Public Policy Design and Analysis
Course description
The course offers an in-depth analysis of the issues involved in policy development in various fields, based on the international classical and modern relevant literature. As a product of the political system, public policies interact with society, ideas, values and beliefs and need legitimation. Different theoretical perspectives on agenda-setting, decision-making procedures and relations between the political-administrative system and the institutional and social environment, interest groups, etc., are examined in order to provide a comprehensive understanding of the scientific inquiry around factors potentially influencing the policy cycle.
The course is designed to:
- deepen the understanding of the policy process
- attitudes in the context of state-society relations[s1]
- develop awareness of the controversies around policy choices
- foster a critical perception of decision-making processes, beyond their formal-legal expression
- build the capacity of students for empirical investigation based on a theoretical inquiry
- familiarize them with the relevant international literature.
Contents
- Introduction. Public policy: the general frameworks
- The emergence of public policy. Agenda setting processes
- Legitimation, Rhetoric and Framing of public policies
- Decision and Non-decision. Rational model and incrementalism
- Policy implementation
- Factors of success and failure
- Normative, intellectual and cognitive frames
- Policy instruments
- Policy change, transfer and diffusion
- Public policy and interest groups
- State, networks and governance
- Policy types and typologies. Policy style
- New institutionalism and public policy
Learning outcomes
Successful completion of the course provides students with:
- understanding of the processes and mechanisms of policy formation in the context of state-society relations
- capacity to analyze the factors affecting implementation, success or failure and policy change
- capacity to formulate research questions regarding specific policies
- capacity to handle a wide range of foreign language literature on related topics.