The Democratic Foundations of policy diffusion : how health, family and employment laws spread across countries / Katerina Linos.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Linos, Katerina.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Law--Mobility.

Law.

Law--Foreign influences.

Health care reform.

Family policy.

Comparative law.

Democracy.

Public opinion.

Physical Description:

xiii, 231 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, [2013].

Summary:

Why Do Law Reforms Spread Around the World in Waves? Leading theories argue that international networks of technocratic elites develop orthodox solutions that they singlehandedly transplant across countries. But, in modern democracies, elites alone cannot press for legislative reforms without winning the support of politicians, voters, and interest groups. As Katerina Linos shows in The Democratic Foundations of Policy Diffusion, international models can help politicians generate domestic enthusiasm for far-reaching proposals. By pointing to models from abroad, policitians can persuade voters that their ideas are not radical, ill-thought out experiments, but mainstream, tried-and-true solutions. Through the ingenious use of experimental and cross-national evidence, Linos documents voters' response to international models and demonstrates that governments follow international organization templates and imitate the policy choices of countries heavily covered in national media and familiar to voters. Empirically rich and theoretically sophisticated, The Democratic Foundations of Policy Diffusion provides the fullest account to date of this increasingly pervasive phenomenon. Book jacket.

Contents:

1 Introduction 1

2 A Theory of Diffusion Through Democratic Mechanisms 13

3 How Americans View Foreign Models 36

4 National Health Services Across OECD Countries 67

5 Health Reforms in the United Kingdom, Spain and Greece 96

6 Family Policy Diffusion Across OECD Countries 127

7 Family Policy Developments in Greece and Spain 150

8 Conclusions and Implications 175.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 189-224) and index.

ISBN:

9780199967865

0199967865

9780199967872

0199967873

OCLC:

819105355