KAY 386: Public Policy

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KAY 386 Public Policy

• Lecture 5
• Readings Parsons, 1995 110-131, 461-473
• Bonser at al., Chapter 6.

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AGENDA

• The first installment of the Journal Assignment
  due on the Midterm Exam date.
• Reminding the selected readings for After-Midterm
  Period
• Todays Subjects
• Public Opinion Public Policy
• Public Policy Implementation
• Globalization

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READINGS AFTER MIDTERM (Five Subjects for Five
Weeks)

• Right to Die
• Will be analyzed in class together
• Factory Farms
• Gun Control Debates
• Organ Donations
• Stopping Genocide

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Public Opinion Public Policy

• Observations on the character and importance of
  the public voice from ancient times
• Vox populi, vox dei (Alcuin)
• Publica Voce (Machiavelli)

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What is Public Opinion?

• Although it is an old concept, it is first
  defined in the 18th Century Britain as
• An identifiable body of views held by a defined
  group to whose opinions government attached a
  standing and significance.

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Public Opinion Public Policy

• Which comes first?
• Public policy or public opinion?
• Policy agenda is set by the interplay of public
  opinion and public power.
• How is public opinion shaped by power?
• Shaping of public concerns, priorities and
  attitudes

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Interplay between the Media and Agenda (Mayer)

• Which comes first? (Chicken-egg?)
• Unidirectional
• Media influencing the public agenda
• Multidirectional
• The policy agenda of the government influencing
  media coverage and public opinion

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Public Opinion Public Policy

• In a democracy, public policy is a function of
  public opinion.
• Policy demand determines policy supply
• Public opinion is to the political market what
  consumer demand is to the economic market.

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What is Public Opinion?

• In the Post-Second World War Era, the
  introduction of techniques to make empirical,
  quasi-scientific measurements of public opinion
  on issues... led to the analysis of the impact of
  opinion on the political agenda.

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Agenda Setting (McCombs Shaw)

• The media has a key role in agenda setting, that
  is, in the power to determine what topics are
  discussed.
• The more attention that is given to an issue, the
  more does the public regard it as being a high
  agenda item.

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The Impact of Media Attention on the Public Agenda
High
Media attention on issues
Low
Issues considered less important by the public
Issues considered more important by the public
Source Parsons, 1995 113.
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Factors Determining Response

• Policy makers response to new stories/media
  coverage is influenced by
• The relationship of journalists to policy-making
  elites and vice versa
• The timing of the publication
• Interest group pressures
• Costs and benefits of problems and solutions, etc.

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Downs Issue Attention Cycle Source Parsons,
1995 115
Issues as having highs and lows, ons and offs...
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Downs Issue Attention Cycle

• 1.Pre-Problem Stage
• Experts and policy-makers may be aware of the
  problem, and knowledge may have been produced,
  but there is negligible public interest.

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Downs Issue Attention Cycle

• 2. Alarmed Discovery and Euphoric (Joyful)
  Enthusiasm Stage
• The issue is recognized as a problem, prompted
  by a disaster and event, which focuses concern
  and leads to demands for government action

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Downs Issue Attention Cycle

• 3.Counting the Costs and Benefits Stage
• Policy makers and the public become aware of
  what progress will cost.
• 4.Decline of public interest in issue
• 5.Post-Problem Stage
• The issue slips down the public agenda. New
  issues replace the environment in public opinion
  and policy agendas.

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Types of Policy Agendas (Rogers and Dearing)

• Agenda-setting is an interactive process
• It may be intentional or unintentional
• The basic types are
• Media agenda
• Public agenda
• Policy Agenda

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Systemic and Institutional Agenda (Cobb Elder)

• Transformation of an issue into an
  (institutional) agenda item
• Expansion of an issue from a specifically
  concerned attention group to a wider interested
  or attentive public

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Systemic and Institutional Agenda (Cobb Elder)

• Systemic Agenda
• All issues commonly perceived by members of a
  political community as meriting public attention
  of public authorities
• Shared concern of a sizeable portion of the public

• Institutional Agenda
• Explicitly up for active and serious
  consideration by decision-makers
• May be an old item which is up for regular review
  or is of periodic concern or it may be a new
  item.

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Factors that Affect Transfer

• Degree of specificity (-)
• The more ambiguous the issue, the easier it will
  be exposed to a larger population
• Scope of social significance ()
• Temporal relevance ()
• The higher the long-term relevance, the easier it
  will be exposed to a larger population
• Degree of complexity (-)
• The more non-technical the issue, the easier it
  will be exposed to a larger population
• Categorical precedence (-)
• The more an issue lacks a clear precedence, the
  easier it will be exposed to a larger population

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Issues Institutions

• The key to understand agenda formation is the
  relationship between issues and institutions.
• An issue only begins to become important when an
  institution within the political system becomes
  associated with it.

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Policy Marketing Policy Making

• The worlds of advertising public opinion
  research overlap in theory practice.
• Issues policies are increasingly approached
  from a marketing point of view.
• Policy actors are interested in what the voter
  thinks and wants.
• The idea of analyzing the policy agenda as if the
  voter was a consumer and policies are products.

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Theories of Agenda Control

• The pluralist perspective
• Definition of problems setting of policy
  agendas is essentially the outcome of a process
  of competition between different groups.
• Critics
• Power and influence are not equally distributed
• The policy-making process is not open and neutral
• The dominant players establish their own
  priorities.

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Theories of Agenda Control

• The definition of issues is a fundamental form of
  political power.
• The definition of the alternatives is the supreme
  instrument of power.

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Issue Triggers (Cobb Elder)

• Internal Triggers
• Natural catastrophes
• Unanticipated human events
• Technological changes
• Imbalance or bias in the distribution of
  resources
• Ecological change

• External Triggers
• Act of war
• Innovations in weapons technology
• International conflict
• Patterns of world alignment

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Summary

• The politics of agenda setting is a process in
  which issues and priorities are defined through
  the regulation of conflict.

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Policy Implementation

• Source Parsons, 1995 461-473.

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Implementation Definitions

• Studying implementation is studying change
• How does change occur?
• Study of the political system inside and outside
  the organization
• What motivates implementors?

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Source Davis, Influencing PP through Research
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Implementation

• An important stage in the policy process
• Task of translating policy intentions into
  outcomes
• Involves participation by a number of
  stakeholders
• Reflects intention of governments to act

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Examples of policy implementation
Policy Possible implementation scenarios
Electricity available to all citizens 1. Creation of a public enterprise (direct provision) 2. State regulation of private companies
Cleaner water 1. Ban of using certain products (regulation) 2. Possibility to buy the right to pollute (market creation)
Prevention of heart disease 1. Advertising in the media 2. More hours for physical activities in schools (standard-setting)
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Implementation Definitions

• Policy-making does not come to an end once a
  policy is set out or approved.
• Policy is being made as it is being administered
  and administered as it is being made.
• Black-Box Model
• What is happening between input and output?
• Problems of implementation were rarely analyzed.
• Bureaucrats are not just neutral public servants

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Development of Implementation Studies

• The analysis of failure (Early 1970s)
• Rational (top-down models)
• Bottom-up critiques of the top-down model
• Hybrid Theories Implementation as
• Evolution
• Mutual adaptation
• Learning, exploration
• Inter-organizational analysis, etc.

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Perfect implementationPreconditions (Gunn)

• no constraint from external environment
• availability of adequate time and sufficient
  resources
• direct relationship between cause and effect

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Perfect implementationPreconditions (Gunn)

• single implementation agency, not dependent upon
  other agencies
• complete understanding of, and agreement upon,
  objectives
• specified tasks to be performed by each
  participant

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Perfect implementationPreconditions (Gunn)

• perfect communication among, and coordination of,
  various elements in the program
• perfect obedience demanded and obtained by those
  in authority

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Example Village Towns (Köykent) in Turkey
(Marin, 2005)

• Objective
• The establishment of towns with industrial and
  agricultural functions across rural Turkey.
• A policy intervention that facilitates changes in
  the socioeconomic structure and cultural values
  of the rural population.
• Agents in this transformation
• Politicians have similarly been obsessed with the
  idea of rural socioeconomic development
• emphasizing the role of small urban centers in
  this process

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Evaluating Failure in Village Towns

• None of the Village Town projects produced
  desired outcomes. There are a number of factors
  that caused this outcome
• an unstable political environment of some 20
  years,
• ignorance of the socioeconomic structures in
  project areas,
• impractical program design
• failures to accurately evaluate the importance of
  local citizen participation for the success.
• As a result most of the projects failed as soon
  as they began.

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Rational (Top-down model)

• Effective implementation is required
• Getting people to do what they are told
• Deliberately excluding all emotions and
  motivations
• A good chain of command
• A healthy system of control and communications
• A system of resources to do the job
• Minimizing conflict and degeneration
• But everything degenerates in the hands of men
• When do things go right?

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Criticisms to the Rational Model

• Implementation is not a perfect line of causation
  (x causes y)
• There is too much emphasis on the definition of
  goals from the top (rather than role of workers
  on the line)
• This model excludes any consideration of how real
  people actually behave
• Implementors make policy as well (discreation)
• The interaction of bureaucrats with their
  clients at street level
• Is it right for teachers and police to make
  policy?
• Interpretation of rules

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Michael Lipskys street-level bureaucracy model

• Lipskys book entitled Street-level Bureaucrats
  (1980) has been viewed as the leading challenge
  to the top-down model of policy implementation
  models and the starting point of bottom-up model.

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Michael Lipskys street-level bureaucracy model

• Lipsky argue(s) that public policy is not best
  understood as made in legislatures or top-floor
  suites of high ranking administrators, because in
  important ways it is actually made in the crowded
  offices and daily encounters in street-level
  workers.
• And the street-level bureaucrats, the routines
  they establish, and the devices they invent to
  cope with uncertainties and work pressures,
  effectively become the public policies they carry
  out. (Lipsky, 1993, p. 382)

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Michael Lipskys street-level bureaucracy model

• Lipsky underlines that in implementing policy at
  street level, front-line workers are confronted
  with conflict and ambiguities. These may include
• Inadequate resource and unsatisfactory working
  condition, e.g. large classes for teachers, huge
  caseloads for social workers, dangerous and
  hostile neighborhood for police officers.
• Unpredictable, uncooperative, skeptical clients
• Unclear and ambiguous job specification and
  guidelines.

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Michael Lipskys street-level bureaucracy model

• Confronted with these inadequacies and
  uncertainties, street-level bureaucrats derive
  coping strategies or even survival strategies to
  deal with the unaccommodating working situations.
  
• Lipsky point out that in daily client-processing
  routines, street-level bureaucrats in fact have
  considerable amount of powers and discretions at
  their disposal, which may lead to substantial
  deviations from, if not complete alterations of,
  official and top-down policy specifications.

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Alternative Models (Elmore)

• Forward Mapping (top-down)
• Control over people and resources are not enough
  for successful implementation
• is only a myth
• Not the nature of the implementation process
• Backward Mapping (bottom-up)
• What really important is the relationship between
  policy makers and policy deliverers
• Begin at the phase when the policy reaches its
  end-point
• Then analyze and organize policy by taking into
  account organizational and political environments

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Policy-action continuumProblems

• conflicts over values, issues, and preferences
• network of activities and actors
• negotiations, bargaining, and compromise

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Policy-action continuumProblems

• values and belief systems as well as
  professionalism of actors
• policies may deliberately be made ambiguous

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Implementation failureCauses

• different values, perspectives and priority of
  organizations
• policies altered through process of delivery
• best bargainers (negotiators) get what they want

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Implementation failureCauses

• hierarchical control difficult to obtain
• lack of capacity to mobilize target population
• powerlessness of government
• underestimation of complexity and difficulty of
  coordination

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Implementation failureCauses

• resistance from bureaucrats and officials
• gap or breakdown between tasks and agencies
• changes in the environment beyond the direct
  control of policy makers

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Synthesis

• The top-down and bottom-up synthesis approach It
  characterizes theoretical orientations perceiving
  implementation as process of constituting
  coalition, structuration, networking, learning or
  institutionalization, within which various
  parties in a specific policy domain/area strive
  to realize a policy, program or project.

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Implementation as a Political Game

• Conflict is not dysfunctional
• On the contrary, it is essential in acquiring and
  maintaining power
• Deal-making is acceptable
• Bargaining and persuasion under conditions of
  uncertainty
• Actors are trying to win as much control as
  possible
• Groups and individuals seek to maximize their
  power and influence during implementation
• Self-interested people playing games
• Bardach, The Implementation Game Book (1977)
• Blurring of boundaries between politics and
  bureaucracy

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Implementation as Evolution

• Top-down and bottom-up models oversimplify
  complexity
• Implementation is constrained by the
  institutional context and the world around the
  institution
• It is an iterative bargaining process between
  policy enacters and resource controllers
• Emphasis on power and dependence, interests,
  motivations and behavior
• Policy is something which evolves and unfolds
  over time

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"you can't take politics out of analysis.
(Deborah Stone)
What worksis about what works when, where, how,
and from whom. (Wayne Parsons)
Policy implementation is the social construction
of reality it is a process of meaning making
through interpretation. ( Dvora Yanow)
Source H. Gottweis - SoSe 2oo8
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PUBLIC POLICY AND GLOBALIZATION

• Source Bonser et al., 2000.
• Chapter 6

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Globalization

• A process of integration and interdependence
• Old wine in new bottles?
• Merchants, crusades, explorers, colonialism?
• Wider embrace of democracy and free markets
• Changes in transportation and communication
  technologies
• Fragmentation of the production processes

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CONQUESTS OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT, 334-323 BC
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Marco Polos Travels, 1271-1297
Route of Marco Polo, Circa 1271-1297 CE
                                                  
                                                  
                                                  
                                                  
                                                  
                                                  
                         
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Globalization

• The next step after nation-states?
• Regional trading blocks and alliances
• EU, NAFTA, Pacific Rim (ASEAN)
• Free Trade/ Easier flow of people and capital?
• Better quality with less prices?
• Increased competition and restructuring

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From the European Economic Community to the
European Union
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Global Institutions

• Economical
• WB, IMF, WTO
• Political
• International Court of Human Rights, etc.
• Social
• Global brands Similar consumption patterns?

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How opening up new markets affects people's lives
here and abroad?

• Critics charge that
• Globalization only benefits corporations that
  relocate factories in countries with cheap labor
  and weak environmental laws
• Worsening working conditions abroad
• Polluting the environment
• Threatening American jobs

• Proponents say
• Transformation of the manufacturing industry
• Free trade is the key to improving living and
  working conditions in developing countries
• Creating high-paying jobs in the U.S.
• Protecting the global environment.

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Upcoming Global Issues

• Productive vs. Speculative Capital
• Global Financial Crisis
• Nation-less multinational corporations
• Global warming
• International Criminal Court
• Controlling population growth
• Global Organized Crime and Terrorism
• One global language?

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Global comparisons

• http//www.eurunion.org/profile/EUUSStats.htm
• http//www.eurunion.org/profile/facts.htm

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