POLICY ANALYSIS AND IMPLEMENTATION EVALUATION

Public Administration’s myriad impacts on the economy and society have fostered concern about how well public policies work and how their implementation could improved.

There are two ways of judging policies:Policy Analysis and Implementation Evaluation

Policy analysis can be prospective and retrospective.-It seeks to determine how social, economic, and other problems will be affected by different governmental policy choices.-It also considers the extent to which a policy achieves its objectives and why it is successful or falls short.

Implementation Evaluation-Focuses on whether implementation maximizes

appropriate values.

The Public Administration is an activist part of the government. It is a means by which government seeks to intervene in aspects of the economy, society and polity.

The Growing Concern with Policy Analysis Only in 1960’s to 1970’s the systematic policy

analysis became a standard in public administrative function.

- Due to a shift in the nature of administrative intervention in the 1960’s that made public administration more salient in the work place, neighborhoods, in families, and in society.

-However, perspective on the implementation tend to follow what is known as the “Miles Law”

“Where one stands depends on where one sits.” what one person considers service provided by public administration, another may consider a constraint.

As public Administration provides more services to people, it also engages in more extensive regulatory activities.

In 1970s it was evident that many individuals and groups thought that the administrative state had gone too far in regulating their activities.

Retrospective policy analysis was strengthened by a number of related administrative developments. -Among these developments were a congressional requirement that in many policy areas a percentage of a program’s budget be set aside for program evaluation.

Policy analysis can help by showing whether a program is having the intended impact in a cost-effective manner and with a favorable benefit-cost ratio.

APPROACHES TO ANALYZING PUBLIC POLICYTwo aspects o f Public Policy:Policy outputPolicy Impact or Policy OutcomePolicy Output- the outgrowth of policy.- an official statement of governmental intent,

delineation of powers and methods, and allocation of resources.

-it can be tangible and/or symbolic activity.-Statutes, congressional resolution,

presidential proclamation, and allocation of staff and funds are policy outputs.

Policy outcomes

Are concerned with performance.What effect is the policy output having on the

intended target? Is the objective being achieved? If not, why not? If so, is achievement related to administration?

Three basic models that policy analysts use to asses the impact or outcome of a particular policy:

• Pure experimental• Quasi-experimental• Non-experimental

Implementation evaluationImplementation evaluation depends on policy

analysis, but it is a different enterprise. In public administration, the question is whether the implementation of the policy is appropriate, rather than whether it has the intended impact. What we consider properly executed policy will often depend on whether we adopt a managerial, political, or legal perspective.

MANAGERIAL PERSPECTIVES ON IMPLEMENTATIONTraditional Management- values

effectiveness, efficiency, and economy in implementation. It places less importance on such other concerns as customer satisfaction, public participation, and procedural due process.

The New Public Management- favors implementation by “steering “ rather than “rowing”. It favors discretion over rules add measures success in terms of customer satisfaction and performance.

POLITICAL PERSPECTIVE ON IMPLEMENTATION

It tends to view a policy as appropriately executed. Within the parameters of the policy having discernible impacts on the target. if if affords representation to those individuals and interest most affected by it.

Representation of demographic constituency Interest. Political perspective is also concerned that public administrative implementation be deemed to substantively serve the interest of demographic groups in legislative constituencies.

Accountability

LEGAL PERSPECTIVE ON IMPLEMENTATIONFocus on constitutional integrity, equal

protection, fairness (procedural due process), and protection of the rights of those individuals who come into contact with public administrative procedures.

The Constitutional Integrity- sometimes public policies are in conflict with constitutional provisions for the separation of powers of federalism.

Equal ProtectionFocuses more on whether individuals or

groups are afforded equal protection of laws.Procedural Due Process And Protection of

Individual Rightsthe legal perspective toward public

administration also favors providing those dependent on administrative services or subject to administrative regulation with procedural protection against an adverse action.

CONCLUSION: THE COMPLEXITY OF POLICY DESIGNThe diverse managerial, political, amd legal

perspectives on implementation can make policy design a complex endeavor. There is little agreement concerning the basic criteria on which implementation should be judged. Cost effectiveness, Customer satisfaction, political accountability, procedural due process, and other relevant values often conflict with one another- in abstract and in day to day administrative practice.

The traditional, managerial, political and legal approaches all favor strictly limiting administrative discretion, especially on the street level. By contrast the NPM favors broad employee empowerment.

OVERHEAD POLICY- Are concerned with keeping public administrative operations running on a day to day basis. They include disbursement and accounting for money, personnel functions such s compensating and retiring employees, and the maintenance and interior design of the physical plant of agencies.

SOCIOTHERAPEUTIC POLICIES

Such as war on poverty and the Model Cities Program- seek to treat an undesirable condition that has become associated with a particular group. The group could have various attributes: it could be economic, urban, elderly or rural.

REGULATORY POLICYRegulation through administrative action.Programs engaged in such functions as rate

setting for public utilities and common carriers; assuring the purity or healthfulness of substances such as food, water and air, and in promoting fair economic competition and eliminating deceptive marketing practices.