MPP 801 PUBLIC POLICY PLANNING, IMPLEMENTATION AND EVALUATION

Model of Politics

Muhammad Ery Wijaya

 What is a Model
• What is a model?
• A ‘model’ is a simplified way of representing the
reality- a simple substitute of real system (Ford,
2009)
• Purposes of making models are different:
• Conceptualizing and understanding the system
• Testing our ideas
• Predicting the implications of or to system
Uses of Models
• The models we shall use in studying policy are conceptual models. These are word
models that try to:
1. Simplify and clarify our thinking about politics and public policy
2. Identify important aspects of policy problems.
3. Help us to communicate with each other by focusing on essential features of
political life.
4. Direct our efforts to understand public policy better by suggesting what is
important and what is unimportant.
5. Suggest explanations for public policy and predict its consequences
Selected Policy Models (1/2)
Over the years, political science, like other scientific disciplines, has developed a number of
models to help us understand political life. Among these models are the following:
1. Process model
2. Institutional model
3. Rational model
4. Incremental model
5. Group model
6. Elite model
7. Public choice model
Selected Policy Models (2/2)
• None of these models was derived especially to study public policy,
yet each offers a separate way of thinking about policy and even
suggests some of the general causes and consequences of public
policy.
• These models are not competitive in the sense that any one of them
could be judged "best." Each one provides a separate focus on
political life, and each can help us to understand different things
about public policy.
 Process: Policy As
Political Activity (1/2)

• Since World War II, modern

"behavioral" political science has
studied the activities of voters,
interest groups, legislators,
presidents, bureaucrats, judges,
and other political actors.
• One of the main purposes has
been to discover patterns of
activities or "processes."
Process: Policy As Political Activity (2/2)
• The process model is useful in helping us to understand the various
activities involved in policymaking. We want to keep in mind that
policymaking involves agenda setting (capturing the attention of
policymakers), formulating proposals (devising and selecting policy
options), legitimating policy (developing political support; winning
congressional, presidential, or court approval), implementing policy
(creating bureaucracies, spending money, enforcing laws), and
evaluating policy (finding out whether policies work, whether they
are popular).
Institutionalism: Policy As Institutional Output (1/2)
• Government institutions have long been a central focus of political science.
Traditionally, political science was defined as the study of government
institutions.
• Political activities generally center around particular government institutions-
Congress, the presidency, courts, bureaucracies, states, municipalities, and so
on. Public policy is authoritatively determined, implemented, and enforced by
these institutions.
• The relationship between public policy and government institutions is very
close. A policy does not become a public policy until it is adopted,
implemented, and enforced by some government institutions.
Institutionalism: Policy As Institutional Output (2/2)
• Government institutions give public policy three distinctive characteristics:
1. Government lends legitimacy to policies. Government policies are
generally regarded as legal obligations that command the loyalty of
citizens.
2. Government policies involve universality. Only government policies
extend to all people in a society.
3. Government monopolizes coercion in society-only government can
legitimately imprison violators of its policies
Rationalism: Policy As Maximum Social Gain (1/4)
• A rational policy is one that achieves "maximum social gain"; that is,
governments should choose policies resulting in gains to society that
exceed costs by the greatest amount, and governments should refrain
from policies if costs exceed gains.
• Rationalism involves the calculation of all social, political, and
economic values sacrificed or achieved by a public policy, not just
those that can be measured in dollars.
Rationalism: Policy As Maximum Social Gain (2/4)
• To select a rational policy, policymakers must:
1. Know all the society's value preferences and their relative weights,
2. Know all the policy alternatives available,
3. Know all the consequences of each policy alternative,
4. Calculate the ratio of benefits to costs for each policy alternative,
5. Select the most efficient policy alternative.
Rationalism: Policy As Maximum Social Gain (3/4)

A Rational Model of a Decision System The rational model assumes complete

agreement on goals, knowledge of alternative policies, and the ability to calculate
and select the policies with the greatest benefits and least costs.
Rationalism: Policy As Maximum Social Gain (4/4)
• However, there are many barriers to rational decision making:
1. Many conflicting benefits and costs cannot be compared or weighed; for example, it is difficult
to compare or weigh the value of individual life against the costs of regulation.
2. Policymakers may not be motivated to make decisions on the basis of societal goals but instead
try to maximize their own rewards-power, status, reelection, and money.
3. Uncertainty about the consequences of various policy alternatives compels policymakers to
stick as closely as possible to previous policies to reduce the likelihood of unanticipated
negative consequences
4. Large investments in existing programs and policies (sunk costs) prevent policymakers from
reconsidering alternatives foreclosed by previous decisions.
Incrementalism: Policy As Variations On The Past
(1/2)
• Political scientist Charles E. Lindblom first presented the incremental model in
the course of a critique of the rational model of decision making.
• Incrementalism views public policy as a continuation of past government
activities with only incremental modifications.
• According to Lindblom, decision makers do not annually review the whole range
of existing and proposed policies, identify societal goals, research the benefits
and costs of alternative policies in achieving these goals, rank order of
preferences for each policy alternative in terms of the maximum net benefits,
and then make a selection on the basis of all relevant information.
 Incrementalism: Policy As Variations On The Past
(2/2)

• They do this because they do not have the time, information, or money to investigate
all the alternatives to existing policy. The cost of collecting all this information is too
great. Policymakers do not have sufficient predictive capacities to know what all the
consequences of each alternative will be.
Group Theory: Policy As Equilibrium In The Group
Struggle (1/3)
• Group theory begins with the proposition that interaction among groups is the
central fact of politics. Individuals with common interests band together
formally or informally to press their demands on government.
• According to political scientist David Truman, an interest group is "a shared
attitude group that makes certain claims upon other groups in the society“.
• Individuals are important in politics only when they act as part of, or on behalf
of, group interests. The group becomes the essential bridge between the
individual and the government.
Group Theory: Policy As Equilibrium In The Group
Struggle (2/3)
• Politics is really the struggle among groups to influence public policy.
The task of the political system is to manage group conflict by:
1. Establishing rules of the game in the group struggle,
2. Arranging compromises and balancing interests,
3. Enacting compromises in the form of public policy, and
4. Enforcing these compromises.
 Group Theory: Policy As
Equilibrium In The Group
Struggle (3/3)

• Public policy at any given time is

the equilibrium reached in the
group struggle. This equilibrium is
determined by the relative
influence of various interest
groups.
• Changes in the relative influence
of any interest group can be
expected to result in changes in
public policy; policy will move in
the direction desired by the
groups gaining influence and
away from the desires of groups
losing influence.
Elite Theory: Policy As Elite Preference (1/3)
• Public policy may also be viewed as the preferences and values of a governing
elite. Although it is often asserted that public policy reflects the demands of
"the people," this may express the myth rather than the reality.
• Elite theory suggests that the people are apathetic and ill informed about
public policy, that elites actually shape mass opinion on policy questions more
than masses shape elite opinion.
• Public officials and administrators merely carry out the policies decided on by
the elite. Policies flow downward from elites to masses; they do not arise from
mass demands.
Elite Theory: Policy As Elite Preference (2/3)
1. Society is divided into the few who have power and the
many who do not. Only a small number of persons allocate
values for society; the masses do not decide public policy.
2. The few who govern are not typical of the masses who are
governed. Elites are drawn disproportionately from the
upper socioeconomic strata of society.
3. The movement of nonelites to elite positions must be slow
and continuous to maintain stability and avoid revolution.
Only nonelites who have accepted the basic elite consensus
can be admitted to governing circles.
Elite Theory: Policy As Elite Preference (3/3)
4. Elites share consensus on behalf of the basic
values of the social system and the preservation
of the system.
5. Public policy does not reflect the demands of
masses but rather the prevailing values of the
elite. Changes in public policy will be incremental
rather than revolutionary.
6. Active elites are subject to relatively little direct
influence from apathetic masses. Elites influence
masses more than masses influence elites.
Public Choice Theory: Policy As Collective Decision
Making By Self-interested Individuals (1/3)
• Public choice is the economic study of nonmarket decision making, especially
the application of economic analyses to public policymaking.
• Thus, separate versions of human motivation developed in economics and
political science: the idea of homo economicus assumed a self-interested actor
seeking to maximize personal benefits; that of homo politicus assumed a
public spirited actor seeking to maximize societal welfare.
• James Buchanan, the Nobel Prize-winning economist, argues that individuals
come together in politics for their own mutual benefit, just as they come
together in the marketplace.
Public Choice Theory: Policy As Collective Decision
Making By Self-interested Individuals (2/3)
• Public choice theory recognizes that government must perform certain functions that the
marketplace is unable to handle.
• First, government must provide public goods-goods and services that must be supplied
to everyone if they are supplied to anyone. National defense is the most common
example: protection from foreign invasion is too expensive for a single person to buy, and
once it is provided no one can be excluded from its benefits.
• Second, externalities are another recognized market failure and justification for
government intervention. An externality occurs when an activity of one individual, firm,
or local government imposes uncompensated costs on others. The most common
examples are air and water pollution: the discharge of air and water pollutants imposes
costs on others.
Public Choice Theory: Policy As Collective Decision
Making By Self-interested Individuals (3/3)
• Public choice theory helps to explain why political parties and
candidates generally fail to offer clear policy alternatives in election
campaigns.
• Parties and candidates are not interested in advancing principles but
rather in winning elections. They formulate their policy positions to
win elections; they do not win elections to formulate policy. Thus,
each party and candidate seeks policy positions that will attract the
greatest number of voters
Further Readings
• Dye, T.R., (2013), Understanding Public Policy 14th Edition, Pearson,
New Jersey.

• Goodin, R.E. (Ed.), (2006), The Oxford Handbook of Public Policy,

Oxford University Press, New York.

• Araral E. et. al (Ed.), (2013), Routledge Handbook of Public Policy,

Routledge, New York.
Thank You