Lecture 1
Examples of public policy in action:
-Duterte (president of lippine) singing LPG industry regulation act
-Con ict between Poland and European Union-> policy con ict
-COP26 in Glasgow (summit for climate change)
-cyber crimes
Policy helps us to: set goals and invent solutions, allocate means to achieve solutions, coordinate
e orts to work on solutions, divide tasks gov and non-gov, make government prevedibile
(otherwise it wouldn’t be a democracy), in uence behavioural change
Two prospective on public policy
Positivist take: focus on facts and proofs, be bounded rationality because people understand
rational things, behave according to interest (self-pro t), institutional constraints (historical
institutionalism so how policy making in the past a ects present policy making), technocratic
aspects prevail, rely on scienti c expertise, interested in causality
Constructivist take: not one truth fact or proof, all aspects of policy making are debatable,
informations are never complete (guesses, hunches, expectations…), strategy: manipulation of
information-> doesn’t have to be a bad thing (you have a goal in mind and you have a strategy to
achieve that goal), in communities self-interest and altruism co-exist, interpretations are more
powerful than facts
Lecture 2
What is public what is policy and what is public policy?
1) the public element
: something opposed to private, physical (library, parks, buildings), social category
(government, political movement) collectivity: BLM, su ragettes, public event
(commemoration of RBG), concern (conversation between people about a subject), public
opinion
Public as a collective that gathers to deal with matters of public concern
John Dewey: “the public snd its problem”-> public= “all those who are a ected by the transaction
(= mutual and reciprocal in uence of individual on each other) to such an extent that is delved
necessary to have those to those consequences systematically cared for”
Interaction and reciprocal in uences
Example of public: social moments, NGOs, citizens initiatives, democratic governments,
sometimes private actors for instance cybercrime
Debora Stone:
- Public= community, public concern= public interest, in politics (addressing public matters) there
will never be agreement (because a lot pf organs are involved), hence pools is very political:
communities struggle over the public interest
- Common problems: public and private interest oppose each other in polis (coal re power
plant: power for private families + polluting the environment)
- Commons problems: self-interest and public interests coming together
- Most policy problems are commons problems due to broader e ects then intended
-
Complexity of the public interest: common problems are power struggles, leavers of power:
in uence, cooperation, loyalty, strategic control of information (Stone)
2) the policy element:
Polity= context within rules and policies are made
Politics= who gets what, when, why, how-> what: competition over resource, who: at other
expenses, how: nature of political power
1
fffl fl fi fl fl fi fl ff fi ff fl ff ff fi
, Birkland: what is public policy-> oriented to a problem, decision made on the public behalf,
oriented to a goal or to reach a desired state, ultimately made by a government actors than
government, what the government chooses to do or not to do (but people and the public can
in uence the government)
B:“A statement by the government of what it intends to do about a public problem”
K & T: “a course of action (or non-action) taken by a government or legislature with regard to a
particular issue”
-> public element is missing in K & T
-> B focuses on statements, k&t on actions
Tradition of policy sciences: problem and solution oriented, multi-disciplinary prospectives, call
oriented
3) public policy as process
k&t: policy variation and change-> RATIONAL PROSPECTIVE
State a clear goal, analyse all possible means on costs and bene ts, choose the most e cient
alternative
-> critique by Kingdon and Stone: limited individual information process capacity, the goals are
not always so clear, policy making are not a neatly order process
INCREMENTAL PROSPECTIVE: policy-makers have bounded rationality, look at limited new
information, make small adjustment-> seems to work for relative simple existing policy problems
(i.e. tra c regulation)
GARBAGE PROSPECTIVE: policy making as partial uid, chaotic, anarchic, incomplete;
preferences are not held but revealed trough action, action re ect immediate responses instead of
well-de ned goals
FOUR STREAMS: problems (have a problem need a solution), solution (have a solution and look 4
a problem), participant ( ow in and out carry problem or solution), choice opportunities (when it
occurs used as dump for few problems)
Lecture 3
What are institutions?
- Organised structure of political and governmental system (electoral system, political parties,
state bureaucracy)
- Mid 1980s: new institutionalism with focus on formal rules (constitution, administrative law, rule
of law, dimensions of power) and informal rules (cultural side of government)
1) important actors
- THE EXECUTIVE: administration-> cabinet with a prime minister and several ministers, state
secretaries-> power to propose policies and allocate public spending lower times: state
government
- THE LEGISLATIVE: elected in politician in parliament or municipal council-> 3 important
functions: represent electorate control the executive, propose legislation rules and policy
- THE JUDICIARY: various types of courts, 2 important tasks: review administrative action based
on lawsuit, act as constitutional court to check rules against the constitution
- THE BUREAUCRACY: ministries, municipalities, authorities, civil servants, make and
implements policies
2) role of the formal rule
Constitution:
- k&t: constitution= most essential institution (fundamental rules of government, de ne practical
system)
- Rules of government, de ned political system
- Separation of power (trias politica) to avoid high concentration of power (executive taken over
legislation, political role judiciary, politicians interfere with court cases)
2
fl ffi
fi flfi fl fl fi fi ffi
, The rule of law: idea that administration is always bound by law, whatever the government is
allowed to do is base on legality principle, without this legal basis government wouldn’t be able
too make an implement policy-> make government predictable
Administrative law:
- impartiality principle-> government decisions need to be impartial
- Right to be heard-> parties with interest in decision should be heard
- State reasons-> government always share reasons for decision
- Detournement de pouvoir-> government always use power for reason conferred to them
Equality principle: decision should treat people equally
Legal certainty: government decisions should be clear and understandable
Honouring legitimate expectations
Proportionality: government decisions should not a ect people beyond state goal
Two views on admin justice:
- recourse objectives: check if governmental organisation acted lawfully, citizens as instruments
for court to check legally government behaviour
- Recours subjectives: focus on the individuals’’ legal protection, check if legal position actor is
violated
Lecture 4
1) liberty and freedom
Stone:
- liberty= independence and autonomy caused by not being restrained-> perception as
individuals
- freedom= independence or autonomy depends on relationship to other people and
committees-> sociological notion on system freedom
Berlin:
- negative liberty: freedom from interferences by other people, freedom from fear
- positive liberty: processing power and resources to ful l your potentials-> freedom from want
Positive liberty depends on negative liberty being constrained by your own ideas or habits->
negative liberty might interfere with positive liberty
From liberty to citizenship:
- negative and positive liberty captured in extension of rights
- To understand the need concept of citizenship that is essentially contested
-
Isin & Nyers: 2 dimensions-> rights and duties, performance by citizens
P.H. Marshal: when you are a citizen of a country you have a lot of rights (in theory equal)
CIVIL RIGHTS: personal security, access to justice, freedom to make contracts, freedom of
conscience and choice (developed from 17th century onwards, from the 20th century extended to
large population portion, fundamental to other rights, side they de ne negative liberties)
POLITICAL RIGHTS: personal rights, organisation rights, membership rights (took more to
develop-> results of hard struggle between social movements and the government)
SOCIAL RIGHTS: enabling rights (health care), opportunity rights (education), redistributive rights
(tax-unemployment compensation); those rights were developed during the wake of the welfare
state in the 60s
UNIVERSAL RIGHTS: civil, politic and social rights are citizenship rights they are universal rights
and apply to everyone, sometimes they are conditional
DUTIES: conscription, taxation, participation
3
ff fi fi
Examples of public policy in action:
-Duterte (president of lippine) singing LPG industry regulation act
-Con ict between Poland and European Union-> policy con ict
-COP26 in Glasgow (summit for climate change)
-cyber crimes
Policy helps us to: set goals and invent solutions, allocate means to achieve solutions, coordinate
e orts to work on solutions, divide tasks gov and non-gov, make government prevedibile
(otherwise it wouldn’t be a democracy), in uence behavioural change
Two prospective on public policy
Positivist take: focus on facts and proofs, be bounded rationality because people understand
rational things, behave according to interest (self-pro t), institutional constraints (historical
institutionalism so how policy making in the past a ects present policy making), technocratic
aspects prevail, rely on scienti c expertise, interested in causality
Constructivist take: not one truth fact or proof, all aspects of policy making are debatable,
informations are never complete (guesses, hunches, expectations…), strategy: manipulation of
information-> doesn’t have to be a bad thing (you have a goal in mind and you have a strategy to
achieve that goal), in communities self-interest and altruism co-exist, interpretations are more
powerful than facts
Lecture 2
What is public what is policy and what is public policy?
1) the public element
: something opposed to private, physical (library, parks, buildings), social category
(government, political movement) collectivity: BLM, su ragettes, public event
(commemoration of RBG), concern (conversation between people about a subject), public
opinion
Public as a collective that gathers to deal with matters of public concern
John Dewey: “the public snd its problem”-> public= “all those who are a ected by the transaction
(= mutual and reciprocal in uence of individual on each other) to such an extent that is delved
necessary to have those to those consequences systematically cared for”
Interaction and reciprocal in uences
Example of public: social moments, NGOs, citizens initiatives, democratic governments,
sometimes private actors for instance cybercrime
Debora Stone:
- Public= community, public concern= public interest, in politics (addressing public matters) there
will never be agreement (because a lot pf organs are involved), hence pools is very political:
communities struggle over the public interest
- Common problems: public and private interest oppose each other in polis (coal re power
plant: power for private families + polluting the environment)
- Commons problems: self-interest and public interests coming together
- Most policy problems are commons problems due to broader e ects then intended
-
Complexity of the public interest: common problems are power struggles, leavers of power:
in uence, cooperation, loyalty, strategic control of information (Stone)
2) the policy element:
Polity= context within rules and policies are made
Politics= who gets what, when, why, how-> what: competition over resource, who: at other
expenses, how: nature of political power
1
fffl fl fi fl fl fi fl ff fi ff fl ff ff fi
, Birkland: what is public policy-> oriented to a problem, decision made on the public behalf,
oriented to a goal or to reach a desired state, ultimately made by a government actors than
government, what the government chooses to do or not to do (but people and the public can
in uence the government)
B:“A statement by the government of what it intends to do about a public problem”
K & T: “a course of action (or non-action) taken by a government or legislature with regard to a
particular issue”
-> public element is missing in K & T
-> B focuses on statements, k&t on actions
Tradition of policy sciences: problem and solution oriented, multi-disciplinary prospectives, call
oriented
3) public policy as process
k&t: policy variation and change-> RATIONAL PROSPECTIVE
State a clear goal, analyse all possible means on costs and bene ts, choose the most e cient
alternative
-> critique by Kingdon and Stone: limited individual information process capacity, the goals are
not always so clear, policy making are not a neatly order process
INCREMENTAL PROSPECTIVE: policy-makers have bounded rationality, look at limited new
information, make small adjustment-> seems to work for relative simple existing policy problems
(i.e. tra c regulation)
GARBAGE PROSPECTIVE: policy making as partial uid, chaotic, anarchic, incomplete;
preferences are not held but revealed trough action, action re ect immediate responses instead of
well-de ned goals
FOUR STREAMS: problems (have a problem need a solution), solution (have a solution and look 4
a problem), participant ( ow in and out carry problem or solution), choice opportunities (when it
occurs used as dump for few problems)
Lecture 3
What are institutions?
- Organised structure of political and governmental system (electoral system, political parties,
state bureaucracy)
- Mid 1980s: new institutionalism with focus on formal rules (constitution, administrative law, rule
of law, dimensions of power) and informal rules (cultural side of government)
1) important actors
- THE EXECUTIVE: administration-> cabinet with a prime minister and several ministers, state
secretaries-> power to propose policies and allocate public spending lower times: state
government
- THE LEGISLATIVE: elected in politician in parliament or municipal council-> 3 important
functions: represent electorate control the executive, propose legislation rules and policy
- THE JUDICIARY: various types of courts, 2 important tasks: review administrative action based
on lawsuit, act as constitutional court to check rules against the constitution
- THE BUREAUCRACY: ministries, municipalities, authorities, civil servants, make and
implements policies
2) role of the formal rule
Constitution:
- k&t: constitution= most essential institution (fundamental rules of government, de ne practical
system)
- Rules of government, de ned political system
- Separation of power (trias politica) to avoid high concentration of power (executive taken over
legislation, political role judiciary, politicians interfere with court cases)
2
fl ffi
fi flfi fl fl fi fi ffi
, The rule of law: idea that administration is always bound by law, whatever the government is
allowed to do is base on legality principle, without this legal basis government wouldn’t be able
too make an implement policy-> make government predictable
Administrative law:
- impartiality principle-> government decisions need to be impartial
- Right to be heard-> parties with interest in decision should be heard
- State reasons-> government always share reasons for decision
- Detournement de pouvoir-> government always use power for reason conferred to them
Equality principle: decision should treat people equally
Legal certainty: government decisions should be clear and understandable
Honouring legitimate expectations
Proportionality: government decisions should not a ect people beyond state goal
Two views on admin justice:
- recourse objectives: check if governmental organisation acted lawfully, citizens as instruments
for court to check legally government behaviour
- Recours subjectives: focus on the individuals’’ legal protection, check if legal position actor is
violated
Lecture 4
1) liberty and freedom
Stone:
- liberty= independence and autonomy caused by not being restrained-> perception as
individuals
- freedom= independence or autonomy depends on relationship to other people and
committees-> sociological notion on system freedom
Berlin:
- negative liberty: freedom from interferences by other people, freedom from fear
- positive liberty: processing power and resources to ful l your potentials-> freedom from want
Positive liberty depends on negative liberty being constrained by your own ideas or habits->
negative liberty might interfere with positive liberty
From liberty to citizenship:
- negative and positive liberty captured in extension of rights
- To understand the need concept of citizenship that is essentially contested
-
Isin & Nyers: 2 dimensions-> rights and duties, performance by citizens
P.H. Marshal: when you are a citizen of a country you have a lot of rights (in theory equal)
CIVIL RIGHTS: personal security, access to justice, freedom to make contracts, freedom of
conscience and choice (developed from 17th century onwards, from the 20th century extended to
large population portion, fundamental to other rights, side they de ne negative liberties)
POLITICAL RIGHTS: personal rights, organisation rights, membership rights (took more to
develop-> results of hard struggle between social movements and the government)
SOCIAL RIGHTS: enabling rights (health care), opportunity rights (education), redistributive rights
(tax-unemployment compensation); those rights were developed during the wake of the welfare
state in the 60s
UNIVERSAL RIGHTS: civil, politic and social rights are citizenship rights they are universal rights
and apply to everyone, sometimes they are conditional
DUTIES: conscription, taxation, participation
3
ff fi fi
