Environmental Policy As Learning: A New View of an Old Landscape

Environmental policy in the United States has always been characterized by high levels of political conflict. At the same time, however, policy makers have shown a capacity to learn from their own and others' experience. This article examines U.S. environmental policy since 1970 as a learning process and, more specifically, as an effort to develop three kinds of capacities for policy learning. The first decade and a half may be seen in terms of technical learning, characterized by a high degree of technical and legal proficiency, but also narrow problem definitions, institutional fragmentation, and adversarial relations among actors. In the 1980s, growing recognition of deficiencies in technical learning led to a search for new goals, strategies, and policy instruments, in what may be termed conceptual learning . By the early 1990s, policy makers also recognized a need for a new set of capacities at social learning, reflecting trends in European environmental policy, international interest in the concept of sustainability, and dissatisfaction with the U.S. experience. Social learning stresses communication and interaction among actors. Most industrial nations, including the United States, are working to develop and integrate capacities for all three kinds of learning. Efforts to integrate capacities for conceptual and social learning in the United States have had mixed success, however, because the institutional and legal framework for environmental policy still is founded on technical learning.     

国外住房问题和住房政策研究——回顾及启示

以文献资料法和比较分析法为基础,对国外住房问题和住房政策的研究进行了回顾——主要包括住房问题的产生、公共住房与住房福利、住房政策的比较和划分以及住房问题的主要研究方法。通过国外文献回顾有助于进一步认识和理解住房问题和住房政策。在全球化的进程中,当中国必须面对和住房问题相关的危机和困境时,一方面需要以全球视角不断借鉴国外解决住房问题以及制定和执行住房政策的经验,另外一方面也需要认清国内外形式,选择属于自己发展模式。     

No Home for Housing: The Situation of the Commonwealth's Housing Policy Advisory Function

The Commonwealth's policy capacity with regard to housing policy and provision has been erratic and patchy. Partly this is because housing was not traditionally a formal Commonwealth responsibility but something in which Commonwealth governments episodically intervened, and partly it was because Commonwealth ministers often did not exercise demand for policy advice in this area. When policy capacity was exercised it tended to define housing narrowly as a welfare initiative, thereby limiting its conception and excluding other important questions and problems involved with housing as a policy domain. This trajectory meant that the advisory deficiencies of the Commonwealth were often exposed at exactly those times when they were most needed. It also meant that the Commonwealth lacked the detailed knowledge and understanding of housing issues when it was called upon to deliver various programs. The article argues that the Commonwealth needs to adopt a more strategic housing policy that addresses longer term needs as well as the economic, social and environmental consequences of its housing policy.     

A Bottom‐Up Theory of Public Opinion about Foreign Policy

If public opinion about foreign policy is such an elite‐driven process, why does the public often disagree with what elites have to say? We argue here that elite cue‐taking models in International Relations are both overly pessimistic and unnecessarily restrictive. Members of the public may lack information about the world around them, but they do not lack principles, and information need not only cascade from the top down. We present the results from five survey experiments where we show that cues from social peers are at least as strong as those from political elites. Our theory and results build on a growing number of findings that individuals are embedded in a social context that combines with their general orientations toward foreign policy in shaping responses toward the world around them. Thus, we suggest the public is perhaps better equipped for espousing judgments in foreign affairs than many of our top‐down models claim.     

Policy Transfer among Local Governments: An Information–Theory Approach

We argue that the burgeoning literature on policy transfer suffers from the lack of an analytical framework that would facilitate understanding and, thus, theory–building. We suggest that policy transfer be conceptualized as occurring through a communications and information framework and that it focus on information networks that include producers, senders, and facilitators of information, as well as recipients. We apply this framework to an illustrative study of how British local–authority officials involved in the area of urban regeneration policy learn from each other's experience.
Utilizing this approach, the results of our case study yield several testable hypotheses for future study. In particular, they direct us towards the importance of informal networks in the policy–transfer process, towards an examination of the motivations of producers, senders, and disseminators of information, and towards the difficulty all participants in the network have in assessing the quality and validity of the information they receive.     

国内学术界关于马克思主义大众化研究综述

在新时代,马克思主义大众化的实现路径问题依旧是国内学术界研究的重点。学术界主要围绕"马克思主义大众化历史路径选择的研究""马克思主义大众化现实路径选择的研究""马克思主义大众化未来路径选择的研究"等三个方面展开。以往的研究依托多个学科,从多个视角和方法层面分析了马克思主义大众化路径的个别差异。但同时也存在一些不足,如研究成果的层次和水平有待进一步提高;研究成果的视野有待进一步拓展。这些不足为今后的研究提供了努力的方向。     

Housing Policy Under the Reagan Presidency: The Demise of an Iron-triangle

This paper analyzes the changing politics of housing policy during the Reagan administration. The analysis applies the concept of "subgovernments" to the housing coalition. The demise of the housing subgovemment is analyzed within a theoretical framework that includes "policy type" as an important explanatory variable. Specifically, this paper argues that as housing policy shifted from "distributive" to "redistributive" due to a curtailment of funding, the housing coalition came under pressure from external farces and ultimately fragmented into competing (rather than cohesive) interests. As a result, the U.S. commitment to housing provision was drastically reduced.     

Privatization in Central Europe: The Case of Housing Policy in Hungary

Policymakers in Central and Eastern Europe are encountering difficulties in resolving the clash between market efficiency and distributional equity. A similar tension characterized post-war Western Europe. However, in Central and Eastern Europe expectations emanating from the previous regime presume that distributional equity will compensate for the lack of market efficiency. The possible resolution of this tension is discussed in the context of the privatization in Hungary.     

有限理性利益人--公共政策学的人性假设

公共政策学的人性假设是其理论的根本出发点。以有限理性利益人作为公共政策学的人性假设,这既符合人的一般本性,也符合公共政策实践活动的人的特殊本性,更重要的是它为科学地揭示公共政策的本质及其运行规律提供了依据。公共政策行为实质是一种选择行为,有限理性利益人的行为选择具有价值偏好多元性、智能活动有限性和追求满意性的特征。有限理性利益人假设规定了公共政策学的逻辑起点、内在结构和研究路径,从而规定了公共政策学的整体面貌。     

Moving Policy Theory Forward: Connecting Multiple Stream and Advocacy Coalition Frameworks to Policy Cycle Models of Analysis

The stages/policy cycle, multiple streams, and Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) approaches to understanding policy processes, all have analytical value although also attracting substantive criticism. An obvious direction for research is to determine whether the multiple streams framework and the ACF can be refined and applied to other dimensions of policy‐making set out in the policy cycle model. This article argues that extending and modifying Kingdon's framework beyond the agenda‐setting stage is best suited to this endeavour. Doing so makes it possible to bring these three approaches into alignment and enhances our understanding, although retaining the core insights of each.     

Measuring the Effectiveness of New Approaches to Housing Support Policy for Persons with Disabilities

Housing support policy for persons with disabilities who require access to 24‐hour formal or informal support is changing throughout Australia. This is consistent with international trends including: independent living in generic housing; facilitating choices about where and with whom people live; individualised home‐based support; and community integration. Are these trends leading to policies that are effective in the Australian context? This article presents a framework for analysing the effectiveness of new approaches to housing support using a rights perspective. The framework consists of four domains: client outcomes; administrative systems; service viability; and coordination between formal and informal carers. Applying the framework to six case studies found that they all aim to foster independence, while providing effective individualised, holistic housing support.