Editors’ introduction
| DOI | 10.1177/0951629817747652 |
| Date | 01 January 2018 |
| Author | Torun Dewan,John W Patty |
| Published date | 01 January 2018 |
| Subject Matter | Editors’ introduction |
Journal of Theoretical Politics
2018, Vol.30(1) 3–5
ÓThe Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0951629817747652
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Editors’ introduction
To r u n D e w a n
London School of Economics& Political Science, UK
John W Patty
University of Chicago, USA
This issue of the Journal of Theoretical Politics contains five original articles. Two
of the articles discuss elections and, among other connections, share a focus on the
effect of crises on policy outcomes. The other three articles consider key questions
about institutional design. Coming from different substantive corners of political
science, all three articles share a concern with sustaining cooperative outcomes in
the face of potentially costly coordination failures. As editors, we view this set of
articles as indicative of the type of research we want the Journal of Theoretical
Politics to support and publish: analytical theoretical models applied to substantive
concerns within political science. As we believe each of these contributions demon-
strates, analytical models are important for clarifying and guiding the broader
understanding of political phenomena.
In ‘Clarity or collaboration: Balancing competing aims in bureaucratic design’,
Christopher Carrigan develops a theory of institutional design that combines the
possibility of multiple tasks with the notion of goal ambiguity in delegation set-
tings. Goal ambiguity is modelled as the agent’s (or agents’) uncertainty about
which of two tasks is considered more important by the principal. The theory pro-
vides an important and elegant insight into how the impact of goal ambiguity on
the optimal design choice (i.e., whether to task a single agent with both tasks or
separate the responsibility across two agents) is driven by the principal’s desire for
coordination of the performances of the two tasks. Carrigan’s theory also repre-
sents an important contribution to expanding the applicability and scope of the
principal-agent literature on institutional design.
In ‘The electoral strategies of a populist candidate: Does charisma discourage
experience and encourage extremism?’, Gilles Serra presents a theory of elections
that blends both personality traits and populist electoral appeals. The theory
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