Kevin Brown, in a Chronicle article, talks about some of them. I have, indeed, found these to be true, though I have also been part of a SLAC where the departments were funded separately and competition was fierce.
The specific section I am responding to with that comment is:
Professors at research universities tend to see their departments as the defining aspect of their employment at the institution, fending off space and financial concerns from other departments, while we tend to see the university as a whole, with subgroups within it that help shape us, but do not define us, per se.