Public Policy and Intergovernmental Relations: Measuring Perceived Change(s) in National Influence‐The Effects of the Federalism Decade

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Abstract
Federal grants‐in‐aid have been a major instrument for the exercise of national influence on the states. This research investigates empirically the degree of perceived national influence (PNI) exerted through the grant process during the 1970s and 1980s. Respondents were state administrators heading agencies that received federal grants. Surveys at four points in time across the two decades produced a unidimensional measure of PNI. PNI levels were notably higher in the 1970s than in the 1980s. Two competing explanations were offered to account for the decline: (a) intergovernmental institutional policy changes promoted by the Ronald Reagan administration from 1981 through 1988, and (b) symbolic and rhetorical advocacy of an altered (reduced) national role in relation to the states. Both factors appear to have contributed to sharp decline in PNI between the mid‐1970s and the mid‐1980s.

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