Alphabet Soup (R&DAPSAUNDPWBUSAIDDFIDNSF)

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

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?

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).

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?

What can donors do for us? - 1• Moneymoneymoneymoneymoney– From: foundations, multilaterals, bilaterals, other

gov’t 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.

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

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).

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)