1. Chapter 8: policy design, policy tools, and decisions
An Introduction to the Policy Process
Chapter 8: policy design, policy tools, and decisions

2. What happens “after” agenda setting
Policy design
Decision making about which policy designs—”tools”—to adopt
Again, these don’t happen in any particular order
Decisions and policy design are ongoing
Implementation includes ongoing decision making and redesign

3. Some general concepts First, consider that all policies have goals
Goals are related to outcomes
What is the difference between a policy output and an outcome?
What is an outcome?
What is a goal?
What are unintended outcomes?
Why do they happen?
Policy design and implementation influence each other

4. Policy design and implementation
Choices made in design influence implementation
Policy design continues during implementation
Experience will change design
Experience can change appreciation of problems

5. Preparing to Design Policy
Problems
Goals
Efficiency as a goal
Conflicting goals
Liberty versus security
Ambiguity and goal conflict
Proper causal theory
Policy tools
Policy targets

6. Table 8.1: Elements of Policy Design
Questions to ask
The goals of the policy
What are the goals of the policy? To eliminate a problem? To alleviate a problem but not entirely eliminate it? To keep a problem from getting worse?
The causal model
What is the causal model? Do we know that, if we do X, Y will result? How do we know this? If we don’t know, how can we find out?
The tools of the policy
What tools or instruments will be used to put the policy into effect? Will they be more or less coercive? Will they rely more on incentives, persuasion, or information? Capacity building?
The targets of the policy
Whose behavior is supposed to change? Are there direct and indirect targets? Are design choices predicated on our social construction of the target population?
The implementation of the policy
How will the program be implemented? Who will lay out the implementation system? Will a top-down or bottom-up design be selected? Why?
Table 8.1: Elements of Policy Design

7. Problems Something we can do something about
Is something a problem?
Or is it a condition about which we can do little?
We learn about problems through
Changes in indicators of problems
Sudden, harmful or frightening focusing events
Problems are not obvious and self-evident
Problem definition is contested
Problem definition shapes the solutions to problems

8. Policy goals What we want policy to achieve Deborah Stone’s goals
Equity
Efficiency
Security
Liberty
Are these goals immediately obvious?

9. Goals are contested Stone: eight ways to “equally” divide a cake!
Equality in America defined by
Equal opportunity
Equal outcomes
Which of these goals dominates in the United States?
Which of these dominate in social democracies, such as Sweden?

10. Efficiency The classic economic definitions
Getting the most output for the least input
Getting more output for the same input
Getting the same output for the least input
Problems of efficiency in policy
What are the inputs?
What are the outputs? How do we measure these?
What do we do when an output becomes an input to a subsequent process?
Policy making is not a market transaction—it’s a social process

11. Conflicting goals: security and liberty
The “Hobbesian” tradeoff: to get more security, we have to surrender some liberty
Is this true? How do we know this?
Whose liberty is being restrained?
Whose security is being promoted?
Is the tradeoff “worth it”?
A key point here is that, for example, the Bill of Rights is intended to protect and promote everyone’s freedom in civil society, not just the liberties of criminal suspects. The Bill of Rights is a further restraint on state action, not individual action. But the state still can restrict liberty in many ways.

12. Ambiguity and goal conflict
Policy design
Reveals goal conflict
Reveals conflicts over means to achieve goals
Example: How do we lower the teen pregnancy rate?
Think about how we might do this
Would all methods be equally acceptable to everyone?
How would decision makers overcome this impasse?

13. Ambiguity and goal conflict
Conflict with other policies’ goals
Examples:
Illegal immigration policy versus relations with Mexico
Aviation safety versus oil companies’ proprietary information
These conflicts are not hopeless! They are complex.

14. Proper causal theory Needed to measure outcomes
Causal theory shapes policy tools
The concern of agencies and professionals
Sometimes implicit in statutory design
Poor causal theory can yield policy failure
Stone: causal theories are often outlined in “causal stories”
Causal stories sometimes shape policy design
But what if the causal stories are “wrong”?
More on casual stories in Chapter 6 and in Table 6.1

15. POLICY TOOLS

16. On what dimension can we assess policy tools?
The extent to which a policy tool involves more coercion or more incentives
Are all policies just one or the other?
Is there an ideological dimension to policy tool choice?
If so, does ideology influence the causal story behind problems?
Does the nature of the causal story influence potential tool choice
Keep all this in mind when we talk about decisions

17. Salamon and Lund’s Dimensions of Policy Tools
Description
“The nature of activity in which government is engaged”
“outright money payments”
“provision of goods and services, including information“
“legal protections, such as monopolies or guarantees”
“restrictions/penalties,” such as regulation or criminal laws.
“Structure of the delivery system”
Direct – Federal gov’t is sole actor
Indirect – Provision through an intermediary
“Degree of centralization”
Centralized: Social Security
Decentralized: Forest Service, Park Service
“Degree of automaticity”: “the degree to which [programs] require detailed administrative action”
More automatic: Tax incentives
Least automatic: Welfare, other entitlements
This is a summary of the discussion in the book. It’s not a table in the book itself. I found this table to be an effective way to work through Salamon and Lund’s ideas in a concise way.

18. Bennett and Howlett on policy tools
An economic model of policy tools
Favor individual freedom and choice
Therefore tend to favor noncoercive rules
Coercion to correct economic errors, such as income tax
A political model of policy tools
“Any instrument [or tool] can theoretically accomplish any chosen aim, but governments prefer less coercive instruments unless forced by either recalcitrance on the part of the subject and/or continued social pressure for change to utilize more coercive instruments.”
Think about the provisions of the health care bill—are some provisions more or less coercive? Why?

19. Tools and choices in policy design
Technically sound design does not trump politics
Tools choice is constrained by resources
Tools are based on behavioral assumptions about policy targets
Targets: entities whose behavior policy will alter
Effects choices about, for example, more or less coercive policies
Multiple policy tools are used to achieve goals

20. DECISIONS

21. Overview of Decisions Matters can be complex, or simple
The Cuban Missile Crisis
A speeding ticket
Our constitutional system slows policy decision making
In this discussion: decisions are made “after” agenda setting—What do we do now?

22. Decision making “models” and assumptions
Rational Comprehensive
Analysis of goals and tools is separate
Goals isolated before tools are selected
Good policy is the technically best policy
All important factors considered
Heavy reliance on theory
Bounded Rationality
Goals and tools are “closely intertwined”
Means and ends (tools and goals) are not distinct
Good policy is one where consensus is reached on adoption
Analysis is limited
Successive comparisons “reduces or eliminates reliance on theory.”
Technical in this case does not mean “by the rules” or similar popular conceptions of the term—it means the best solution based in research and policy analytic knowledge.
This slide is really just a restatement of the table; Lindblom’s language can be a bit hard to penetrate for some students.

23. Rational comprehensive
Bounded rationality
1a. Clarification of values or objectives distinct from and usually prerequisite to empirical analysis of alternative policies.
1b. Selection of value goals and empirical analysis of the needed action are not distinct from one another but are closely intertwined.
2a. Policy-formulation is therefore approached through means-end analysis: First the ends are isolated, then the means to achieve them are sought.
2b. Since means and ends are not distinct, means-end analysis is often inappropriate or limited.
3a. The gist of a “good” policy is that it can be shown to be the most appropriate means to desired ends.
3b. The test of a “good” policy is typically that various analysts find themselves directly agreeing on a policy (without their agreeing that it is the most appropriate means to an agreed objective).
4a. Analysis is comprehensive; every important relevant factor is taken into account.
4b. Analysis is drastically limited: (i) Important possible outcomes are neglected; (ii) Important alternative potential policies are neglected; (iii) Important affected values are neglected.
5a. Theory is often heavily relied upon
5b. A succession of comparisons greatly reduces or eliminate reliance on theory.
Table 8.4: Rational Comprehensive Decision Making and Bounded Rationality

24. Incrementalism Based in notions of “bounded rationality”
People cannot process all information
We do the best we can with the information we can process
Decisions are made in increments, which allow for
“Successive limited comparisons”—that is, tests and adjustments of policy
Not having to separate means from ends, which could slow decisions

25. Problems with the theory of incrementalism
Bold steps = doing something in the face of demands or crises
Some decisions must be big leaps
Going to the moon
Starting wars
Addressing the Great Depression
Others?

26. Other models of decision making
Garbage can model (Cohen, March and Olsen)
Allison’s models in Essence of Decision
Rational actor model
Organizational process
Governmental politics
These models relate to what we’ve studied