Is there policy-oriented learning in the analysis of natural gas policy issues?

The debate on natural gas pricing policy has been one of the longest and most active in the United States in this century. Conflicts in the fundamental belief systems of the advocacy coalitions involved in the production, distribution, and consumption of natural gas have dominated the debate, and the financial stakes to each have been high. These circumstances and the physical nature of the gas supply, distribution, and consumption system have motivated a very large number of analytic studies of the policy options, particularly since 1973. In this paper the extent of policy-oriented learning that has taken place in the development of natural gas pricing policy, and the role of formal analysis in that learning process are assessed. These objectives are greatly facilitated by reliance on a recently proposed framework for analyzing the factors affecting policy change.