How Do Crises Affect Policy Subsystems? The Evolution of Policy Core Beliefs in the EU Asylum Policy

Abstract

Crises, shocks, and perturbations are frequently considered turning points in public policy literature. The Advocacy Coalition Framework has become one of the most employed policy process frameworks, focusing on policy subsystems, belief systems and shocks as one of the drivers of policy change. Relying on a network approach, this article aims at analysing the EU asylum policy by exploring the prioritisation of policy core beliefs before, during and after the so-called refugee crisis. From a methodological perspective, discourse network analysis (DNA) is employed. The results show that the system of policy core beliefs has not stabilised in the aftermath of the crisis, implying a ‘conservative’ crisis response approach and short-term effects on the policy subsystem. The innovation of this article stands on the theoretical–analytical elaborations of some crisis management and public policy literature core concepts and the empirical testing of said concepts through an original dataset with DNA.