REGULATION AS SOCIAL POLICY: HOME EVICTIONS AND REPOSSESSIONS IN THE UK AND SWEDEN

This article asks how the UK and Sweden regulate, prevent, or mitigate the consequences of mortgage‐related household eviction and repossession. Contrary to initial expectations, the findings show a growth and diversity in both regulation and social spending in the UK intended to address this social issue; something that has not occurred in Sweden. In the UK's liberal ‘regulatory welfare regime’, the aim is to prevent the eviction and repossession of vulnerable borrowers who have defaulted on their housing loan. In the Swedish social democratic ‘regulatory welfare regime’, effort focuses instead on minimizing the risk of default before it occurs rather than after the fact. These findings offer a more nuanced understanding of the relations between regulation and welfare more generally, demonstrating that regulation may be used as a form of social policy once the welfare state has failed, as a safety net of last resort.     

EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES POLICIES AND RACIAL INEQUALITY: THE ROLE OF PUBLIC POLICY

This article examines the seeming contradiction between the publicly stated objective of successive governments to promote greater equality of opportunity for racial minorities and the limited impact of successive policies and programmes on processes of racial discrimination and exclusion in British society. The article begins by outlining the different conceptual approaches used to analyse the development of public policies on racial inequality. It then analyses the main aspects of national policy change in this area over the past two decades, and more recent initiatives which have sought to use local government as a vehicle for promoting racial equality. This analysis offers a critical review of the achievements and limitations of both past and present policies. The concluding section takes up the question of the prospects of change in the future.     

FROM POLICY COMMUNITY TO ISSUE NETWORK: SALMONELLA IN EGGS AND THE NEW POLITICS OF FOOD

In the last two years the issue of food has been subject to increasing political controversy with firstly salmonella in eggs and later listeria and BSE becoming the focus of conflict and widespread media attention. This is an important change. In most of the post-war period food policy was conducted within a relatively closed policy community where issues concerning food policy were largely treated as routine technical decisions. The significance of the salmonella in eggs affair is that it is indicative of wider changes in the making of food policy. The increased activity of interest groups, the impact of the Common Agricultural Policy and changes in the retail economy have combined to transform the food policy community into an issue network.     

POLICY TRANSFER IN PRACTICE: IMPLEMENTING SUPPLIER DIVERSITY IN THE UK

This article draws on the policy transfer literature to examine a UK‐based initiative to promote supplier diversity and provides insights into three areas neglected in current research, namely: the dynamics of non‐governmental policy transfer; the factors that mediate policy transfer in different jurisdictions; and the integration of research and practice in small business related policy transfer. To this end, an innovative action research approach is deployed with the dual purpose of effecting practical change and advancing knowledge. This comprises two phases: first, a realist analysis of the US National Minority Supplier Development Council (NMSDC), an exemplar intermediary; and second, the implementation and concurrent realist evaluation of a supplier diversity initiative modelled on NMSDC, referred to as ‘Supplier Development East Midlands’ (SDEM). The findings provide lessons for academics and practitioners dealing with small and medium‐sized enterprise (SME) policy transfer in general and supplier diversity intermediaries in particular.     

INSTITUTIONAL ADAPTATION IN THE UK NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY INDUSTRY

Public inquiries into controversial development proposals have themselves become increasingly controversial in recent years. Despite their increasing length and cost, such proceedings remain part of the administrative process – the Inspector's report serving to'inform the minister's mind. This paper examines certain features of the Sizewell B Inquiry and draws attention to the ability of the applicants to respond to criticisms raised at the hearings through various forms of institutional adaptation. Changes to the Central Electricity Generating Boards case on the organization of project management, to the management of the nuclear site licencing process, and to provisions for future nuclear reactor choice are highlighted. Significantly, each of these areas had been the subject of particular investigations undertaken at the behest of the inquiry Inspector. The paper concludes by raising a number of questions concerning the implications of this singularly interactive process.     

BUYER-SUPPLIER PARTNERING IN UK DEFENCE PROCUREMENT: LOOKING BEYOND THE POLICY RHETORIC

This article looks beyond the rhetoric in recent UK defence procurement policy to discuss factors that might impact on the practical implementation of buyer-supplier partnering. Various explanations of the difficulty of creating a partnership are identified. The principal explanation explored is that the likelihood of successful partnering is a function of the power relation between a buyer and a supplier. It is argued that partnering is most likely to occur under circumstances of interdependence when each party is highly dependent upon and vulnerable to the other. A case study from naval shipbuilding is used to examine the plausibility of this power explanation. None of the power relations in the supply network discussed is primarily characterized by interdependence and there is no evidence of partnering. This suggests that while the MoD and its suppliers may use the language of partnering, they often find it difficult to translate this into meaningful action.     

THE INEXORABLE RISE IN THE UK NHS DRUGS BILL: RECENT POLICIES, FUTURE PROSPECTS

The UK National Health Service drugs bill has been the subject of controversy since the inception of the nhs . This article identifies the growth in the drugs bill and explores some of the factors driving the bill upward. The conclusions of this article are: that the drugs bill will continue to remain high on the political agenda; the government has only a limited amount of control on the drugs bill; various policies may counteract rather than complement each other; some of the policies may actually increase the drugs bill; however, many of the effects of the policies are unknown and there has been no rigorous assessment of the effects of any of the policies since 1948; and finally there is no robust evidence to suggest the drugs bill either does or does not represent good value for money.     

THE CONDITIONS FOR HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE POLICY: ROUTINES AND INSTITUTIONS IN THE DUTCH CASE OF NEED ASSESSMENT

By focusing on institutions (rules for action) and routines (patterned behaviour) our intention is to contribute to the understanding of government policy and its outcomes in health and social care. We analysed data to show how the relationship between a new idea for a routine and new rules from the government on the one hand, and existing rules and routines in society on the other, as well as the interaction between rule makers and rule takers (i.e. those who are governed by those rules), have an impact on the change or maintenance of routines. The data concern the case of government policy for need assessment (that is, assessment of needs) in The Netherlands. As our discussion will show, even a national government, however, is not able to completely impose its will on other agents in order to change existing routines. The concept of ‘negotiated order’ helps us to understand why. In the case reported here, the Dutch government and the home care agencies had to exercise give and take, the outcome being a suboptimal result for both.     

SEEING THE FOREST FOR THE VILLAGE,NATION, AND PROVINCE: FORESTRY POLICY AND ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT IN EARLY-TWENTIETH-CENTURY YUNNAN

Abstract

This article compares village, national, and provincial forestry policy in early-twentieth-century China, with a focus on Yunnan, making three important observations. First, by identifying villages as key arenas for the production of forestry policy, it highlights the importance of rethinking the political geography of forestry policy during this period, to establish a proper comparative baseline for evaluating policy implementation. Second, its comparisons reveal diverging interests in forestry at these three levels, ranging from village reforestation for ecological conservation to provincial afforestation for economic development. Third, it shows that policymakers in these three arenas deployed distinctive cultural and political resources to promote their policies. The localized formats and objectives of village policies may have rendered them relatively invisible to national policymakers, who promoted more general and systematic forestry frameworks as novel interventions into a seemingly neglected policy arena that demanded comprehensive and intensive political intervention.     

BEYOND POLICY NETWORKS: POLICY FRAMING AND THE POLITICS OF EXPERTISE IN THE 2001 FOOT AND MOUTH DISEASE CRISIS

For the past decade, the policy community/issue network typology of pressure group interaction has been used to explain policy outcomes and the policy‐making process. To re‐examine the validity of this typology, the paper focuses on the UK government's response to the 2001 Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) crisis, and in particular the decision to pursue contiguous culling rather than vaccination to overcome the epidemic. Rather than illustrating the emergence of an issue network in agricultural policy, the decision‐making process of the FMD outbreak demonstrates continuity with prior crises. In addition, the politicization of scientific expertise is identified as an emerging trend in crisis management. Policy framing is used to explain the impetus behind the contiguous cull decision, concluding that the legacy of previous policy choices conditioned the crisis response to a far greater degree than contemporaneous pressure group action.     

CHANGING THE DECISION SPACE: EUROPEAN POLICY INFLUENCES ON ENERGY POLICY AND SYSTEMS CHANGE IN SWEDEN

The EU takes a growing interest in governing the energy sector in its member states. Competing with national institutions, policies and organizational structures, it is however not clear whether the EU exerts a strong influence compared to other factors, and if there is such an influence, the mechanisms are not well understood. This paper examines strategic reorientation towards electricity investment in the Swedish energy sector, a ‘frontrunner case’ of Europeanization, and discusses how this change can be attributed to EU policy change, national policy change and organizational field developments respectively. It finds that EU energy policy influence has been notable, and that governance mechanisms that shape beliefs and expectations are strongly at play. However, despite growing EU clout on energy policy, field level and national policy change remain key drivers of the changing decision space in the examined time period.     

POLITICAL DISCOURSE AND PATH SHAPING IN PUBLIC POLICY: COMPARING PENSION REFORMS IN GREECE AND ITALY

Which factors account for successful policy reform and what role does discourse play in the process? This article examines this empirical puzzle with reference to the issue of Greek reform failure. A matched comparison with Italy in the area of pensions reveals the salience of path shaping and the use of political discourse in narrowing down reform options and facilitating change. The Greek case of limited public information, incoherent preparation of the problem, and inner‐circle decision‐making, is contrasted with the Italian government's information‐sharing and consensus‐building campaign for the establishment of a pro‐reformist discourse. Findings confirm the salience of institutional conditions but suggest that pure institutionalist accounts premised on rational choice thinking and the power of veto players should be complemented with more agency‐driven accounts of public policy.     

PUBLIC MANAGEMENT REFORM IN THE UK AND ITS CONSEQUENCES FOR PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATION: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS

It is often assumed in the literature on public management reforms that radical changes in values, work and organization have occurred or are under way. In this paper our aim is to raise questions about this account. Focusing on three services in the UK, each dominated by organized professions – health care, housing, and social services – significant variations in the effectiveness of reforms are noted. The available research also suggests that these outcomes have been inversely proportional to the efforts expended on introducing new management practices. The most radical changes have been in housing, where, paradoxically, successive UK governments focused least attention. By contrast, in health and social services, management restructuring has been less effective, despite the greater resources devoted to it. This variation is attributed to professional values and institutions, against which reforms were directed, and the extent to which different groups became locked either into strategies of resistance or accommodation.     

POLICY AND ADMINISTRATION: ONE MORE TIME IN THE FRYING PAN

As an academic discipline, public administration has reached yet another fork in its evolutionary road. Earlier milestones have posed choices during the discipline's unfolding. In this century emphases have shifted in turn from civil service reform to scientific management, then to human relations and decision making. As the century closes, the discipline acknowledges some intellectual debt to each of these foci. The traditional debate about what kinds of ties suffuse policy/politics and administration now reflects a new uncertainty—the meaning of administration itself. Is there anything analogous among the public, private, and not-for-profit contexts in which administration transpires? Are there substantive or procedural considerations within these various contexts of policy making that influence, and in turn are influenced by, administrative participation in the policy process? If so, what is the nature of such influence, and what are its consequences?     

STAKEHOLDERS AND PERSPECTIVISM IN QUALITATIVE POLICY EVALUATION: A REALIST REFLECTION

This paper examines the epistemological bases for the inclusion of stakeholders in policy research. While it concedes that the input of stakeholders provides essential expert and experiential knowledge for the understanding of complex policies and programmes, it contends that the approach which assumes that all interpretations of policy including those of stakeholders should be afforded equal validity, which we term relativist perspectivism, undermines the possibility of robust research by allowing power to replace methodological rigour as the primary research dynamic. It is noted that this problem tends to be more acute when the research is qualitative. A study into the gendered effects of Common Agricultural Policy reforms is used as an illustrative example of how research can be compromised by relativist perspectivism. It is argued that realist research methodologies uniquely provide the capacity to maintain epistemological robustness, while also being able to take due account of the perspectives of stakeholders.