Policy Analysis, Development and Implementation

SW815, Section 001

A policy is 1) an idea, which is 2) a guide to action and which 3) is approved by legitimate authority. It exists on the individual level (a will, for example, or New Year's Resolutions posted on the fridge) as well as at community, organizational and societal levels. This course focuses on two general areas of relevance to policy. One is the substance of policy (policy realms). The other is policy process - the transformation of problems, issues and ideas into policy options, the making of policy decisions, the translation of policy into program and the evaluation of policy/program elements and impacts. Each area has its own issues, but they come to-gether as well (some realms ma, for example, have different policy process structures than others. Realms will be considered, among others, are male violence, social exploitation, control of substances (alcohol), self harming behavior, the right to die, personal owner-ship of scarce organs (kidney, etc.) and parenting. A focal policy idea - the parents license - will be used to illustrate some of the value conflicts in policy creation that make the policy makers lot not a happy one. Other issues - such as "How does 'something' become a 'problem' needing 'policy' anyway"? will be considered.

In terms of policy process, a template involving problem, option, decision, implementation and evaluation will be applied. This phase model has interphase and intraphase issues of importance. In addition, attention will also be paid to the role of policy history, and policy purveyors (policy analysists, policy partisans, policy makers, policy evaluators) in policy realms and processes.