PUBLIC POLICY
G53.2371
Fall 2003
Tuesdays, 6:20-8:20PM
726 Broadway, Room 700
Prof. Lawrence M. Mead
Department of Politics
726 Broadway #765
Phone: (212) 998-8540
E-mail: LMM1@nyu.edu
Hours: Tues 3-5 PM or by Appointment
This is an advanced course on policymaking in the American federal government. Students are presumed to have some prior background in policy, either through employment or prior study. This course is aimed mainly at graduate students planning to do policy research for their Masters projects or Ph.D. dissertations.
I have two objectives. The first is to teach, or to review, leading theories of policy analysis and the policymaking process at an advanced level. The second is to teach an approach to public policy research that connects policy analysis with political analysis. In the policy literature, these subjects are usually separate. But in my conception, one first develops a position about how best to solve some major public problem, on the merits, and then goes on to analyze why actual policy falls short of that ideal. A tension is expected between desirable policies and political and institutional constraints. Each is understood and critiqued in terms of the other.
The readings including leading examples of policy research that make this connection. Students will write papers developing their own research topics.
Readings
The course will use these texts, in about this order. All are on sale at the book store and also on reserve at Bobst. Buy as many as you are able:
Michael Howlett and M. Ramesh, Studying Public Policy: Policy Cycles and Policy Subsystems, 2nd ed. (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 2003).
Michael C. Munger, Analyzing Policy: Choices, Conflicts, and Practices (New York: Norton, 2000).
Deborah Stone, Policy Paradox: The Art of Political Decision Making, revised ed. (New York: Norton, 2002).
John W. Kingdon, Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies, 2nd ed. (New York: Longman, 2003).
Graham T. Allison and Philip Zelikow, Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis, 2nd ed. (New York: Addison Wesley Longman, 1999).
Allen Schick, with the assistance of Felix LoStracco, The Federal Budget: Politics, Policy, Process, revised ed. (Washington, DC: Brookings, 2000).
C. Eugene Steuerle, Edward M. Gramlich, Hugh Heclo, and Demetra Smith Nightingale, The Government We Deserve: Responsive Democracy and Changing Expectations (Washington, DC: Urban Institute Press, 1998).
Derek Bok, The Trouble With Government (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001).
In addition, for students with a limited background in federal institutions and policy processes, I recommend:
James E. Anderson, Public Policymaking: An Introduction, 5th ed. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003).
In the course schedule below, required assignments come mostly from the above books. Some additional articles and selections are also assigned. A few of the latter are followed by web addresses; these are available over the internet for free. Note that you must download these on your home computer and printer; using the Politics Department printers is not allowed. All other additional articles and selections are on reserve at Bobst. A copy of these articles and selections may also be purchased at New University Copy and Graphics, 11 Waverly Place, phone 212-473-7369. The recommended items are not on reserve or on sale, but most of them can be found at Bobst.
Requirements
There will be a midterm and final examinations, which will each count 20 percent of the grade. There will also be a paper of about 20 pages, due at the end of the course, in which students work out a study design for an actual research project in public policy. The assignment will be distributed later. This paper will count 40 percent of the grade. The remaining 20 percent will be given for participation in class.
Schedule
The following are the dates of each session, with the subject and readings for each. Readings must be completed before class to profit from the discussion and contribute to it:
Sept. 2, Introduction: The Policy Approach: The development of the policy field. An approach to policy research stressing both policy analysis and political analysis. Contrast to other approaches:
Required:
Howlett and Ramesh, ch. 1.
Lawrence M. Mead, ÒPublic Policy: Vision, Potential, Limits,Ó Policy Currents (newsletter of the Public Policy Section of the APSA), February 1997: 1-4.
Dennis J. Palumbo, ÒBucking the Tide: Policy Studies in Political Science, 1978-1988,Ó in Policy Studies Review Annual, Volume 10: Advances in Policy Studies Since 1950, ed. William N. Dunn and Rita Mae Kelly (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1992), ch. 2
Recommended:
Paul Sabatier, "Political Science and Public Policy," PS, vol. 24, no. 2 (June 1991), pp. 144-7.
Yehezkel Dror, Public Policymaking Reexamined (Scranton, PA: Chandler, 1968), chs. 1-2, 14.
William T. Gormley, Jr., "Institutional Policy Analysis: A Critical Review," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, vol. 6, no. 2 (Winter 1987), pp. 153-69.
Sept. 9, The Economic Paradigm 1: How economists understand the goals of government, and criticisms of this approach.
Required:
Howlett and Ramesh, Studying Public Policy, ch. 2.
Munger, Analyzing Policy, chs. 2-4, 8, 12.
Stone, Policy Paradox, chs. 1-5.
Recommended:
Charles W. Anderson, "The Place of Principles in Policy Analysis," American Political Science Review, vol. 73, no. 3 (September 1979), pp. 711-23.
Ronald Coase, ÒThe Problem of Social Cost,Ó Journal of Law and Economics, vol. 3, no. 1 (1960), pp. 1-44.
Richard O. Zerbe, Jr., and Howard E. McCurdy, ÒThe Failure of Market Failure,Ó Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 18, no. 4 (Fall 1999): 558-78.
Sept. 16, The Economic Paradigm 2: The economic approach to the optimization of policy, and criticisms of it:
Required:
Howlett and Ramesh, Studying Public Policy, chs. 4, 7.
Munger, Analyzing Policy, chs. 1, 9-11.
Stone, Policy Paradox, introduction, chs. 7-8, 10-14.
Recommended:
Amitai Etzioni, ÒMixed Scanning: A ÔThirdÕ Approach to Decision-Making,Ó Public Administration Review, vol. 27 (1967), pp. 385-92.
John Forester, ÒBounded Rationality and the Politics of Muddling Through,Ó Public Administration Review, vol. 44 (1984), pp. 23-30.
Charles E. Lindblom, "The Science of 'Muddling Through'," Public Administration Review, vol. 19, no. 2 (Spring 1959), pp. 79-88.
Aaron Wildavsky, Speaking Truth to Power: The Art and Craft of Policy Analysis (Boston: Little, Brown, 1979), pp. 1-25, 41-85.
Sept. 23, The Policy Process: The stage model of policymaking, and recent criticisms of it. The critical role of political appointees. Implementation and evaluation.
Required:
Howlett and Ramesh, Studying Public Policy, chs. 3, 5-6, 8-11.
Kingdon, Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policy, chs.1-2, 4-5, 7, 10.
Recommended
Malcolm Goggin, Ann OÕM. Bowman, James P. Lester, and Laurence J. OÕToole, Jr., Implementation Theory and Practice: Toward a Third Generation (New York: HarperCollins, 1990), introduction, ch. 1.
Paul A. Sabatier, ÒThe Need for Better Theories,Ó in Theories of the Policy Process, ed. Paul A. Sabatier (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1999), chap. 1.
Sept. 30, Policy Advocacy: How policy entrepreneurs form and sell policy solutions, the most global form of policy analysis. Experts as entrepreneurs. The case of airline deregulation.
Required:
Munger, ch. 5.
Kingdon, Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies, chs. 3, 6, 8.
Paul A. Sabatier and Hank C. Jenkins-Smith, ÒThe Advocacy Coalition Framework: An Assessment,Ó in Theories of the Policy Process, ed. Paul A. Sabatier (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1999), ch. 6.
Stephen Breyer, Regulation and its Reform (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982), ch. 16.
Recommended:
Hugh Heclo, "Issue Networks and the Executive Establishment," in The New American Political System, ed. Anthony King (Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute, 1978), ch. 3.
Richard R. Nelson, The Moon and the Ghetto, New York: Norton, 1977; chs. 1-3.
Oct. 7, The Politics of Policy: Lowi's types of policy and other approaches to understanding the politics aroused by policymaking. The question of how easily interests can mobilize:
Required:
Stone, Policy Paradox, ch. 9.
Theodore J. Lowi, "American Business, Public Policy, Case Studies, and Political Theory," World Politics, vol. 16 (July 1964), pp. 677-715.
James Q. Wilson and John J. DiIulio, Jr., American Government, 6th Ed.(Lexington, MA: D.C. Heath, 1995), ch. 15.
Mancur Olson, The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971), introduction, ch. 1.
James Q. Wilson, Political Organizations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), pp. vii-xxiv.
Recommended:
Theodore J. Lowi, "Four Systems of Policy, Politics, and Choice," Public Administration Review, vol. 32, no. 4 (July/Aug. 1972), pp. 298-310.
George D. Greenberg et al., "Developing Public Policy Theory: Perspectives from Empirical Research," American Political Science Review, vol. 71, no. 4 (Dec. 1977), pp. 1532-43.
Oct. 14, Bureaucracy: The powerful influence of organization on policymaking:
Required:
Allison and Zelikow, Essence of Decision, chs. 1-7.
Michael D. Cohen, James G. March, and Johan P. Olsen, "A Garbage Can Model of Organizational Choice," Administrative Science Quarterly, vol. 17 (March 1972), pp. 1-25.
Recommended:
Jonathan Bendor and Thomas H. Hammond, "Rethinking Allison's Models," American Political Science Review, vol. 86, no. 2 (June 1992), pp. 301-22.
James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, ÒThe New Institutionalism: Organizational Factors in Political Life,Ó American Political Science Review 78 (1984): 734-49.
Oct. 21, Midterm examination
Oct. 28, Budgeting: The evolution of the federal budget process. The federal deficit problem and the politics thereof. Recent developments.
Required:
Schick, Federal Budget, chs. 2-6, 9, 11.
Office of Management and Budget, ÒBudget System and Concepts and Glossary,Ó Budget of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 2004: Analytical Perspectives (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2003), pp. 455-77 (www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2004/pdf/spec.pdf).
Recommended:
Anthony Downs, "Why the Government Budget is Too Small in a Democracy," World Politics, vol. 12 (1960), pp. 541-63.
V.O. Key, Jr., ÒThe Lack of a Budgetary Theory,Ó American Political Science Review, vol. 34, no. 6 (December 1940), pp. 1137-44.
Allan H. Meltzer and Scott F. Richard, "Why Government Grows (and Grows) in a Democracy," The Public Interest, no. 52 (Summer 1978), pp. 111-18.
Nov. 4, Entitlement Reform: The question of how to reorient spending for major social benefits to respond to changing social and economic conditions.
Required:
Steuerle et al., The Government We Deserve, chs. 1-6.
Aaron Wildavsky and Naomi Caiden, The New Politics of the Budgetary Process, 3rd ed. (New York: Longman, 1997), ch. 7.
Congressional Budget Office, ÒA 125-Year Picture of the Federal GovernmentÕs Share of the Economy, 1950-2075Ó (http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=3521&sequence=0)
Recommended:
Henry J. Aaron and Robert D. Reischauer, ÒPaying for the Elderly Population,Ó in Setting National Priorities: The 2000 Election and Beyond, ed. Henry J. Aaron and Robert D. Reischauer (Washington, DC: Brookings, 1999), chap. 6.
R. Kent Weaver, ÒControlling Entitlements,Ó in The New Direction in American Politics, ed. John E. Chubb and Paul Peterson (Washington, DC: Brookings, 1985), ch. 11.
Nov. 11, Governmental Performance: How to improve the performance of the federal government in several areas of domestic policy.
Required:
Bok, The Trouble with Government, introduction, chs. 1, 3-7, 11-13.
Recommended:
Derek Bok, The State of the Nation: Government and the Quest for a Better Society, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996.
Harold L. Wilensky, Rich Democracies: Political Economy, Public Policy, and Performance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002).
Nov. 18, School Reform: The substance and politics of federal education standards in the nationÕs schools.
Required:
Diane Ravitch, ÒThe National Agenda in Elementary and Secondary Education,Ó in Setting National Priorities: The 2000 Election and Beyond. ed. Henry J. Aaron and Robert D. Reischauer (Washington, DC: Brookings, 1999), ch. 8.
Kevin R. Kosar, ÒNational Education Standards and Federal Politics,Ó chs.1, 3, 8-9 (http://www.kevinrkosar.com).
Recommended:
Diane Ravitch, National Standards in Education: A CitizenÕs Guide (Washington, DC: Brookings, 1995), ch. 1.
Joseph P. Viteritti, Choosing Equality: School Choice, the Constitution, and Civil Society (Washington, DC: Brookings, 1999), chs. 1, 3.
David C. Berliner and Bruce J. Biddle, The Manufactured Crisis: Myths, Fraud, and the Attack on AmericaÕs Public Schools (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1995), chs. 2-3.
Nov. 25, Student
Presentations: selected members of the class will present summaries of
their papers on the definition of public policy research topics.
Dec. 2, Student Presentations: selected members of the class will present summaries of their papers on the definition of public policy research topics.
Dec. 16, Final examination, 6:20-8:20 PM, 726 Broadway, room 700.
Papers due no later than the final exam.