PUBLIC POLICY ANALYSIS DAY -1
The concepts and definition of Public and Policy: The dictionary meaning of policy is a norm or standard or rules or regulations. It is a guide, a course of action or set of principles. In popular statement, policy is whatever government says to do or not to do. It is the goal or the purpose of the government program. Definition of Public Policy: Public Policy has been defined differently by different policy experts, Scholars and economists: 1. Y. Dror defines public policies as "general directives on the main lines of actions to be followed"1. 2. Carl Frieddrichregards policies as "…… a proposed course of action of a person, group or a government within an given environment providing obstacles and the opportunities which the policy was proposed to utilize and overcome in an efforts to reach a goal or realized an objectives or purpose"2. 1. James Anderson stated policy be regarded as "a purposive courses of action followed by an actor or set of actors in dealing with a problem or a matter of concern"3. 2. David Easton defines public Policies as "the authoritative allocation of the values for the whole society".4 3. Thomas Dye states "public policy is what the government chooses to do or not to do".5 4. In Robert Lineberry's words "it is what governments do and fail to do, to and for their citizens".6
Main ideas underlining these definitions:
Public policies are the policies adopted and implemented by the public authorities,
Public policies are purposive courses of action, or public policies are the steps of activities government taken to achieve certain purpose.
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Public policy focuses on "the public and its problems".
Public policies reflect what the government decide to do and fails to do.
Y. Dror, Public Policy Making Reexamined, San Francisco, 1968. C. J. Friedrich, Man and his Government, New York, Mcgraw Hill, 1963. 3 James E. Andorson, Public Policy Making, New York: Praeger, 1975. 4 David Easton, The political System, New York: Knopf, 1953. 5 Thomas R. Dye, Understanding the Public Policy, Eaglewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 3 rd Edition. 1978. 6 Robert Lineberry, American Public Policy: What Government Does and What Difference It Makes, New York: Harper and Row, 1977. 2
Public policies are authoritative. They are binding in nature as said by Easton. It should be noted that all the public policies are not binding. Some policies may not be mandatory.
Easton connotes the distributive aspect of public policy. Although certain policies are allocative in nature in the sense they take resources from a segment of society and distribute them to others, but all the policies will not have allocative issues as for example regulatory policies such as those relating to the financial and banking institutions.
According to Hogwood and Gunn7 PP has different uses like:
As field of activity,
As an expression of desired state of affairs,
As a decision of the government (central, state and local),
As formal authorization (binding in nature),
As a program: Policy is program of action. (It’s implementation is based on program, projects, activities),
As output, it is output of a system or the political system or the public administration system,
As a model or theory, it consists of set of process,
As a process (Policy is process of series of interrelated steps),
Nature of Public Policies:
Policy may be explicit or implicit. Explicit policies are those policies which are open to all. Such policies are usually in the form of the written document like constitution, law, programs, projects, guidelines. Implicit policies are those which are not open to all. And these are familiar only to those who are in intimate concerned. There are certain government activities which require a great secrecy and commitment to secrecy must be a norm. These are implicit policies like defense policy.
Some policies may be written and some are unwritten and based on social norms, tradition and culture.
A policy may be narrow covering the specific activity like family planning. A public policy may be applied to all the people in the country, or it may be limited to a section of a people. Similarly some policies may be implemented in some specific area and some may in the whole country.
Some policies may be legally bindings like tax policies, constitution, and law or legal codes. Some policies may not be obligatory. Under the priority sector policy, the government has to provide easy access to institutional credit to the small farmers, women, poor, artisans. From the
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B.W. Hugood and L.A. Gunn Policy Analysis for the Real World, London, Oxford University Press, 1984.
perspective of the beneficiaries of the policy, this banking rule provides access and opportunities instead of issuing the commands that they must obey. 
Each level of government central, state or local may have its specific or general policy. Then there mega policies: the general guidelines to be followed by all the policies. The mega policies are like the master policies.
Public Policy Analysis (PPA) In the past, the studies on the public policy were dominated by researchers and the students of the political science. The concept of policy science was first introduced by Harold Lasswell in 1951. PP has been acquiring new dimension from the beginning of the academic pursuit. It has emerged as a new branch of social science with interdisciplinary dimensions. It is one of the important tools to measure effectiveness of a political institution. Or success or the failure of the government depend on the effectiveness of the government policy and program Public policy analysis is a multidisciplinary science. It incorporates the ideas and methods of economics, sociology, anthropology, history, law, public administration, mathematics, and statistics. It adds to the theoretical development of social science. The field of public policyanalysis has assumed a considerable importance in response to the increasing role of the government, increasing need and aspirations of the people and commitment made by the government in the global and regional forum. Along with others, the delivery of goods and services is one of the important functions of the government. Its ability in efficient delivery lies in making policies, executing them and doing policy reforms if necessary, based on the lesson learned. Policy education or policy study is important for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the delivery of the goods and the services. H. Lasswell8 stressed public policy analysis is important for improvising the democratic or the political capacity of the people and not simply the efficiency of service delivery. He termed the policy study (analysis) as public education which is necessary if democracy is to work for the interest of the general people.
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H. Lasswell, 1951, "The policy Orientation", in Daniel Lerner and H. Lasswell (eds) The Policy Sciences, The recent Development in scope and Methods, StandFord University Press.
It is not only concerned with explanation of the causes and consequences of the government actions, but also with developing scientific knowledge about the forces of shaping and implementing the policies. The policy study deals with substantive explanation of the policy issues, including policy making and implementation and evaluation of the policies.
As an applied social science, it uses multiple methods of enquiry and arguments to produce and transform policy relevant information that may be utilized for the policy problems.9
The acquisition and the dissemination of the information about the public policies have become the major theme in the social sciences. The use of such knowledge for making, managing, evaluating and doing policy reforms is generally termed as policy analysis.
Public policy analysis is a technique to measure the organizational effectiveness through the examination and evaluation of the effects of a program.
According to Thomas Dye observes (Dye, 1980) PPA involves the following:
It is taken as rigorous search for the causes and the consequences of public policies. Sophisticated scientific techniques have been used for making inferences about the causes and consequences of the policies. Based on the policy research findings, modules and theories are developed that are reliable and that apply to different government agencies and different policy areas. In the policy analysis various methods are used like:
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System analysis and simulation,
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Cost benefit analysis,
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New approaches to budgeting,
Dun, William N., Public Policy Analysis, Pentrice Hall, 1981.
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Policy experimentation and
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Policy evaluation.
PUBLIC POLICY ANALYSIS (PPA): MEANING AND STEPS
There has been considerable growth in research and training in policy since early 1970s in the developed countries. In these countries PPA has been substantially stimulated by the government increased concern for policy problems. And in the context of the developing countries its importance increased immensely though lately, because of government's concern for public welfare and organizational effectiveness and donor's concern for the effective use of resources which are used for implementing the policy/programs. PPA is policy Science which studies policy process. PPA is concerned with understanding how the policy process works. The acquisition and the dissemination of the information about the public policies have become the major theme in the social sciences. The use of such knowledge for making, managing, evaluating and doing policy reforms is generally termed as policy analysis. It ismultidisciplinary field of enquiry. It incorporates the ideas and methods of economics, sociology, anthropology, history, law, public administration, mathematics, and statistics. It adds to the theoretical development of social science.Different types of analytical tools are used in its study. Public policy analysis is a technique to measure the organizational effectiveness through the examination and evaluation of the effects of a program. Traditionally the subject of PPA has been dominated by political science, with the focus on institutional structure designed for policy making. PPA is the policy science and it emerged with the publication of Harold Lassel'sEssay on policy orientation in the policy science (1951)10. Laswell's vision of policy science was: 1. Multidiscilinary (Cross Cutting) 2. Problem oriented: PPA as an academic activity concerned primarily with understanding of policy process and policy analysis is an applied activity concerned mainly with contributing to the solution of problems11 10
Harold Laswell, " Policy Orientation " D. Lerner and H.D. Laswell (eds), Policy science (Standford University Press, 1951, p. 12
3. Explicitly normative As an applied social science, it uses multiple methods of enquiry and arguments to produce and transform policy relevant information that may be utilized for solving problems12. Anderson (1979) in his book Public Policy Making, stated Policy analysis is concerned with examination and description of the causes and the consequences of public policies, such as international trade and civil rights. According to Anderson PPA has three basic concerns:
Explanation of the policy process Study of causes and consequences of public policies, and Theorizing or in other words the efforts are made to develop reliable general theories concerning the public policies and their formulation.
According to Caputo PPA is a study of public policy as a goal of government action. According to him it seeks to get answer of the following questions:
What choices are made and why? What are the cost and benefits of those choices of the public policies? How shall policy be evaluated? Are the goals perused desirable ends? Are we actually accomplishing the goals?
But according to the comprehensive approach along with the above concern, PPA seeks to answer the following questions:
How the government decisions were reached? What governmental and non-governmental factors led the government to take decision? What is the impact of decision?
Steps in Policy Analysis: 1. Problem Analysis:problem identification and assessment of the symptom generally appears as background of policy analysis and it conveys relative importance and urgency of the problem. Understanding the problem related to relevant issue:
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Cristopher Ham and Michael Hill, The Process in the Modern Capitalist State, 1984, p. 4. Dun, William N., Public Policy Analysis, Pentrice Hall, 1981.
Identification of the problems relating to the concerned issues, Asses the symptoms of the problem and provide explanation on how they arise. Causes of the problems This is done by trying to locate the data that will help to define the symptoms in quantitative perspectives Qualitative information also serves the purpose in case of non availability of quantative data. Examination of the history of existing policies implemented to address the problems, in the national and the international context Different good sources of information: media, opinion poll, interaction with different stakeholders and study reports.
Example of the relatively lower enrollment of the girls in the school as identified problem:Low level of enrollment of boys/girls,
Difference by regions, caste/ethnicity, different economic groups Causes of variation: social/economic/cultural/religion Trend in the enrollment rates by caste/ethnicity, different economic groups over the years Examination of the current government interventions to enhance the enrollment of the girls. Reasons for low level of achievement despite the policy implementation, Gaps in the current policy/government interventions.
2. Modeling the Problem or theorizing: Modeling the problem means identifying the policy variables that can be manipulated to solve the problem. Or it means linking the policy variables to the problem. Example. 1: Identified problem—less revenue generation from VAT than expected. Let us suppose policy variables identified after in-depth study of the causes of the problem of less revenue generation from VAT as followed:
Increase in rate Increase in coverage, Improvement in tax administration.
Example. 2: Identified problem: Relatively lower enrollment of the girls in the school compared to the boys. Policy variables identified are: Increase in the awareness level of the parents, Giving incentives to the parents sending their daughters to school, Scholarships and other facilities for the girls, Increase in the income level of the parents,
Easy access to the drinking water facilities to the rural households, so girls are relieved from household works particularly fetching drinking water Construction of separate toilets for the girls and hiring more female teachers in the schools, Opening schools near to the settlement.
3. Specifying the policy alternatives: there are various sources for developing the policy alternatives.
Existing or current policy; Policies implemented in other jurisdictions; (other countries) Proposal designed by the interest groups or the pressure group/policy entrepreneurs to draw the attention to the policy problems and Proposal designed by NGOs/INGO/UN agencies and other institutions.
We can borrow the policy alternatives from other jurisdiction if they have handled the problem quite well. Many additional polices can be developed from the successful polices from other jurisdictions. The policy experts may also design the policy alternatives. While identifying the alternative it is necessary to find out whether the client (government organization or private institutions) has budgetary, administrative and other resources that alternative requires. Moreover the alternative should be consistent with available resources including the jurisdictional authority.Detail specification of policy alternatives that can potentially promote the policy goals. In order to predict the consequences it is necessary to provide clear and detail specification of the alternatives along with resource needs for implementation and implementation procedures. It is also necessary to identify how each of the alternatives contributes to each of the goals. It is appropriate to include the current policy also as policy alternatives to avoid the risk of recommending an alternative as the best, but that may be worse than the current policy. 4. Recommendation of the Best Alternatives This is most important step. Various methods are used for selecting the best policy alternatives. It is recommended to use the relevant model to evaluate each of the alternatives. As for example for forecasting the consequences of alternative water pollution control measures the analyst would have to build model of how the quality of water would respond to various types of pollution. Only then the analyst can forecast the possible consequences in terms of quality of
water and the degree of pollution control. In this case a model based on computer simulation is most appropriate. It should be noted that it is necessary to predicts all the effects of proposed policies, not just the economic effects. Sometime the estimated outcome of the proposed alternatives may be quite different amongst the alternatives. In that case the policy expert may develop a decision tree and evaluate the probability of each outcome on the basis of cost benefit analysis of each policy choice. In some cases like in the pollution control projects the relative cost and the benefits must be discounted. The cost may be very high to the government. The benefits may be enjoyed by one section of the community and may extend over many years. As for example the effects of the pollution control projects will extend over several years. Thus the relative and cost must be discounted while doing evaluation of the alternative policy choices. Along with these it is also important to identify the risk associated with each of the proposed projects. 5. Presenting Recommendation: While recommending the alternatives it is necessary to give clear statement of rational for selecting that particular alternative. Advantages and disadvantages of the recommended policy, what benefits can be expected, what will the cost, possible risks that deserve consideration. Along with these the analyst should work out on listing of the specific action the clients must take for implementing the recommended policies successfully. 6. Policy Implementation Arrangement:
It is also necessary to make decision on Planning for implementation arrangement of the selected policy Decision regarding the implementing agencies, (internal agencies, or external agencies or public in collaboration with other non governmental agencies, Implementation in partnership or in participation, Where, when and time coverage, Sources of funding, fund flow mechanism, and fund allocation in different activities or resource allocation, Organization design and modification if necessary, institutional changes, creation of new organization for implementation and Human resources development, Policy legitimization and constituency building,
Procedures, rules, regulations and enactment of laws and directives for implementation if necessary.
7. Policy Monitoring: Program for policy monitoring is also prepared along with policy preparation. Monitoring is done to track out the whether the required processes are followed or not. It is usually done to track out the progress in implementation, to find out the problems in implementation. Tracking these will facilitate learning and error correction which can help to avoid negative policy impact, Process monitoring is important to make sure that the policy managers and the implementing agencies are fulfilling their prescribed obligations and responsibilities. Output monitoring is important to make sure the intended goals are achieved within the stipulated time. 8. Policy Evaluation: It is another important stage of PPA.
Policy evaluation is usually done after program or policy completed implementation, or the program phase out. Policy evaluation is necessary to answer the following questions: Are the interventions reaching the targets groups? Is it being implemented in the specified ways? Has it achieved the intended goals? What are the unintended results? How much does it costs? Has the program creates the synergic effects? Has it been successful in addressing the problems? If not, what are the reasons for not addressing the problems?
9. Policy Restructuring: Adjustments, policy restructuring or modification of the public policy based upon the findings of the policy monitoring, evaluation or policy review.