Policy Sciences最新文献

This article examines the relationship between policy experiments, a form of policy innovation, and policy change. Despite a great deal of scholarship on experiments, little is known about how experiments lead to change. For example, what factors make change more likely? How can experimentation best be governed so as to lead to policy change? These questions are answered using data from a case study of 45 policy experiments in Canadian arts and cultural policy. The article highlight six factors crucial to enabling mainstreaming and scaling in this case: leadership, the scope of experiments, congruence with existing policy priorities, alignment with an existing modernization program, expanded relationships and stakeholder collaboration, and creative space. Each of these factors is linked to one or more of McFadgen’s (Ecol Soc 24:30, 2019) four pathways to policy change via policy experiments. The article’s findings have broader implications for the study and understanding of how to achieve change in risk-averse policy settings.

We explore emerging work around the relational dimensions of public policy. What constitutes a relational frame of analysis is a broad terrain, but some general tenets characterize these approaches, including the foregrounding of relationships between policy actors along with the idea that these relationships are, at least in part, constitutive of the role and identity of these actors. In fact, relationality has long been a feature of studies on policy processes and implementation. More recent scholarship in policy and public administration attempts to more systematically theorize and analyze relationality. This draws from the “relational turn” in sociology and other social sciences. After reviewing the relevant literature on relationality, we offer several propositions on the immediate relevance of the concept of relationality for policy studies. Short of accepting strong ontological and teleological claims regarding relationality and society found in the broader literature, there nevertheless is value in the systematic exploration of the relational dimensions of public policy—i.e., as a mode of description of the practice of policy in the everyday, and as a rich, new lens by which to understand institutions in society. While previous policy literature will acknowledge the relevance of the relational in policy life, there has yet to be a concerted effort to foreground relationship and relationality so as to be the primary focus of analysis.

Earlier conceptual studies suggest that policy bubbles differ from the more common pattern of policy overreaction due to their sustained, self-reinforcing nature, which results in prolonged overinvestment. Although the best way to analyze this phenomenon is through rigorous empirical investigation, such future endeavors require a guiding theory. This article lays the groundwork for a potential theory of policy bubbles by differentiating between micro-level causes, such as cognitive, emotional, and social network factors influencing individual behavior (e.g., whether a person’s friends are connected to one another), and macro-level causes, including institutional and ideational factors, as well as social network dynamics at the aggregate level, such as links density or segregation patterns. A similar distinction is made here between micro- and macro-level positive feedback processes, which may evolve independently, interact with one another, and exhaust themselves during the emergence of policy bubbles and in the lock-in stage. This stage is conceived here as a prolonged conflict between policy entrepreneurs who advance distorted or accurate policy images. This conflict at times involves the use of sheer power in authoritarian regimes, while in democratic ones it often entails strategic action by policy entrepreneurs via mutual reinforcement between policy overproduction and various forms of capture—constitutional, technological, cultural, and informational. These mechanisms are used by policy entrepreneurs to block bureaucratic drift, coalition drift, and drift of accountability forums that may lead to a decline in policy overproduction. If this theory results in conclusions that offer sufficient generalizations, it may have a place alongside the major theories of the policy process.

This research note explores how policymaking can manage the spill-over effects of digital and social infrastructures to support social cohesion, particularly in "left-behind places" (LBPs). While digitalization is often seen as a tool to reduce regional disparities, its implementation frequently neglects the critical role of social infrastructure, risking the reinforcement of existing inequalities. By synthesizing insights from urban development, governance, and digital inclusion literature, this research develops a conceptual policy-infrastructure framework that categorizes spatial and aspatial interventions. Examples such as digital health platforms and public libraries highlight the need to balance standardized digital solutions with localized, context-sensitive strategies. The findings emphasize the importance of flexible, participatory policymaking and stakeholder coordination to align digital initiatives with social infrastructure, fostering equitable and inclusive development across diverse regions.