A Hero for the Aged? The Townsend Movement, the Political Mediation Model, and U.S. Old-Age Policy, 1934-1950

1992 ◽  
Vol 98 (2) ◽  
pp. 308-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edwin Amenta ◽  
Bruce G. Carruthers ◽  
Yvonne Zylan
Keyword(s):  
Old Age ◽  
The Political ◽  
Mediation Model ◽  
Political Mediation

Age for Leisure? Political Mediation and the Impact of the Pension Movement on U.S. Old-Age Policy

2005 ◽  
Vol 70 (3) ◽  
pp. 516-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edwin Amenta ◽  
Neal Caren ◽  
Sheera Joy Olasky
Keyword(s):  
Old Age ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Qualitative Comparative Analysis ◽  
State Level ◽  
The Political ◽  
Mediation Model ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Old Age Assistance ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Political Mediation

This article elaborates a political mediation theory of the impact of social movements on states and policy, positing that the influence of mobilization and specific strategies of collective action depends on specified political contexts and the type of influence sought. Examining the influence of the U.S. old-age pension movement, which involved millions of people, this article appraises the mediation model using state-level data from the 1930s and 1940s on Old Age Assistance—the main support for the aged at the time-and a Senate vote for generous senior citizens' pensions in 1939. Our models control for other potential influences, notably public opinion, which is often ignored in empirical studies and sometimes claimed to be responsible for causal influence mistakenly attributed to challengers. We employ pooled cross-sectional and time series analyses and fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (FSQCA), which is especially suited to appraising the combinational expectations of the political mediation model. Both sets of analyses show that the pension movement was directly influential on the outcomes and provide support for the political mediation arguments.

“IT HAPPENED BEHIND CLOSED DOORS”: LEGISLATIVE BUFFERING AS AN INFORMAL MECHANISM OF POLITICAL MEDIATION*

2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 365-388 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua A. Basseches
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Political Context ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
The Political ◽  
Legislative Process ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Mediation Model ◽  
Complete Failure ◽  
Movement Organizations ◽  
Political Mediation

The political mediation model explains movement policy outcomes ranging from complete failure to total success. However, the qualitative mechanisms through which political mediation occurs empirically remain understudied, especially as they relate to the content-specifying stages of the legislative process. Furthermore, while we know that political mediation is context dependent, key elements of what political context entails remain underspecified. This article addresses these gaps by tracing the influence of a coalition of social movement organizations (SMOs) seeking to simultaneously shape the content of two major climate bills in a progressive U.S. state where the climate movement enjoys a relatively favorable political context overall. Comparing the divergent trajectories and outcomes of the two bills illuminates the process of legislative buffering, which is conceptualized as an informal mechanism of political mediation. The comparative analysis also reveals situational elements of political context that can present additional hurdles movements must overcome to maximize their success.

Charlemagne’s Health in ‘Old Age’: Did It Affect Carolingian Military Strategy?

Mediaevistik ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-53
Author(s):  
Bernard S. Bachrach
Keyword(s):  
Old Age ◽  
The Political ◽  
Military Strategy ◽  
The West ◽  
Long Time

During the first thirty-three years of his reign as king of the Franks, i.e., prior to his coronation as emperor on Christmas day 800, Charlemagne, scholars generally agree, pursued a successful long-term offensive and expansionist strategy. This strategy was aimed at conquering large swaths of erstwhile imperial territory in the west and bringing under Carolingian rule a wide variety of peoples, who either themselves or their regional predecessors previously had not been subject to Frankish regnum.1 For a very long time, scholars took the position that Charlemagne continued to pursue this expansionist strategy throughout the imperial years, i.e., from his coronation on Christmas Day 800 until his final illness in later January 814. For example, Louis Halphen observed: “comme empereur, Charles poursuit, sans plus, l’oeuvre entamée avant l’an 800.”2 F. L. Ganshof, who also wrote several studies treating Charlemagne’s army, was in lock step with Halphen and observed: “As emperor, Charlemagne pursued the political and military course he had been following before 25 December 800.”3

scholarly journals A Confluence of Policy Inequality: Health Disparities in Old Age Among American Indian and Alaska Native Populations

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 37-37
Author(s):  
Sadie Giles
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Health Disparities ◽  
Life Course ◽  
American Indian ◽  
Old Age ◽  
Alaska Native ◽  
Political History ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Life Course

Abstract Racial health disparities in old age are well established, and new conceptualizations and methodologies continue to advance our understanding of health inequality across the life course. One group that is overlooked in many of these analyses, however, is the aging American Indian/Native Alaskan (AI/NA) population. While scholars have attended to the unique health inequities faced by the AI/NA population as a whole due to its discordant political history with the US government, little attention has been paid to unique patterns of disparity that might exist in old age. I propose to draw critical gerontology into the conversation in order to establish a framework through which we can uncover barriers to health, both from the political context of the AI/NA people as well as the political history of old age policy in the United States. Health disparities in old age are often described through a cumulative (dis)advantage framework that offers the benefit of appreciating that different groups enter old age with different resources and health statuses as a result of cumulative inequalities across the life course. Adding a framework of age relations, appreciating age as a system of inequality where people also gain or lose access to resources and status upon entering old age offers a path for understanding the intersection of race and old age. This paper will show how policy history for this group in particular as well as old age policy in the United States all create a unique and unequal circumstance for the aging AI/NA population.

The Strategies and Contexts of Social Protest: Political Mediation and the Impact of the Townsend Movement in California

1999 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edwin Amenta ◽  
Drew Halfmann ◽  
Michael Young
Keyword(s):  
Collective Action ◽  
Old Age ◽  
Social Protest ◽  
Regression Analyses ◽  
Old Age Pensions ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Political Mediation

We contend that the collective action of state-oriented challengers is politically mediated, and that the impact of collective action will differ according to political contexts. More specifically, we argue that mobilization and limited protest will yield collective benefits in specified favorable political circumstances; more assertive action is required in specified less favorable circumstances. In addition to specifying these arguments, we go some distance toward appraising them, by examining the Townsend Movement, an American old-age pension challenger of the 1930s and 1940s, and the politics of old-age pensions in California. Historical, "similar systems," and regression analyses indicate that the movement had an impact on California old-age policy that varied according to the expectations of our political mediation arguments.

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