PUBLIC POLICY : MEANING AND NATURE

1.1 INTRODUCTION Public policies are as old as governments. Whatever be the form, oligar~hy, monarchy, aristocracy, tyranny, democracy etc., - whenever and wherever governments have existed, public policies have been formulated and implemented. To cope with the ems and demands of the people the government has to make many policies, these policies are called public policies. This Unit tries to explain the meaning and types of public policy. It will highlight the different components of a policy and distinguish between policy, decision and goal. An attempt will be made to bring out the relationship between politics and policy, and importance and characteristics of public policy will also be discussed. 1.2 RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN POLITICS AND PUBLIC POLICY Before discussing the meaning of public policy, it would be better if we are clear about the relationship between public policy and politics. Policy making process is a part of politics and political action. According to Gabriel ! Almond, political system is a set of interactions having structures, each of which i performs its functions in order to keep it like an on-going concern, it is a set of processes that routinely converts inputs into outputs. Almond classifies illputs of F political system into generic functional categories like politica! sociali