by Katherine E. Smith

In this article, author Katherine E. Smith revisits Scotland’s landmark smokefree public places legislation to ask not only how policy change occurred, but how it was actively made. Drawing on a 2024 witness seminar with ministers, civil servants, advocates and researchers, the article builds a collectively constructed, retrospective account of how this major reform was developed, designed and implemented.  

Existing analyses, particularly those based on Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Framework and Punctuated Equilibrium Theory, are broadly supported. As Smith shows, a policy window opened as problem, policy and political streams aligned, while wider shifts in policy image and venue helped enable a significant punctuation in tobacco policy. However, the article’s central contribution lies in demonstrating that these theories under-specify the policy work through which such conditions are produced and translated into outcomes. 

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