Comparative Public Policy Research Research Articles

On Concepts, Analytics, and Statistics in Comparative Policy Studies: An Introduction from the New Section Editors

Effective comparative public policy research necessitates three key aspects. Firstly, it requires concepts that allow the differences in policies and policy developments across various domains to be discerned. Secondly, even with robust concepts established, they typically must be “put into practice”. This means scholars need analytical tools that can either provide theoretical insights helpful in creating careful research designs or extract relevant information from laws, legislation, and other governmental sources and organize it meaningfully. Lastly, the objective of these endeavors is to produce statistics on policies or their effects that permit robust conclusions to be drawn about policy efficacy and impact. Building upon this “trinity” as the foundation of successful comparative policy research, the new section editors of the Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis (JCPA) are seeking contributions in the areas of policy concepts, analytics, and statistics. This introductory article further clarifies what these aspects entail and presents examples from existing research that may align with this section.

Minding the time gap: politicians’ perspectives on inter-temporal trade-offs in policy and politics

ABSTRACT Scholars in several fields share a desire to better understand the inter-temporal dimensions of policy-making. While several studies analysed individuals’ preferences regarding policies whose benefits unfold in the future, little is known about policy-makers’ own perceptions of inter-temporal trade-offs in politics. Using an original survey of municipal politicians in Sweden, we demonstrate that factors found important in macro-level research on future-oriented policy-making also matter for politicians’ micro-level perceptions. Politicians who perceive the policy-making process as consensus-oriented, characterised by corporatist concertation and by a low risk of policy reversal, and those who feel confident about (re-)election into government, are less likely to perceive a trade-off between policies that help them win elections and policies that benefit society in the long term, and less likely to view politics as short-term biased. Trade-off perceptions are, furthermore, related to previously overlooked variations in how politicians understand the inter-temporal profile of physical and social investment policies. Our findings have significant implications for comparative public policy research, by uncovering how politicians perceive inter-temporal trade-offs and shining new light on the micro-foundations of future-oriented policy-making.

Not Hidden but Not Visible: Government Funding of Independent Schools in Canada

AbstractA growing body of comparative public policy research examines the effects of delegated delivery of public services and the related emergence of what is labelled a submerged state that obscures the role of government in the provision of public services. Data limitations have constrained investigations of these dynamics in Canada, including for K–12 education. In this research note, we draw on charitable tax records and provincial and federal spending data to present the evolution of provincial and federal financial support for independent schools over time, drawing on the case of British Columbia (BC). By factoring in indirect support through various tax mechanisms, we establish that BC independent schools have seen increasing financial support from both the federal and provincial governments in recent decades, primarily via tax expenditures tied to their charitable status—a “not hidden but not visible” shift in public expenditure that has substantial political, distributive and accountability implications.

Self-undermining policy feedback and the creation of National Health Insurance in Ghana.

Contributing to the ongoing debate about policy feedback in comparative public policy research, this article examines the evolution of healthcare financing policy in Ghana. More specifically, this article investigates the shift in healthcare financing from full cost recovery, known as 'cash-and-carry', to a nation-wide public health insurance policy called the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS). It argues that unintended, self-undermining feedback effects from the existing health policy constrained the menu of options available to reformers, while simultaneously opening a window of opportunity for transformative policy change. The study advances the current public policy scholarship by showing how the interaction between policy feedbacks and other factors-particularly ideas and electoral pressures-can bring about path-departing policy change. Given the dearth of scholarship on self-undermining policy feedback effects in the Global South, this contribution's originality lies in its application of the novel theory to the sub-Saharan African context.

Bringing agency back into the study of partisan politics: A note on recent developments in the literature on party politics

The question of whether political parties make a systematic difference in terms of public policies is one of the classics of comparative public policy research. However, unstable class cleavages and changing party strategies challenge the assumptions of traditional partisan theory, namely that parties represent a stable group of voters and implement policies according to the preferences of this group. Against this backdrop, several recent studies have called for an “electoral turn” in partisan theory and suggest establishing a party–voter link on the microlevel, depending on the policy area at stake. In this article, we propose a different view on partisan effects. While we do not argue that public opinion is unimportant for parties, we maintain that the electoral turn literature has a tendency to black-box the political actors and their preferences, because they become mere agents of voter preferences. Our argument builds on a growing literature that shows that political actors both at the party member and the elite level do have preferences and that these may or may not be coherent with those of the voters. Hence, the effect of partisan ideology on public policies may also be situated on the level of the parties or policy-makers themselves.

Policy Change in Comparative Contexts: Applying the Advocacy Coalition Framework Outside of Western Europe and North America

The advocacy coalition framework (ACF) is one of the most frequently applied theories of the policy process. Most applications have been in Western Europe and North America. This article provides an overview of the ACF, summarizes existing applications outside of Western Europe and North America, and introduces the special issue that features applications of the ACF in the Philippines, China, India, and Kenya. This article concludes with an argument for the continued application of the ACF outside of Western Europe and North America and a research agenda for overcoming challenges in using the ACF in comparative public policy research.

Combining the Strengths of Qualitative Comparative Analysis with Cluster Analysis for Comparative Public Policy Research: With Reference to the Policy of Economic Convergence in the Euro Currency Area

Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) is a well-established method for comparing national public policy similarities and differences. It is argued that Cluster Analysis can add additional benefits to such research when used concurrently with QCA. Cluster Analysis provides a better method for the initial exploration of multivariate data and examining how countries compare because it can work with the full range of available interval data while patterns are created and viewed. This provides the best first method for exploring patterns and likely groupings of countries. QCA then provides a more robust method for theorizing about the construction of such groupings and their relationship around similar variable scores. QCA makes such theorizing transparent. The research example used to illustrate the benefits of combining Cluster Analysis and QCA is an analysis of the evolving of macroeconomic policy for the countries sharing the Euro, comparing 2005 (precrisis) with 2010 (postcrisis).

Parties, Institutions and the Politics of Law and Order: How Political Institutions and Partisan Ideologies Shape Law-and-Order Spending in Twenty Western Industrialized Countries

Although the politics of law and order are currently a major issue of debate among criminologists, comparative public policy research has largely neglected it. This article fills that gap by bringing together criminological and public policy theories, and by examining law-and-order policies in twenty Western industrialized countries. It adds to the existing literature in two important ways: it provides a straightforward quantitative test of the existing criminological explanations of law-and-order policies using public spending as the dependent variable; and it shows that governments’ partisan ideology matters for law-and-order policies. Government ideology influences how much countries spend on public order and safety, but the effect depends on the budgetary room for manœuvre and the strength of institutional barriers.

Selecting Cases and Inferential Types in Comparative Public Policy Research

This chapter presents an outline for a comparative research by design (as opposed to a comparative research by outcome). Starting with different classic comparative research designs and different inferential types it introduces the reader into one of the key aspects of the comparative method: case selection. Throughout the chapter it is argued that cases need to be selected based on the additional level of variety they provide. This as variety in cases and case characteristics is considered key in understanding the object of study and drawing strong inferences. Subsequently, the chapter presents a research design that exactly builds on variety, a compound research design, and guides the reader through this design and its strengths. Finally, the chapter concludes with a step-wise approach for carrying out comparative research. This to help the reader overcome much of the existing critique to comparative policy studies.

Enlightened Eclecticism or Hazardous Hotchpotch? Mixed Methods and Triangulation Strategies in Comparative Public Policy Research

This article discusses the trend toward triangulation and mixing methods in comparative public policy research and proposes criteria for further such endeavors, especially regarding the sophistication of the respective (qualitative and quantitative) parts, the way the different analyses are combined, and the aspects of the social world as well as the statements about them political researchers are interested in. It draws on both the current methodological debates and a review of relatively recent contributions to the comparative public policy literature employing several methods. The final recommendation is to consider thoroughly whether to engage in triangulation, and if doing so, to use tailor-made triangulation strategies fitted to the research questions and interests.

Sinking Budgets and Ballooning Prices: Recent Developments Connected to Military Spending

Edited by Francis G. Castles, a leading authority in the field, and bringing together an outstanding group of British, German and American scholars, it examines trends in non-social or ‘core’ spending on public administration, defence, public order, education, economic affairs and debt financing and in the regulatory ordering of the economic sphere. The book not only opens up new areas of comparative public policy research, but also demonstrates clearly that there have been real reductions in the reach of state in some areas, although patterns of causation are more complex and varied than generally presumed by the retrenchment literature.

From Process to Structure: Developing a Reliable and Valid Tool for Policy Network Comparison

AbstractOne of the major shortcomings for the use of Social Network Analysis (SNA) in comparative public policy research is the lack of valid, reliable and – maybe most important for people not really familiar with SNA – practical procedures to generate comparable network data. In this research note, we suggest an easy to follow, non‐technical solution for transferring information from decision‐making case studies into policy networks. Focusing on the actors’ participation in decision‐making processes, we visualize in a first step the description of a policy process in an ‘Actor‐Process‐Event Scheme’ (APES). In a second step, the data formalized in the APES can be transformed into two matrices on a) the actors’ event participation and b) the process links between the actors. Joining the two matrices allows us finally to analyze the decision‐making process in the form of a policy network. Furthermore, the generated network data can be used for more formalized comparative methods.

Centre for the Study of Public Policy

Research Resource: The CSPP specializes in comparative public policy research. Since 1991 it has developed a unique programme of cross-national cross-time surveys to monitor the transformation of post-Communist societies. In collaboration with the Paul Lazarsfeld Society, Vienna, more than 80 surveys have been completed and more are being planned.

Policy Flow Analysis: a Conceptual Model for Comparative Public Policy Research

EXPANDING interest in policy making parallels a crisis in the institutions of democracy. Policy making is fundamental to government for committing resources and defining the priorities guiding governmental action. In industrial and developing societies, where increasing complexity, rapid change and continuous tension are concomitants of existence, traditional administrative agencies, rooted in nineteenth-century experience, are placed under ever increasing stress as they adapt to the altered environment which they now serve. Concern for policy making signals a reawakened sensitivity to the importance of value choices. It is value choice, implicit and explicit, which orders the priorities of government and determines the commitment of resources within the public jurisdiction. The proposed model focuses on the changed role of the executive, legislative and judicial participants in the policy process, with a view to explicating the relationship of values to public policy. To this end, the model identifies actors, groups and agencies and suggests the critical interactive processes that blend power and value in determining policy choices. The model is applicable to the dynamics of the policy-making process in at least the ministerial and presidential systems of western industrialized countries and may have potential use in other jurisdictions as well.

Policy Flow Analysis: A Conceptual Model for Comparative Public Policy Research

Policy Flow Analysis: A Conceptual Model for Comparative Public Policy Research