PLC2602 Assignment 1 (COMPLETE ANSWERS) Semester 2 2024 (751936) - DUE 19 August 2024

PLC2602 Assignment 1 (COMPLETE ANSWERS) Semester 2 2024 (751936) - DUE 19 August 2024 ............ 100 % TRUSTED workings, explanations and solutions. For assistance call or W.h.a.t.s.a.p.p us on +/ 2/ 5/ 4 /7 /7 /9 /5 /4 /0 /1 /3 /2 . Assignment 01 Semester Two All information about when and where to submit your assessment is contained in this Tutorial letter 102 and will be made available to you via the myModules site for your module. Unique Number Due Date August All Enquiries may be submitted to: Lecturer: Prof AM Court E-mail: This assignment is compulsory and has to be submitted BEFORE THE FINAL DUE DATE for you to obtain admission to the examination. This assignment has two parts: Section A Multiple Choice Questions, and Section B Short Discussion Question. SECTION A: MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS QUESTION 1 Please indicate whether this statement is true or false. If public policy is the policy of government, it follows that public policy can be applied to even the most undemocratic forms of government such as totalitarianism and authoritarianism. a. True b. False PLC2602/102/3/2024 17 QUESTION 2 Which of the following are sources of public policy? Please select the correct option. a. Official discussion documents, green papers and white papers b. The national budget c. Policy statements, speeches and articles d. Election manifesto of a political party e. All of the above QUESTION 3 The third stage in the policy-making process is the formulation and decision-making stage. Policy decision-making is important because, as Anderson argues, policy decision involves action by some official person or body to approve, modify, or reject a preferred policy alternative. In most democratic dispensations, the legislature is responsible for final policy-decision-making. When a 50% + 1 majority of the legislature’s total membership is required to pass the legislation, what do we call this type of majority? Please select the correct option. a. Relative majority b. Loaded majority c. Special majority d. Absolute majority e. Effective majority QUESTION 4 Please indicate whether this statement is true or false. Dye argues that direct or tangible impact of policy can be judged by several means, including output measuring. The data generated by government departments about a policy programme are typically an indication of policy outputs and not impact. But in that case, this would mean that policy output data are the most important instrument for policy evaluation in most cases. a. True b. False PLC2602/102/3/2024 18 QUESTION 5 Please read the following scenario and answer the question. The United States government is proposing a domestic policy that is unpopular amongst public opinion. The government wants to pass legislation that protects women’s access to abortion as a human right under all circumstances within the first trimester of pregnancy. There is a difference between elite opinion and public opinion on this issue. Whereas a majority of public opinion is opposed to abortion except in the cases of rape and incest, elite opinion is overwhelmingly in favour of government’s proposed legislation, which does not place conditions on women’s right to decide during the first trimester of a pregnancy. The opinion amongst the elites is that without this legislation, it is far more likely that women will seek “backstreet” abortions - which are potentially life-threatening to mothers - if they are not granted the right to a medical procedure that terminates an unwanted pregnancy subject only to government’s one condition. In this case, the American government decides to pursue its policy goal despite the opposition to this policy goal reflected in public opinion. Policy analysts consider why government has chosen this path despite the political risk of pursuing an unpopular policy? One prominent scholar argues that this could be explained by the tendency of elite preferences to align with public policy preferences rather than with the public opinion of the population, moreover that elite opinion is more likely than public opinion to affect public policy. Which scholar makes this argument? a. Jan-Erik Lane b. Philippe Schmitter c. James E Anderson d. HK Colebatch e. J Smith Greenway QUESTION 6 The policy implementation stage follows the policy decision-making stage. Policy implementation is the responsibility of the political executive. Which one of the following institutions is most responsible for translating policy decision-making into operational rules and regulations? Please select the correct option. a. The judiciary b. The legislature c. The bureaucracy d. The ruling party e. The cabinet PLC2602/102/3/2024 19 QUESTION 7 Please select the sequence of words that correctly completes the following statement. There are several problems in policy evaluation. One of these, causality, is associated with the challenge of determining whether there is a correlation between (i) ............. and (ii).........., which means that it is often difficult to determine whether a policy can be directly credited with impacting the target groups of the policy and delivering the (iii) ............ in line with the policy goals. 1. (i) cause (ii) results (iii) effects 2. (i) cause (ii) effect (iii) results 3 (i) cause (ii) outcome (iii) effects 4. (i) cause (ii) expectation (iii) results QUESTION 8 Please read the following scenario and then answer the question. On 5 March 2020, South Africa recorded its first case of COVID-19. In response, the government formed a National COVID-19 Command Council responsible for taking government decisions on how to combat the spread of the virus. With the prospect of the rapid spread of the life-threatening virus, the government had to make a decision about how it would respond to the health emergency to save lives. Twenty-two days after the first COVID-19 case was reported, South Africa went into a “level-5” national lockdown. Movements of the population were restricted, businesses were closed, and services were suspended, except for essential services and suppliers of essential goods. As a consequence of this policy, unemployment rose dramatically as most citizens were unable to travel to work. The negative impact of this policy was experienced in its most extreme form amongst workers who depend on wages to support their families. Because the latter segment of the population constitutes the majority of the ruling party’s most loyal supporters, the unpopularity of the policy negatively affected political support for the government in the short-term during the health crisis. But if the government would not have adopted the lockdown policy, it is possible that even more people would have fallen ill and died. This could have had disastrous consequences not only for lives lost but also for the political support of the government in the longer-term. As a result, the government could have been voted out of power at the next general election. Identify which policy-making dilemma is described in this example. a. Making policy on highly technical issues b. Making policy in the absence of sufficient information c. Dealing with conflicting interests and values d. Making policy that can affect the government’s constituency e. Unintended consequences PLC2602/102/3/2024