Policy Analysis
POSC 315
Week 9
Overview
- General Concepts of Policy Analysis
- Outputs and Outcomes
- Role of Policy Analysis in the Policy Process
- Causation
- Brief History of Policy Analysis
- Role of the Policy Analyst
- Modern Policy Analysis
- Let's Try It!
General Concepts of Policy Analysis
Outputs and Outcomes
Outputs
- The measurable things an agency or org. produces
- The effort gov't expends to address problems
- e.g., # of traffic signals installed, # of people served by a program, # of people arrested
- e.g., laws, regulations, programs, services, etc.
Outcomes
- The intended or unintended consequences of gov't action
- The effect of gov't action on the problem
- Difficult to measure and hard to quantify
- e.g., reduction in traffic accidents, reduction in crime, reduction in poverty
Policy Analysis in the Policy Process
- The use of analytic tools, often from operations research, statistics, and economics, in order to assess the consequences of policy alternatives—to predict outcomes from expended outputs.
- Useful to predict how a policy may adapt to new conditions and changing circumstances and interests.
- It asks, "How does the effort expended cause a particular outcome?"
Causation
- Causation is the relationship between cause and effect.
- Conditions for Cause and Effect
- Cause must precede effect
- Cause and effect must be related
- No other factor can explain the relationship
Causation
Positive and Negative Relationships
- Positive relationship: the higher the value of one variable, the higher the value of the other variable
- Negative relationship: the higher the value of one variable, the lower the value of the other variable
- No relationship: the value of one variable does not affect the value of the other variable
A Brief History of Policy Analysis
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Muller v. Oregon (1908)
- The liberty protected by Due Process of the Fourteenth Amendment is not a bar to Oregon's compelling interest in protecting women's health through restricted working hours.
- What does this have to do with policy analysis?
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Empirical knowledge for gov't policy expanded as social science disciplines and law were professionalized in the early 20th century.
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Increase in policy advisors in the 1930s and 1940s and especially after WWII.
A Brief History of Policy Analysis
Harold Laswell on the Principles of Policy Science
- Orientation toward problem solving based in theory and empiricism
- Policy sciences are multidisciplinary
- Politics matter because values matter "[In] a democracy, decisions are made in a political system in which values are as important as neutrally derived facts."
A Brief History of Policy Analysis
A Policy Science
- An applied science
- Deals with major policy issues
- Requires interdisciplinary inquiry
- Empirical and based in sophisticated theory
- Dedicated to improving public policy through improved information and policy discourse
A Brief History of Policy Analysis
- Analysts were in high demand by the time of the Great Society programs of the 1960s.
- Practitioners drew from a wide range of academic disciplines, especially economics.
- ... for a "rational" way of making policy to overcome the "messiness, contingency, and sometimes irrationality fo politics as a system for defining problems and framing solutions."
- Computers were employed to assist in forecasting and modeling.
Role of the Policy Analyst
Analytical Integrity Responsibility to Clients Adherence to One's Concept of Good
| Objective Technician Let analysis speak for itself. Primary focus should be predicting consequences of alternative policies. |
Clients are necessary evils; their political fortunes should be secondary considerations. Keep distance from clients; select institutional clients whenever possible. | Relevant values should be identified but trade-offs among them should be left to clients. Objective advice promotes good in the long run. |
| Client's Advocate Analysis rarely produces definitive conclusions. Take advantage of ambiguity to advise clients' positions. |
Clients provide analysts with legitimacy. Loyalty should be given in return for access to privileged information and to political processes. | Select clients with compatible value systems; use long-term relationships to change clients' conceptions of good. |
| Issue Advocate Analysis rarely produces definitive conclusions. Emphasize ambiguity and excluded values when analysis does not support advocacy. |
Clients provide an opportunity for advocacy. Select them opportunistically; change clients to further personal policy agenda. | Analysis should be an instrument for progress towards ones' conception of the good society. |
Role of the Policy Analyst
Eugene Bardach's Eightfold Path
- Define the problem
- Assemble some evidence
- Construct the alternatives
- Select the criteria
- Project the outcomes
- Confront the trade-offs
- Decide
- Tell your story
Modern Policy Analysis
Two Logics of Policy Making
Economic Rationality of Policy Analysts
- Application of economic logic to political phenomena as a way to bypass the "messiness" of politics
- Transparent assumptions
- Consistent methods to compare alternatives
Modern Policy Analysis
Two Logics of Policy Making
Political Rationality of Policy Makers
- Policy makers are not rational actors
- Strategic use of information
- Release favorable information and suppress unfavorable information
Modern Policy Analysis
Two Logics of Policy Making
Which is Right?
- Both are right, but they are not the same
- Policy makers are not rational actors, but they are not irrational either
- Policy makers are not always strategic, but they are not always naive either
- Politics is full of paradoxes and contradictions that are not amenable to economic logic
Modern Policy Analysis
A Need to Understand the Political Context
- It can explain policy outcomes that might not otherwise make sense
- It can help to design effective democratic institutions or refine existing ones
- Analysts can operate more effectively if they understand the political context
Modern Policy Analysis
Analysis as a Profession
- The field has evolved over the past 50 years
- The field is now more professionalized and specialized
- The field is more diverse and interdisciplinary
- Technical skills are still essential but no longer the leading motivation driving the field
- Analysts are active participants in the policy process
Let's Try It!
"Horse Rich and Dirt Poor"
- The problem: "Horse rich and dirt poor"
- The goals:
- The alternatives:
- The criteria:
- Observed outcomes:
- Policy performance: