In recent years, a new breed of political organizations has had remarkable influence in American educational policymaking. Proponents of neoliberal reform, these groups have been labeled as Education Reform Advocacy Organizations, or ERAOs. I situate these organizations within the larger network of Intermediary Organizations (IOs). To understand…

Caught between extraordinary public expectations and relatively modest constitutional authority, U.S. presidents historically have fashioned all sorts of mechanisms--executive orders, proclamations, memoranda--by which to move their objectives forward. William Howell asserts that under President Barack Obama's administration, presidential…

The context for education policy making has changed dramatically in recent years. Policymaking at the state-level has become characterized by near-unprecedented enactment of neo-liberal education policies, increased influence of so-called Education Reform Advocacy Organizations (ERAOs) and increased challenges to unions' political influence. In…

This article challenges the view that citywide referenda alone are an effective means of ensuring accountability for mayoral control. Through new empirical analysis of the referenda results in Boston and Cleveland, the article shows that rather than establish genuine democratic legitimacy, the referenda in fact mask strong class-based, and in…

Increasingly, foundations are choosing to engage in public policy debates as a way of leveraging their investments and increasing their impact in advancing improvements community-wide, statewide or nationally. For foundations, influencing public policy decisions can happen in different ways: funding policy research and dissemination, building…