Article Review: Fiscal Federalism Assignment Instructions

Overview

In the field of federalism and intergovernmental relations, the Christian statesman needs the skills to analyze, synthesize, and evaluate content from many sources. Toward that end, the purpose of the Article Review assignment is to aid in the development of those skills as they apply to scholarship. The focus of the assignment will be on writing informative annotations for the purpose of research along with a synthesis that integrates the assigned articles, comparing them in response to a prompt question.

Instructions

Write an article review using these articles:

Collins, Brian K. and Brian J. Gerber. 2006. “Redistributive Policy and Devolution: Is State  Administration a Road Block (Grant) to Equitable Access to Federal Funds?” Journal of  Public Administration Research and Theory 16, no. 4: 613-632.

AND

Pagano, Michael A. and Jocelyn M. Johnston. 2000. “Life at the Bottom of the Fiscal Food             Chain: Examining City and County Revenue Decisions.” Publius 30, no. 1: 159-170

 Complete the assignment in Turabian Author-Date style (no footnotes; only in-text citations) in Times New Roman (12 pt.), with margins of 1”. Provide a title page and place page numbers in the upper right corner of the document. It is expected that there will be ample citations throughout the assignment. However, there should be no more than one or two short quotes. Paraphrase and summarize the material instead.

The review should include (in this order):

• TwoAnnotations [300–400 words each]. Each annotation should summarize the article, including identifying the research question/thesis, methodology used, evidence or data presented, major findings, and overall strengths or weaknesses of the article. Place a bibliographic reference at the top of each annotation.
• OneSynthesis [750–800 words]. The synthesis addresses the prompt question, using the two articles to respond to the question, providing comparison/contrast and agreement/ disagreement between them. Organize the synthesis around answering the prompt question. The structure of the synthesis should be the response to the question. For this assignment, the prompt question is, “According to the authors, does the federal government’s fiscal measures (both taxing and spending) have an overall beneficial or negative effect on sub-national governments”?