Laurence
E. Lynn, Jr.
Public policy analysis that is based on transparent, positive methods
adds a crucial dimension to the political discourse, which would otherwise
be dominated by material interests and unverifiable claims. Supporters
of policy analysis, however, have had to contend from the start with
intense criticism, originating from both the political world and the
research community. Most recently, the most outspoken of these critics
have been the post-positivists, who deem policy analysis as anti-democratic
and epistemologically unsound. Contrary to these claims, policy analysis
in practice exhibits an anti-elite bias that has been crucial for its
implementation. In his Harris School working paper titled The
Making and Analysis of Public Policy: A Perspective on the Role of
Social Science, Laurence E. Lynn, Jr. outlines the debate over
public policy analysis, and examines how social science-based studies
can influence state action in a manner that is both constructive and
consistent with evolving political values.
The Practice of Public Policy Analysis
The literature on policy analysis practice
suggests that its emerging ethos was progressive, critical, pragmatic,
optimistic, and reformist. Never monolithic in its methods, policy
analysis practice has evolved in response to the political and social
realities that shape public policy agendas. Policy analysis has been
fueled by intuition, argument, and ethical promptings, clearly associated
with the world of political action, both normative and prescriptive,
often identified with interests otherwise unrepresented. In the words
of practitioner Robert Nelson (1989), "In many cases, policy analysts
make their greatest contribution, not with highly sophisticated economic
analyses, but with simple arguments that challenge practices and
ideas that have simply become part of agency tradition, culture,
and ideology-even in the face of common sense."
A Clash of Ideologies
Lynn stresses that because policy analysis
is an administrative technology with uniquely significant consequences
for the direction of the state, controversies over its means and
ends are inevitable. Moreover they are bound to be intense. Policy
analysis exists in a multi-dimensional Euclidian political space.
As such, its deviation from any axis of normative idealization can
be argued to constitute evidence of impermissible even corrupt, "bias." Indeed,
to make their point, critics attempt to maximize the perceived distance
of policy analysis. Thus it is often difficult to believe that supporters
of policy analysis practice and their critics inhabit the same reality,
much less to understand what they are arguing about.
In recent years, scholars who identify themselves
as post-positivists have emerged as the most strident critics of
mainstream policy analysis. Their critique has its foundations in
postmodernism theory, and various post-positive epistemologies. Lynn
argues that the post-positivist animus toward unreconstructed policy
analysis has two primary goals. The first is a doctrinaire allegiance
with positivist dogma and its goal, the existential removal of policy
analysis from the contaminating influence of social and political
reality. The objectives of public policy are matters of value, post-positivists
claim, not facts based on logic. As a result, conventional policy
analysis is "blinded to
political reality" (Torgerson 1986, 37). The second goal of post-positive
animus is the tendency toward clientelism of mainstream policy
analysis. Post-positivists view the partnership between policy analysis
and the hierarchical state and its executive agencies as devastating
to democracy and to policies; that would otherwise have emerged from
unimpeded discussion among informed, autonomous citizens.
The controversy dividing "positivists" from "post-positivists" is
predominantly ideological. In Lynn's view, the politics of mainstream
policy analysis is, unapologetically, strengthening the liberal democratic
state by debating and investigating important policy questions. The
politics of the post-positivists, however, seems to replace the liberal
democratic state with an imagined "show of hands" democracy in which
no actor has power over others and in which expertise has no
privileged role.
Background
In the 1960s and early 1970s, the policy analysis "movement" erupted
into American political life. Opportunistically assembling rudiments
of authority, knowledge, technical skill and application that
began to accumulate with the emergence of the modern administrative
state, a well-positioned group of federal executives succeeded in
forging new structural links between research-based knowledge and
policy making. These legacies remain controversial, however. The
role of social science in democratic governance and the mediating
contributions of policy analysts are vigorously contested, raising
issues concerning the future of policy analysis training and practice.
The advent of policy as an administrative
technology marked a watershed in public administration: both a culmination
of trends toward governance by qualified managers initiated in the
19th century, and, in view of the movement's tendency to centralize
political power, a stimulus to late 20th century efforts to democratize
policy making influence and expertise. However, public policy scholarship,
textbooks, curriculums and folklore still tend to idealize executive-oriented
policy analysis. Thus a relatively young profession has seemed slow
to adapt to the post-Cold War, "third way," communication-based politics
that seem to call for changes in policy analysis methods and applications.
Prior to the 20th century, the law governing public administration
in the United States was assumed to be indistinguishable from private
law. With the emergence of the administrative state, the courts had
to decide how to rule on the issues involving the exercise of discretion
by administrative officers in a wide range of matters. Further, the
courts had to resolve contentious issues involving the separation of
powers and the non-delegation doctrine, which pitted legal formalism
against reasonable interpretation. The enactment of the Administrative
Procedures Act in 1947 was indeed a milestone, however, the high water
mark of deference to administrative discretion was reached when the
Supreme Court issued its 1984 decision in the case of Chevron USA vs.
Natural Resources Defense Council, in which Federal District judges
were directed to defer agency decision-making if (a) agency action
was in clear conformity with legislative intent and (b) if, in the
absence of clear legislative intent, the agency's actions are reasonable.
Methodology
Lynn reviewed and included studies of social scientist, researchers
and scholars in the field of policy analysis and public administration.
In developing his argument, Lynn placed special attention to several
seminal contributors, in particular Marshall Dimock, Edwin S. Quade,
John Friedmann, Giandomenico Majone and Robert A. Heineman.
Research Summaries are
designed to help broaden the dissemination of current policy-relevant
research. These Summaries are funded by the Irving B. Harris Graduate
School of Public Policy Studies at the University of Chicago.
For more information, contact Jamie Rosman at HarrisSchool@uchicago.edu or
(773) 702.2287.
