  Please briefly describe the source(s) of information for your essay, e.g. secondary data, empirical research, personal experience.  You will need to document these in your essay.

Please note that the turnaround time on this project is short.  To ensure consideration, please submit your proposal no later than Friday, October 11, 2019.  Please send proposals to:

John Accordino, Guest Editor at jaccordi@vcu.edu

Edwin Benton, SLGR Managing Editor at jbenton@usf.edu

Please note the following dates:

Friday, October 11, 2019 – 250 word proposal due.

Monday, October 16 – decision on proposals and feedback to authors.

Friday, December 6 – full draft of essay due to State and Local Government Review.

Friday, December 16 – review and feedback to authors on essays.

Monday, January 16, 2020 – final, revised essay due to State and Local Government Review.

March/April 2020 – anticipated publication of special issue.

We encourage proposals from practitioners and from scholars in all academic disciplines, including but not limited to public administration, political science, sociology, economics, urban and regional planning, and geography.  We are particularly interested in essays that involve collaboration between academics and practitioners.

References

Cramer, Katherine J. 2016. The Politics of Resentment: Rural Consciousness in Wisconsin and the Rise of Scott Walker. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.

Drabenstott, Mark. April 13, 2010. Past Silos and Smokestacks: A Rural Development Proposal. The Daily Yonder, http://www.dailyyonder.com, accessed June 3, 2010.

Fallows, James and Deborah Fallows. 2018. Our Towns: A 100,000 Mile Journey into the Heart of America. New York: Pantheon Books.

Isserman, Andrew M. 2001. Competitive Advantages of Rural America in the Next Century. International Regional Science Review 24, 1:38-58.

Moretti, Enrico. 2012. The New Geography of Jobs. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

Muro, Mark and Jason Whiton. October 17, 2017. Big Cities, Small Cities – and the Gaps, Brookings. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2017/10/17big-cities-and-the-gaps/, accessed August 23, 2019.

Parker, Kim, Juliana Menasce Horowitz, Anna Brown, Richard Fry, D’Vera Cohn, and Ruth Igielnik. May 22, 2018. What Unites and Divides Urban, Suburban and Rural Communities. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2018/05/22/what-unites-and-divides-urban-suburban-and-rural-communities/, accessed August 6, 2019.

Stauber, Karl N. 2001. Why Invest in Rural America—And How? A Critical Public Policy Question for the 21st Century. Kansas City: Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.

Wuthnow, Robert. 2018. The Left Behind: Decline and Rage in Rural America. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.

The Department of Public Administration at Northern Illinois University invites applications for an assistant professor position to begin August 2020 to support our nationally ranked MPA program located in global Chicago’s metropolitan region. Strong preference will be given to candidates whose research focuses on the local government level (research subject field is open). The NASPAA accredited MPA program ranks 4th nationally in local government management, 17th in budgeting and finance, 21st in nonprofit management, and 32nd in public management and leadership. The department fields about 50 full time graduate internships in local government and non-profit organizations throughout metropolitan Chicago, and a rapidly growing number of part-time midcareer students. The department launched its online MPA in local government management in 2018. A review of applications will begin after October, 3, 2019; the search will remain open until the position is filled.

The Section on Intergovernmental Administration and Management invites scholars and practitioners to submit proposals for papers to be presented at the 7th annual Deil S. Wright Symposium. The symposium honors the career and contributions of Professor Deil S. Wright, who was a charter member of the Section and remained active until his passing in 2009. The Wright Symposium will be held on April 3, 2020 at the national conference of the American Society for Public Administration in Anaheim, CA.

The Section on Intergovernmental Administration and Management (SIAM) of the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) and the Section on Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations Section (FIRS) of the American Political Science Association (APSA) are very excited to collaborate on the Wright Symposium for 2020.   Although the disciplines of Public Administration and Political Science address similar research topics such as federalism, intergovernmental relations, state and local government, and public management, the two disciplines often speak past each other regarding research questions, theory, methodology, and policy areas. As a tribute to Professor Wright, who was also a long-time member of FIRS, SIAM and FIRS will collaborate on the Wright Symposium at the ASPA annual meeting in March 2020 and a short course at the APSA annual meeting in September 2020 to promote conversation and collaboration between Public Administration and Political Science scholars.

The goals of the 2020 SIAM-FIRS collaboration events follow:

1. Introduce Public Administration and Political Science scholars with shared research interests to facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration
2. Discuss similarities and differences between Public Administration and Political Science research on federalism and intergovernmental relations
3. Identify new research questions, theory, methodology, and policy areas to advance the interdisciplinary study of federalism and intergovernmental relations

The theme of the all-day 2020 Wright Symposium is “Future Directions in Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations Research.”  As presented above, the vision is that the Wright Symposium will not be a “business as usual” conference, but rather an opportunity for new conversations between scholars of Public Administration and Political Science who may not be in regular dialogue with one another.  As such, we desire paper and/or panel proposals that: 

• Identify similarities, differences, or new directions in Public Administration and Political Science research regarding prevalent subtopics, research questions, framing, terminology, theoretical approaches, methodology, and data sources
• Discuss and evaluate the strengths or limitations of the disciplinary perspectives of Public Administration and Political Science to explain past and current trends in federalism and intergovernmental relations
• Introduce new research questions, theory, or methodology based on disagreements or gaps between Public Administration and Political Science research on federalism and intergovernmental relations

In addition, potential paper or panel themes may include:

• Current or emerging trends in federalism and intergovernmental relations
• Contemporary trends in the politics and administration of major intergovernmental policies
• Impact of political institutions, political behavior, or recent economic and demographic shifts on intergovernmental relations, policy, management, and finance.
• Role of public finance on intergovernmental relations, policy, and management
• Impact of changes in the administrative state on federalism and intergovernmental relations
• Cross-national studies of federalism and intergovernmental relations, policy, and management
• Domestic or international policy areas involving federalism and intergovernmental relations
• Emergent policy issues facing metropolitan areas

Submission Guidelines

Individual Paper Proposals.  The committee welcomes individual paper proposals of 400 words or less. Proposed papers should feature high-quality theoretical, qualitative, or quantitative research.  Proposals should make their connection to the symposium theme direct and clear, and specifically discuss how their work advances the research on federalism and intergovernmental relations.

Full Panel Proposals.  The committee also welcomes the submission of complete panels consisting of four papers and a chair.  Panel submissions should bring together complementary papers that tackle compelling research questions or theoretical frameworks for federalism and intergovernmental relations.

Panel proposals should include a panel title and description (400 words or less), the panel chair, and four individual paper proposals (400 words or less each). Each paper proposal will be evaluated separately on whether it meets the criteria for individual paper submissions.

Panel chairs are encouraged to incorporate diverse participants in panels, whether in gender, race, institution, rank, disciplinary perspective, or methodology.

The program committee may alter panels to remove individual papers that do not meet review criteria or to add an individual paper submission that fits well with the panel, particularly if dropouts occur. The program committee plans to do so sparingly.

Submission Process

Proposals for the symposium should be submitted by email to Christine Palus (christine.palus@villanova.edu) before October 1, 2019.  We welcome proposals from members and nonmembers of SIAM and FIRS and will select papers that seek to advance the field of federalism and intergovernmental relations in a unique way as discussed above.

The Wright Symposium planning committee – Kim Nelson (UNC-Chapel Hill), Christine Palus (Villanova University), Philip Rocco (Marquette University), Chris Stream (UNLV) and Mona Vakilifathi (NYU), will review proposals and make decisions by October 22, 2019.  Questions can be directed to committee members.

Please circulate this call for papers among interested colleagues.

Wright Symposium Format

For this special joint endeavor, we will operate under a different set of “ground rules” for the actual symposium meeting.  In order to truly facilitate an engaging conversation as well as an agenda for future interdisciplinary and collaborative work on federalism and IGR, we hope that scholars will come ready to roll up their sleeves, share ideas, and engage with one another.   Participants will not be permitted to use PowerPoint, but rather are encouraged to approach presenting their work using a more casual and conversational style.

Publius and State and Local Government Review

The editors of Publius: the Journal of Federalism (sponsored by FIRS) and of State and Local Government Review (sponsored by SIAM) endorse and encourage the development of manuscripts for the ASPA Wright Symposium and APSA Short Course. Papers that are prepared and presented at these sessions and are suitable could be considered for submission to and publication in one of those journals.  Junior scholars are also encouraged to take advantage of SLGR’s Junior Scholars Program that supports the development and refinement of papers suitable for publication.

APSA Short Course: A short course at APSA in September 2020 will build on the Wright Symposium and continue the conversation about “Future Directions in Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations Research.” Additional details about the workshop will be released in the coming months.

As the SIAM membership has been aware of, the SLGR editorial team has been working very hard to get the journal placed on the citation index.  Actually, there are two citation indexes-SCOPUS and the Journal Citation Reports (JCR). SAGE has submitted SLGR to be accepted on both SCOPUS and JCR.  We are pleased to let you know that SLGR has been accepted on SCOPUS.  JCR has a more rigorous review process, but given our acceptance on SCOPUS, we along with the Sage Social Science Editor are hopeful of getting accepted on JCR.  We should receive a decision from JCR in the next several months.​

State and Local Government Review (SLGR) is pleased to announce Grant Rissler, Ph.D. as the new editor of the journal’s Governance Matters (GM) Section.  We are excited about the energy and dedication that he brings to the positon.  We expect that he will continue in the tradition of previous editors Bruce Perlman, Beverly Cigler, and Robert Blair.

Dr. Rissler is an affiliate faculty member at Virginia Commonwealth University’s Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs.  He previously served as Assistant Director of the Wilder School’s Center for Public Policy Outreach office where he oversaw VCU’s Translational Research Fellows program, which trains and facilitates academics in building bridges to key state and local policymakers.  Prior to entering academia, Dr. Rissler served more than a decade in program administration, communications and fundraising roles for local, national and international non-profit organizations.  He has published three articles in SLGR, two of which were in the GM section.

The GM Section of SLGR features peer reviewed applied research on state and local government of interest to both practitioners and academics.  It is our hope that these articles will serve to stimulate dialogue among practitioners on critical, vexing issues in order to promote a greater degree of informed decision-making.  Articles published in the GM Section may include case studies or other empirical pieces.  In the past, a variety of timely governance topics have ranged from social media use to capital budgeting to likely social equity impacts at the local level of Trump administration budget cuts to environmental sustainability. In 2018, GM articles represented 3 of the 5 top downloaded articles from SLGR.

Dr. Rissler’s core interests will be continuing the focus on publishing applied research that is relevant to a broad range of SLGR’s readership and that can inform administrators in a practical way.  He also looks forward to supporting broader initiatives of the journal such as encouraging submissions from early career and international scholars and making research findings accessible through social media platforms such as the SLGR podcasts, blog and Facebook/Twitter platforms.

Dr. Rissler welcomes SIAM member’s insight and feedback on topics are currently most relevant to them.  To gather input, a brief survey is available here [https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/XDFQL6C] until June 15^th and SIAM members are encouraged to participate.

In addition, he welcomes regular research submissions as well as proposals from authors for individual articles or a collection in symposium format.  Prospective authors are encouraged to contact Dr. Rissler via email at risslerge@vcu.edu about any ideas they may have for this section of the journal.