As you plan reading lists for the coming academic year, this collection of recent articles offers fresh insights for units on emotions in public policy, the politics of environmental policy, and governance networks. Each article draws on cutting-edge empirical research combined with conceptual innovation, making them ideal for both undergraduate and postgraduate modules exploring the politics of policymaking.
We hope these suggestions save you time and effort in mining recent articles while ensuring your course materials reflect the latest research from the frontiers of the discipline.
by Thomas Bolognesi, Eva Lieberherr and Manuel Fischer
In our recent article published in Policy & Politics, we investigate the formation of policy preferences, which are critical in the policy process as they primarily drive policymakers’ choices and, consequently, policy design. Therefore, understanding policy preferences is essential for understanding policy design. To define policy preferences, we draw on bounded rationality and complexity theory. To explain policy preference formation, we explore two key mechanisms: the willingness to solve a given problem and affiliation with a particular group. Our central question is to determine the extent to which each mechanism influences policy preferences.
Our analysis reveals that each actor’s policy preference is a specific point within a broader policy preference space, which is defined along multiple policy dimensions (see Figure 1). We use the case of the water sector in Switzerland to measure these three interconnected concepts. By performing a principal component analysis on 39 variables representing choices of policy instruments or organisational structures, we identify four distinct policy preference dimensions: regional planning, privatisation, public financing, and flexible inter-municipal collaboration.
To explain the specific preferences of water policy stakeholders within these four policy preference dimensions, we estimate the role of their water policy goal priorities and affiliations. Goal priorities might include cost saving, security of supply, and resource protection. Affiliations considered in the policy process include different administrative levels of the state or the type of participating actors, such as water suppliers or interest groups. We account for regional specificities to limit the impact of the local context of water governance on our estimates.
Our results provide detailed insights into how the willingness to solve a problem and group affiliation affect preference formation. They reveal two distinct patterns. First, preferences along the policy dimensions are significantly associated with a single goal priority, indicating that actors tend to share a common perspective on how to address specific problems. For instance, the preference for privatisation is negatively associated with infrastructure as a goal priority, while public financing is positively associated with security of supply as a primary policy goal. Conversely, various actor types are significantly associated with policy preference dimensions, confirming that there is collective positioning along these dimensions. Additionally, we find that the more central the policy dimension, the stronger the effect of affiliation on individual positioning. Combining these two effects explains the emergence of policy preference spaces and the diversity among individuals’ preferences.
Our research has significant policy implications. It highlights that a few key policy dimensions, such as the public-private debate in the water sector, shape the policy preference spaces. We also emphasise that the willingness to solve a problem and affiliation with a group influence preference formation through different mechanisms, with variations arising from different levels of analysis (preference dimension, space, individual). This insight is crucial for framing policy change and fostering effective collaboration. Methodologically, we offer a replicable approach to analysing policy preferences that facilitates comparability across cases and enhances the relevance of measurements by being both deductive and inductive.
You can read the original research in Policy & Politics at Bolognesi, T., Lieberherr, E., & Fischer, M. (2024). Identifying and explaining policy preferences in Swiss water management. Policy & Politics, 52(3), 384-411 from https://doi.org/10.1332/03055736Y2023D000000004
If you enjoyed this blog post, you may also be interested to read: Hornung, J., & Bandelow, N. C. (2024). Social identities, emotions and policy preferences. Policy & Politics (published online ahead of print 2024) from https://doi.org/10.1332/03055736Y2024D000000036
Are anti-corruption instruments adopted to tackle existing problems or do they contribute to making new corruption risks visible? Policy sciences originally conceived of public policies as means to solve pressing public problems, such as corruption. However, scholars have demonstrated that policymaking is far more messy and complex, with policy problems and solutions often existing autonomously. In my article recently published in Policy & Politics entitled “Can policy instruments shape the policy problems they aim to solve? How interest registers redefined conflicts of interest”, I investigate this question by examining how policy solutions (here interest registers for parliamentarians) contribute to (re-)defining public problems (conflict of interest). Research has pointed to numerous actors and factors that contribute to the construction and definition of public problems. Examples of these include social movements, interest groups, political parties, experts or news organisations. But, I argue, policies themselves also contribute to the construction of policy problems.
Transnational policymaking is an interesting context in which to study the impact of policy instruments on problem definition. Policymakers often import policy ideas from abroad – for many reasons, as Umut Aydin wrote in a previous post of this blog. And policy instruments are not always (and even rarely) transferred into a new country because the latter faces the same well-defined problem as the source country. The pathways that policies take before reaching new jurisdictions can be complex. With the rapid transnationalisation of policymaking, it is important to better understand the impact of policy transfer on problem representations in ‘importing’ countries.
Updating your course reading lists? Check out our essential reading recommendations on evidence-based policymaking, policy learning in multi-level and crisis contexts and the representation of diverse identities in public policy
It’s that time of year again to update your course syllabi with the latest research. Here at Policy & Politics, we hope to make that job easier for you by providing suggestions for teaching three important and timely themes in your policy courses.
Our first theme, showcasing three articles, is evidence-based policymaking (EBP). Of interest to students and scholars alike, our articles on EBP span a variety of perspectives that challenge mainstream views and showcase new angles on how EBP affects policy process dynamics. They should all lead to interesting classroom discussions and assignments about the meaning and validity of EBP.
The next three articles in our collection tackle different aspects of policy learning – an ever-popular topic with students and scholars alike, according to our readership data! These selected articles advance the dialogue on this important topic by exploring how learning may be fostered or constrained by multi-level governance structures and in crisis contexts.
by Robert Ralston, Charlotte Godziewski and Lauren Carters-White
How can obesity policy move away from individual-centred blaming or nudging and meaningfully address the political-economic root causes of poor diets? For many health inequalities researchers, policy instruments that regulate industry are seen as a promising way to target those root causes. More than a simple tweak, such policy instruments are implicitly expected to finally move public health policy away from a focus on individual responsibility characteristic of neoliberal governance. But is a change in policy instrument – even a substantive one – capable of sparking change in the underlying policy paradigm? Does proposing structure-targeting instruments (eg. industry regulation) necessarily mean that policymakers now think differently about the policy issue? This is the puzzle we explore in our article recently published in Policy & Politics entitled The many meanings of policy instruments: exploring individual and structural determinants in obesity policy. Our research focuses on the case of the UK’s 2020 Tackling Obesity Strategy. This strategy has been welcomed precisely because it proposes ‘harder’ regulation of commercial actors. While this may sound promising to many, we argue that the Tackling Obesity Strategy unfortunately lacks the radical change of past strategies.
The idea that public policy should be informed by scientific knowledge has great appeal. There is a growing understanding among politicians, the media and the public that decision making—especially on complex issues such as climate change and biodiversity—must include a scientific evaluation of the underlying problems and the available solutions. The reasoning is that, without science, public policies are most likely doomed to be irrational or ideological or both. To dissociate themselves from such “bad policy making” and to express their commitment to science in the policy process, policy makers and analysts have come to adopt the slogan “evidence-based policy” (EBP). Continue reading →
Sarah Ayres, Steve Martin and Felicity Matthews, Co-editors of Policy & Politics
New virtual issue from Policy & Politics: Working with citizens and changing behaviours
In this month’s virtual issue we showcase our latest research on the topic of the state working with citizens and changing behaviours. As governments grapple with the longer-term implications of the COVID-19 pandemic, invoking behavioural change will be a key measure in the easing of lockdowns and the maintenance of social distancing, Against this backdrop, the articles below provide a series of instructive lessons. Continue reading →
Arno Simons
Sarah Ayres, Steve Martin and Felicity Matthews,
Policy & Politics Journal Blog 