scholarly journals ‘Time to move on’ or ‘taking more time’? How disregarding multiple perspectives on time can increase policy-making conflict

2017 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
pp. 340-356 ◽  
Author(s):  
EEA Wolf ◽  
Wouter Van Dooren

This article argues that when different perspectives on time remain disregarded in a public policy debate, policy-making conflict can increase. We present an in-depth qualitative analysis of media articles from 2005, 2009, and 2014 in the debate surrounding the contested ‘Oosterweel connection,’ a multibillion-euro infrastructure project in Antwerp (Belgium). Although concerns of time management motivated arguments to speed up the policy-process, the insensitivity of policy-makers to multiple perspectives on time increased conflict. Firstly, while administrative actors reasoned mainly from a procedural time perspective and saw time as scarce, citizens reasoned mostly from an impact-based time perspective and saw time as abundant. A binary debate on policy-making tempo (high versus low) ensued. Secondly, political actors often reasoned from political perspectives on time. Their actions, which were intended to appease, did not end the binary debate and sometimes reinforced it. As the debate on the Oosterweel connection persisted, parties increasingly believed that not only were their infrastructure goals incompatible, but so too were their goals for time management. This increased conflict.

Bringing together international case studies, this book offers theoretical and empirical insights into the interaction between social work and social policy. Moving beyond existing studies on policy practice, the book employs the policy cycle as a core analytical frame and focuses on the influence of social work(ers) in the problem definition, agenda setting, policy formulation and implementation of social policy. Twenty-three contributors offer examples of policy making from seven different countries and demonstrate how social work practitioners can become political actors, while also encouraging policy makers to become aware of the potential of social work for the social policy-making process.


2001 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Arnoud Lagendijk

AbstractTerritoriality is an important dimension of knowledge production and application. Despite the ethereal nature of the product itself, knowledge is thought to originate from, and be anchored to, particular places. Over the last decades, studies on themes such as Innovation Systems and knowledge spillovers have pointed at and further explored the spatial dimension of knowledge production, suggesting that due to spatial boundedness of knowledge the region presents an essential site for innovation, production and policy-makers. To review this message of regional salience three stories are presented: The first story, the institutional-economic account, features the role of the economy. The second story features political actors and processes, and the way these have promoted and mobilised the region as a significant site of innovation, production and policy-making. The third story focuses on the message of regional salience itself, with as protagonists the authors of the message, namely academics. The conclusion will bring the various stories together, suggesting how the story of performativity bears on the story on political mobilisation, and how both these stories may serve to put the institutional-economic account into perspective.


2008 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 250-294 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher P. Brown

Through a multiple perspectives model that incorporates the normative, symbolic, and political perspectives, the author analyzes the emergence of standards-based accountability reform in the state of Wisconsin. His analysis offers insight into the effectiveness of various political actors' attempts to alter the state's education systems. Through this case study, the author contends that these policy makers' attempts to reform Wisconsin's systems of education are kept in check by the principles of cheap and local reform. Thus, to achieve change, these principles of cheap and local reform create a policy environment in which stakeholders must offer a continuous series of reform initiatives in hope that some of their policies might slip through an open policy window.


2018 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 198-207
Author(s):  
Celine Harrison ◽  
Maria Harries ◽  
Mark Liddiard

Child welfare policy making is a highly contested area in public policy. Child abuse scandals prompt critical appraisals of parents, professionals and the child protection system creating a tipping point for reform. One hundred and six transcripts of debates in the West Australian Parliament from August until December 2006 relating to child welfare and child deaths were analysed using qualitative content analysis. The analysis found that statistics about child deaths were conflated with other levels of childhood vulnerability promoting blame, fear, risk and an individual responsibility theme. The key rhetorical strategy was the use of numbers to generate emotion, credibility and authority to frame child maltreatment narrowly as a moral crime. Rhetoric and emotions is about telling causal stories and will remain ubiquitous in social policy making. So, in order to guide policy debate and creation, ground their claims and manage ambiguity and uncertainty, policy makers, researchers and practitioners working with complex social issues will do well to step into this public and political discourse and be strategic in shaping more nuanced alternative frames.


2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (5) ◽  
pp. 553-565
Author(s):  
Reza Kiani Mavi ◽  
Hamed Gheibdoust ◽  
Ahmad A. Khanfar

Nowadays, it is obvious that creative tourism industry has become very essential for countries and societies; therefore, governments work on constituting policies in order to develop this industry. To be successful in improving creative tourism industry, governments should identify the influential factors and focus on ones that are more important rather than investing a bit on many different factors. Because of the interrelations among factors, this research is aiming to prioritize factors that influence strategic policies of creative tourism industry in Iran using analytic network process (ANP). Data were collected during the period of May 2017 to February 2018. Participants in this research are 13 tourism experts with more than 10 years' experience in the field. Results show that the most influential criterion is "business support" and the most influential subcriterion is "supporting midsize businesses." This study helps policy makers to improve creative tourism by emphasizing on those factors that have high priority from the viewpoint of strategic policy-making.


Author(s):  
Ralph Henham

This chapter sets out the case for adopting a normative approach to conceptualizing the social reality of sentencing. It argues that policy-makers need to comprehend how sentencing is implicated in realizing state values and take greater account of the social forces that diminish the moral credibility of state sponsored punishment. The chapter reflects on the problems of relating social values to legal processes such as sentencing and argues that crude notions of ‘top down’ or ‘bottom up’ approaches to policy-making should be replaced by a process of contextualized policy-making. Finally, the chapter stresses the need for sentencing policy to reflect those moral attachments that bind citizens together in a relational or communitarian sense. It concludes by exploring these assertions in the light of the sentencing approach taken by the courts following the English riots of 2011.


Hydrology ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 66
Author(s):  
Daniel P. Loucks

Water resource management policies impact how water supplies are protected, collected, stored, treated, distributed, and allocated among multiple users and purposes. Water resource policies influence the decisions made regarding the siting, design, and operation of infrastructure needed to achieve the underlying goals of these policies. Water management policies vary by region depending on particular hydrologic, economic, environmental, and social conditions, but in all cases they will have multiple impacts affecting these conditions. Science can provide estimates of various economic, ecologic, environmental, and even social impacts of alternative policies, impacts that determine how effective any particular policy may be. These impact estimates can be used to compare and evaluate alternative policies in the search for identifying the best ones to implement. Among all scientists providing inputs to policy making processes are analysts who develop and apply models that provide these estimated impacts and, possibly, their probabilities of occurrence. However, just producing them is not a guarantee that they will be considered by policy makers. This paper reviews various aspects of the science-policy interface and factors that can influence what information policy makers need from scientists. This paper suggests some ways scientists and analysts can contribute to and inform those making water management policy decisions. Brief descriptions of some water management policy making examples illustrate some successes and failures of science informing and influencing policy.


1994 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 228-242 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart Croft

For almost fifty years there has been constant argument between those who have supported the development and possession of nuclear weapons by Britain and those opposed to those policies. This article argues that there has been a continuity in the arguments made by policy-makers and their critics, both operating within an unchanging series of linked assumptions forming a paradigm or mind-set. This article sets out the character of the assumptions of the orthodox and alternative thinkers, as they are termed in the article, examining their coherence and differences, particularly during the cold war. It concludes by attempting to draw out some implications for the British security policy debate in the post-cold war period.


Author(s):  
Juan C. Olmeda

State governments have acquired a central role in Mexican politics and policy making during the last decades as a result of both democratization and decentralization. Nowadays state governments not only concentrate a significant portion of prerogatives and responsibilities in terms of service delivery but also control a substantial share of public spending. However, no systematic studies have been developed in order to understand how state governments function. This chapter provides an overview on how policies are crafted at the subnational (state) level in Mexico, the main actors taking place in the process and the way in which professional knowledge and advice influence policy makers. As it argues, the central role in the policy making process is played by the executive branch, being the governors the ones who have the final word in most important decisions. In addition, secretaries also concentrate power in particular policy areas. As a result of the lack of a professional civil service, however, a significant portion of policy analysis is performed by non-governmental actors (universities, NGOs and private firms). The chapter applies this framework to analyze a particular Mexican state, namely Mexico City.


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