TY - JOUR
T1 - Representation and lobbying by Indian nations in California
T2 - Is tribal lobbying all about gaming?
AU - Boehmke, Frederick J.
AU - Witmer, Richard C.
N1 - Funding Information:
6 As of 2009, 120 federally recognized tribes had filed RAPs and about half of tribes with Class III gaming compacts had filed RAPs (Conner and Taggart 2013). 7 Data on gaming facilities and revenues from http://www.nigc.gov/commission/gaming-revenue-reports. 8 “List of Casinos”, from http://www.cgcc.ca.gov/?pageID=tribalinfo&pageName=Tribal%20Info. 9 Gaming has also allowed a number of Indian nations to secure a significant source of funds for improving social service programs, education, infrastructure, law enforcement, and other programs (National Gambling Impact Study Commission 1999; Cornell et al. 1998; McCulloch 1994). See also the National Indian Gaming Association webpage at http://www.Indiangaming.org for additional information on the programs funded by Indian gaming receipts.
Funding Information:
The authors would like to thank Jenn Haas, Kimmey Hardesty, and Abigail Rury for help gathering data used in this project. Boehmke is Professor at the University of Iowa and Director of the Iowa Social Science Research Center. Financial support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation for work done on this paper during Boehmke’s time as a Robert Wood Johnson Scholar in Health Policy Research in the School of Public Health at the University of Michigan is gratefully acknowledged. Witmer is the Rev. John P Schlegel SJ, Distinguished Professor of Government and Politics at Creighton University.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, Springer Nature Limited.
PY - 2020/3/1
Y1 - 2020/3/1
N2 - American Indian nations, as pre-constitutional sovereigns, occupy a unique place in the USA. While tribal governments are able to exercise numerous rights as independent nations, they are often affected by policy decisions at the federal and state level. Yet little is known about the specific efforts of American Indians to seek representation in state legislative decision making. We address this shortcoming by answering two related questions. First, do American Indians and Native organizations lobby for public policy at the state level? If they do lobby, as we expect, do they focus solely on gaming given its role in providing an important source of economic development, or do they seek representation on a wide range of issues? Using data from the California legislature for the years 2000–2012, our findings suggest that American Indians seek representation via lobbying on a wide range of issues, including, but not limited to, Indian gaming. We posit that these findings support prior work on the political incorporation of American Indians as they seek representation on public policy issues.
AB - American Indian nations, as pre-constitutional sovereigns, occupy a unique place in the USA. While tribal governments are able to exercise numerous rights as independent nations, they are often affected by policy decisions at the federal and state level. Yet little is known about the specific efforts of American Indians to seek representation in state legislative decision making. We address this shortcoming by answering two related questions. First, do American Indians and Native organizations lobby for public policy at the state level? If they do lobby, as we expect, do they focus solely on gaming given its role in providing an important source of economic development, or do they seek representation on a wide range of issues? Using data from the California legislature for the years 2000–2012, our findings suggest that American Indians seek representation via lobbying on a wide range of issues, including, but not limited to, Indian gaming. We posit that these findings support prior work on the political incorporation of American Indians as they seek representation on public policy issues.
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U2 - 10.1057/s41309-019-00078-5
DO - 10.1057/s41309-019-00078-5
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85079457629
SN - 2047-7414
VL - 9
SP - 80
EP - 101
JO - Interest Groups and Advocacy
JF - Interest Groups and Advocacy
IS - 1
ER -