Chris Painter

Birmingham City University

THE OXFORD HANDBOOK OF PUBLIC POLICY

Michael Moran, Martin Rein and Robert E. Goodin (eds)

Oxford University Press, 2008, 983pp., £27.50 (pb), ISBN: 978-0-19-954845-3

This collective work provides a fascinating insight into the state of the ‘science’, ‘art’

or ‘craft’ of policy analysis and multi-disciplinarity of the academic public policy

field. As one would expect from a Handbook of this nature, there are contributions

from many leading contemporary scholars. Although dominated by academics, there

is also the occasional input from a practitioner perspective on both sides of the

Atlantic, including one from a former Secretary of the Cabinet and Head of the Home

Civil Service in the UK - Richard Wilson.

Following a magisterial scene-setting introduction written by the Handbook’s

Editors, there are 43 further contributions, subdivided into 8 sections - covering

institutional and historical background; modes of policy analysis; producing public

policy; instruments of policy; constraints on public policy; policy intervention - styles

and rationales; commending and evaluating public policies; and concluding with

public policy, old and new.

For a Handbook of this kind there is a commendable degree of substantive

coherence in its contents, with the possible exception of the final part which is

disparate and seemingly random in its coverage. Thus, we traverse the methodological

considerations distinctive to policy research by contrast with basic research; the case

for focusing on ‘stateless’ small-scale or - at the opposite end of the spectrum -

international societies, as opposed to the well-trodden pre-occupation with national

governmental arenas able to make authoritative public choices; welfare state

development and ruptures with past practices, reflected in the shift from ‘protective’

to ‘market-friendly’ welfare systems (a change of emphasis led by the USA but

disseminated more widely); and the ‘new energy politics’ revolving around issues of

energy security and conservation.

The irony is that the final chapter by Klein and Marmor mounts a defence of

‘eclecticism’ in order to better understand and explain public policy - though in this

context eclecticism is being equated with ‘synthesization’. In the process, the authors

endeavour to return us to the basics of policy making in democratic polities, namely

the imperatives of legitimately gaining and maintaining the authority of public office.

One of the joys for this reviewer of delving into the Handbook were the further

encounters afforded with intellectual icons of policy studies and sciences. This

includes Graham Allison whose ‘Essence of Decision’ in the early 1970s provided a

seminal contribution to the intellectual evolution of the field. He traces the historical

roots of Schools of Public Policy, culminating in some reflections specifically on the

experience of the J.F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. One of the lessons

drawn from the challenges presented for his Deanship of that School resonates with

anyone who has faced the rigours of academic management:

‘…the centrality of the management team cannot be overemphasized. To the extent

that people can become part of such a team, they multiply the effects…The
temptation is to imagine that one can do it oneself or do better than one’s
colleagues. But even if one’s performance was consistently better than other
members of one’s team in any specific task, the multiplication that comes from a
second person and third and fourth far exceeds what any single person can do…’
(p.77).

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 Yehezkel Dror, as one would expect, is not lacking in visionary ambition, pursuing

the improvement of the ‘grand’ policy-making capabilities of our rulers and necessity

for a qualitative improvement in their performance given the increasingly fateful

choices before them. Rather audaciously, a ‘core curriculum’ for their training is

proposed, whilst acknowledging the practical obstacles in inducing senior policy-

makers to participate in such projects.

Rod Rhodes capitalizes upon his reputation for policy network analysis - how such

networks have come to be regarded as pivotal to managing difficult social problems.

He also, however, addresses the implications thereby presented for conventional

forms of public accountability and for effective co-ordination (given the distinctive

dynamics of indirect forms of management), along with the interesting phenomenon

of ‘dark networks’ associated with international terrorism.

Christopher Hood examines the impact of information and communications

technology on the public policy instruments used by government. He brings a critical

perspective to bear on the fashionable ‘transformative’ properties that many regard as

inherent in e-government given its theoretical potentiality for facilitating an

administrative revolution in the way public authorities relate to citizens.

More generally, this Handbook highlights the prevalence of harder-edged

economic analysis in the academic public policy field. The welfare economics

paradigm is particularly powerful bearing in mind how public policy entails the

allocation of scarce resources when making social choices. The systematic analysis

fundamental to maximization of social welfare is justifiable on that basis alone. But

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even Kevin Smith’s chapter on economic techniques accepts that much depends on

acceptance of the conception of social welfare that is the trade mark of welfare

economics (aggregating individual satisfactions and corresponding calculus of net

benefits).

The subsequent contribution from Wolff and Haubrich tackles more methodically

the limits of ‘economism’, how techniques such as social cost-benefit analysis run

into problems of valuation and incommensurability, so making inevitable the

contestability of their assumptions. It is the kind of critique all too familiar as long

ago as the mid-1970s, recalling an earlier demolition job on ‘econocracy’ (Self,

1975). Shue contends that policy choices, in any case, require normative judgements

about who and what matters/counts. Such ethical judgements are prior and

fundamental. Neta Crawford’s chapter on policy modelling in US foreign policy-

making and especially by US nuclear strategists, indeed, highlights the consequences

of ‘scientific seduction’ for the political-military discourse. Mathematical modelling

techniques such as systems analysis constructed - rather then merely mirroring -

reality, therefore constituting an independent variable in driving forward the nuclear

arms race.

That notion of scientific seduction provides a clue to an underlying and recurring

theme in many of the contributions to this Handbook - the retreat from ‘technocratic

hubris’ and the ‘rational instrumentality’ that was so integral to the heyday of policy

‘sciences’, not least bearing in mind the epistemological issues raised by such

positivistic approaches to policy analysis.

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 Accordingly, Winship calls for a mode of analysis factoring in multiple and

conflicting policy ends, as opposed to traditional concerns with identifying the best

means for attaining specified goals. Forester picks up on the importance of ‘critical

listening’ for environmental learning and insight this brings into multiple stakeholder

positions. In fact, a number of the Handbook chapters draw out the centrality of

‘nuanced’ and ‘softer’ analytical skills to successful policy-making.

Ingram and Schneider deal with other normative as opposed to positivistic

challenges, especially the conditions for fostering democratic values. In a

complementary manner, Fung addresses citizen engagement and the arguments for

additional deliberative and participatory mechanisms over and above the minimal

democratic device of elections to select representatives. Dryzek advocates a critical

analytical approach to social problems that is differentiated from both ‘technocratic’

and ‘accommodative’ policy analysis (the latter adopting similar frames of reference

to occupants of established centres of power).

Edward Page illuminates how policy is informed and influenced by political

system-specific characteristics. Majone’s attention is directed towards agenda control,

albeit more sceptical than some about the limitations imposed by international factors

in an era of globalization yet, again, arguing simultaneously that policy analysis has

tended to be too ‘state-centric’. Hajer and Laws concentrate on ‘ordering devices’ that

policy makers use to structure reality in a complex, uncertain and ambiguous world.

Susskind identifies deliberative, bargaining and consensus-building strategies for

dealing with public policy conflict. Bosch and Cantillon are interested in whether

policy makes a difference, when there are so many methodological difficulties

involved in establishing if any discernible impact occurs. Moreover, Bovens, Hart and

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Kuipers emphasize the extent to which evaluating what has been achieved is

inherently value-laden and contested. Whilst policy analysts can assist societal

learning through a reflective orientation, at the same time they must demonstrate

political astuteness and realism.

Elsewhere in the Handbook the complex dynamics of the policy process, our often

rudimentary understanding of those complexities, and indispensability of some trial-

and-error learning surface; as does the vital importance of different ways of thinking

about public policy learning, given the existence of profound uncertainties

compounded by the pace of global change. Martin Rein also reminds us of the extent

to which policy responses are shaped by the manner in which policy problems are

(re)framed, (re)defined and (re)constructed.

As Laws and Hajer point out, from the vantage point of practice, policy

implementation too is often better understood as an exploratory than an instrumental

process, given the trials and tribulations of coping with a complex and changing

reality. Friedman in relating policy analysis to organizational analysis indicates how

policy ultimately is affected by the behaviour of implementing agencies and how

organizations (increasingly including for-profit and non-profit third sector ones)

influence the design of policy itself. That provides the cue for Donahue and

Zeckhauser to analyse the contemporary scale of private actor involvement in public

undertakings. Another dimension to this particular debate, of course, is the

characteristics of the ‘regulatory state’ consequent upon transfers of ownership from

the public sector, in the context of which Scott explores the idea of ‘intelligent’

regulation.

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 Furthermore, a whole section of the Handbook is devoted to the various constraints

on public policy - economic; those attributable to structures of political power and

interests; the impact of institutional rules and procedures; social and cultural ones; and

- yes - the on-going debate about just how binding are constraints emanating from the

globalization process.

The recurring theme identified above is further reinforced by March and Olsen’s

lucid exposition of ‘logics of action’ other than rational instrumentality, drawing upon

the distinction between ‘the logic of consequentiality’ (calculative) and the ‘logic of

appropriateness’ (role expectations and rules/norms associated with discrete

institutional settings). And when Weiss and Birckmayer ruminate on the ‘evidence-

based policy’ debate with their contribution on social research and experimentation,

they nonetheless question the inflated expectations of proponents of this approach.

Many other considerations mould government action, with intractable policy issues in

the final analysis only susceptible to the political process.

Other contributions to the Handbook allude to how market fundamentalism and the

neo-liberal tide on which for example the rise to prominence of New Public

Management depended is now receding, with Christensen critically evaluating

whether NP-related reforms, anyhow, engendered ‘smarter’ policy by producing

efficient and effective outcomes. This raises more general propositions about the

opportunities created by radically changed circumstances, in so far as they shift the

boundaries of political feasibility. In retrospect Tony Blair’s post 9/11 speech as

Prime Minister to the 2001 Labour Party Conference is salutary:

‘The kaleidoscope has been shaken. The pieces in flux. Soon they will settle again.

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 Before they do, let us re-order the world around us’ (quoted in Seldon, 2007, p.
58).

What became of that ‘new world order’?!

Kleiman and Teles contend, moreover, that liberal principles should not be lightly

discarded. Although the institutions of the market-place and civil society can

engender sub-optimal outcomes, so can the consequences of state intervention. A

comprehensive policy analysis needs to take account of both kinds of failure. Even

Rawlsian principles of justice, with the ‘veil of ignorance’ as their reference point,

have to be tempered by the real world operation of political institutions.

Symptomatic of the eclipse of instrumental rationality, however, is the rise of

behavioural economics (its origins can be traced back to the 1970s) (see Kay, 2003),

dissenting as it does from the standard assumptions of that discipline, notably the

dominant paradigm of rational choice. Inductive observation of complex behavioural

and psychological patterns takes precedence over a priori reasoning and deductive

logic. Insights so derived can inform more subtle forms of public policy intervention

in pursuit of valued social outcomes.

Even more radical in its implications is the so-called ‘black swan’ syndrome, a

metaphor for unpredictable and inexplicable events which, along with deficits in

information and understanding, all too often afflict public policy-making (Taleb,

2007). The retreat from ‘technocratic hubris’ charted in the Handbook is tacit

recognition that such uncertainty is ubiquitous, graphically demonstrated recently by

the implosion of global financial markets, a contagion the magnitude of which caught

governments largely unawares.

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 The apprehension must be that fuller awareness of just how much there is over

which public policy-makers have little or no control will propel us to a position that is

a polar opposite of technocratic hubris and rational instrumentality, feeding a ‘counsel

of despair’ and deep scepticism regarding the efficacy of collective action on social

problems. If so, it will sow the seeds for yet another bout of confidence-sapping

introspection about the desirability of activist government, especially when readily

caricatured - in a networked era - as ‘statism’. Previous generations discovered to

their cost that this can have devastating consequences if markets suffer from systemic

malfunctioning. It is precisely in such circumstances that creative public policy is

most at a premium. These debates - one way or the other - are admirably illuminated,

implicitly or explicitly, by many of the contributors to The Oxford Handbook of

Public Policy.

REFERENCES

Kay, J. 2003. The Truth About Markets. London: Penguin, pp. 210-11.
Seldon, A. 2008.Blair Unbound, London: Pockett Books.
Self, P.1975. Econocrats and the Policy Process, London: Macmillan.
Taleb, N.T. 2007. The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, London:
Allen Lane.