Reflections on the political economy of public policy analysis in Africa

Author(s):  
Michael Kpessa-Whyte ◽  
Kafui Tsekpo
1989 ◽  
Vol 31 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 1-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mats Lundahl

…widespread social evils are seldom unconnected with the selfish and brutal behavior of powerful groups and individuals…(Andreski, 1966)Most economic models do not explicitly incorporate the “state” or the “government” into their analyses. Instead, this entity is viewed as a deus ex machina which plans and directs economic policy according to notions of efficiency, growth, distributional justice, and so on, that form the central concepts of the models. Unfortunately, the same naive thinking permeates a good deal of public policy analysis. This is the case, for example, with issues of development and underdevelopment. Here, attention is concentrated on “technical,” or “economic,” solutions, while taking for granted, either implicitly or explicitly, the existence of the political will necessary to implement them.


1981 ◽  
Vol 29 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
George J. Graham

The purpose of this course is to introduce a new framework linking the humanities to public policy analysis as pursued in the government and the academy. Current efforts to link the particular contributions from the humanities to problems of public policy choice are often narrow either in terms of their perspective on the humanities or in terms of their selection of the possible means of influencing policy choice. Sometimes a single text from one of the humanities disciplines is selected to apply to a particular issue. At other times, arguments about the ethical dimensions of a single policy issue often are pursued with a single — or sometimes, no — point of access to the policy process in mind.


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