Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

What explains the vigor with which local governments tackle issues? While a substantial policy literature explores why some jurisdictions adopt policy innovations while others do not, less attention has been devoted to understanding variation in policy intensity subsequent to an affirmative adoption decision. Existing work quantifies stringency as (in various combinations) number of policies, topical coverage, penalty severity, complexity/difficulty of action, cost to regulated entities, and monitoring and implementation expenditures by government. While valuable, we argue that these approaches are missing two potentially important components: time and overall policy goal.

By “time,” we mean the permanence of the policy approach. Some policies have sunset provisions or expirations or are subject to contingent implementation, while others are permanent unless repealed. More permanent policy solutions are arguably more stringent because they exert government control over a longer period. Longer-lasting government action has a larger chance of becoming a taken-for-granted facet of the political landscape, making policy reversal more difficult. By “overall policy goal,” we mean a policy’s (non)restrictiveness toward a focal industry or practice relative to the spectrum of potentially legitimate policy measures proposed for the industry/practice. This is an outcome-focused measure of stringency rather than a procedural one; it recognizes that majorly restrictive outcomes may be achieved by few or simple policies (e.g., one wholesale ban on an undesirable land use), while minor changes to the policy status quo can be effectuated by complex or numerous measures (e.g., changes to building codes).

The paper will theorize why time and overall policy goal may be important but overlooked dimensions of stringency, then use these measures in analysis of the factors driving policy vigor in local regulation of high-volume hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in the State of New York, 2008-2012. This investigation draws an original, full-text database of 426 policies passed by 264 New York municipalities during this period. We will analyze time and overall policy goal separately and in combination with conventional stringency variables such as number of policies passed by a jurisdiction, sectoral coverage, complexity, and penalty severity. The paper will test the hypotheses that government and citizens’ material resources (government revenue, citizen income and education) and resources for anti-fracking advocacy (extent of the citizenry’s Democratic partisanship and presence/activity of anti-fracking advocates, penalized by the extent to which pro-fracking advocates were present/active in the jurisdiction) are positively related to greater local government policy vigor.