A Detailed Analysis of the Policy-making Process: Key Elements

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the policy-making process, examining the influence of various factors and stakeholders. It begins by exploring the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) and Punctuated Equilibrium (PE) models, which help to understand the forces shaping policy. The report then delves into the roles of official and unofficial stakeholders, emphasizing the importance of their involvement and effective communication. It also analyzes the impact of politics on the policy-making process, highlighting how political factors and stakeholder needs influence policy decisions. The report further discusses program logic models, outlining the key elements such as resources, activities, outputs, outcomes, and impact, using the example of the "Their Futures Matter" program. Finally, it addresses the assumptions and limitations of program logic models, including internal and external validity, and provides relevant references. This report offers valuable insights into the complexities of policy-making and the factors that contribute to effective policy development and implementation.

Policy-making
Student’s name
Institution Affiliation(s)

Evidence in the policy process
The advocacy coalition framework (ACF) and punctuated equilibrium (PE) models
both examine the policy process and what forces influence it. These forces, usually
independent of direct governmental control, can sway the policy process one way or another.
Political scientists have long pondered the forces that influence the policy process. In
studying these forces, many researchers emphasized the important role of advocacy groups,
also known as interest groups or pressure groups (Pierce, Peterson, & Hicks, 2017).
In addition to interest groups, political scientists also emphasized the role of
bureaucrats, policymakers, and the media in the policy process. All of these entities could
influence a specific policy subsystem such as agricultural subsidy policy, pesticide regulatory
policy, or any policy considered by policymakers (Brooks, 2018). Over the course of 100
years, political scientists used case studies and quantitative analyses to further examine the
impact of these variables on the policy process. By the late 1980s, this collection of research
helped to provide the theoretical backdrop to models such as the ACF and PE that attempted
to theorize about the policy process (Onwujekwe et al., 2015).
The policy process is a political system of inputs and outputs mediated by the
structure of government, social forces, political factors, and economic conditions (Cairney &
Oliver, 2017). Inputs such as elections, public opinions, and media coverage enter the black
box of the political system where they are transformed into policy outputs such as laws,
regulations, and policy decisions. These outputs can then influence the political system or the
inputs to the political system through a feedback loop (Vannoni, 2018).
Policy beliefs constantly adapt to changing socioeconomic conditions and political
factors. The ACF emphasizes the role of bounded rationality and the ability of individuals
within advocacy coalitions to effectively process new policy information, current
socioeconomic trends, and relevant political information (Moyson, 2017). The concept of

policy beliefs notably distinguishes the ACF from other models of the policy process such as
punctuated equilibrium (PE). While the ACF model embraces the notion of policy beliefs and
its role on policy change, researchers using the PE model usually just look at the process of
policy change (Weible, 2018).
However, even though the use of the ACF model in research has become standard and
accepted within political science, it still has three contentious concepts. First, the ACF
theorizes that advocacy groups and other interested entities can unknowingly coalesce into
advocacy coalitions. Second, the ACF is a framework of related hypotheses and not a
definitive theoretical construct. As a result, detractors often note that the ACF model is too
vague, has too many hypotheses, and attempts to explain too much. Nonetheless, effective
ACF research can still occur as long as the researcher narrows the topic area of ACF research
(Erixon, 2016).
Stakeholders
The key stakeholders fall under two major categories, that is official and unofficial
stakeholders. Official stakeholders are those individuals and organizations that are involved
in the process of policy formation and evaluation and have a constitutionally defined role or
are mandated by the constitution with the role of creating such policy (Hansen & Spitzeck,
2010). This category of stakeholders include executives such as the president, governors, and
executive agencies, legislative bodies including the Senate and the national legislature and
the judicially. This group of stakeholders has the mandate of passing, implementing and
evaluating policies as well as ensuring the legality of those policies (Malfait et al., 2017). The
group of unofficial stakeholders includes all the other persons involved in the process of
making policies. These include citizens, state legislatures, governors, the media, lobbyist
groups and representatives of various organizations.

There are a number of ways to ensure stakeholders involvement in policy and evaluation
process such as.
a) Make seamless and efficient communication that is timely to all the stakeholders.
b) Consultations should be holistic and sincere. Do not ask stakeholders point of view
and then ignore to include it in the policy.
c) When consulting with stakeholders, ensure that the questions you ask are not biased.
d) Ask relevant information, carry out sufficient background research and promote
procedure and timelines when dealing with various stakeholders.
The first argument for including stakeholders in the policy-making policy is that different
bodies at different societal levels should identify with certain roles and responsibilities to
ensure the successful development and implementation of various policies. The key
stakeholders included in this process include the state or government, non-governmental
organizations, civil society, and the private sector (Lemke & Harris, 2015).
Secondly, the roles are responsibilities for the state as a key stakeholder in the
policymaking process is quite clear-cut. The government’s key roles are policy-making,
framework-setting, promoting public input and consultation, instituting public campaigns and
operationalizing policies. For the civil society and non-governmental organizations, the key
roles in policy-making and implementation are public awareness through campaigns,
sponsorship, raising and lobbying (Fischer et al., 2014).
Finally, NGOs and civil society carry out consultancy and input into policy formulation,
deliver policies and programs, especially in informal settings and mediate between the state
and the public on various policy and system matters.
Politics
The policy is the foundation for a government to identify goals for the future and
ambitions whilst also providing a framework by which these objectives can be carried out.

The policy determines what a state performs and sets various limits on its behaviours and
actions. Policy decisions are not static, meaning that they evolve with the needs and
expectations of various societal stakeholders, in which bargaining occurs and
accommodations made to reflect the special interests of citizens and special interest groups,
hence giving the policy a political essence (Cairney, 2015). To suggest that public policy is a
technical aspect of politics is insufficient. Instead, it should be viewed as a multi-faceted,
interactive system that is directly influenced by social and political inputs that are highly
diverse.
Some ways in which politics influence evaluation processes and evaluation findings
include changing the policy to cater to the needs of various stakeholders (Greer et al., 2017).
In a policy-making scenario, even in an environment in which voters were apathetic and
power resources were concentrated with the privileged and influential, city politicians
considered demands imposed by activists to develop relevant public policy that would satisfy
not only the agenda of the privileged politicians but a broader group of stakeholders as well.
This represents the notion of pluralism in policy-making that must respond to diverse needs
and expectations which may not always be congruent with elitist agenda (King, 2016).
Some ways to ensure that policy becomes evidence-based or at least evidence-
informed is by the inclusion of all stakeholders in policy making. Policy makers in
democratic nations attempt to appeal to the concept of balance of power as a method of
ensuring public support. A true and just democratic system must maintain certain distinct
features, which include freedom, equality, transparency, and accountability in all policy-
related decision-making (Bach, Niklasson, & Painter, 2012). If a society does not maintain
the ability to achieve consensus between stakeholders, there is little opportunity and
likelihood that there will be a peaceful resolution of politically-related differences that are
part of every democratic process. Hence, inequality in policy-making that benefits a singular

elite agenda means unequal participation in the democratic process. Citizens and other elites
must participate in a balanced fashion as certain elite factional regimes that continue to
negate the interests of a broader group of stakeholders can face violent protests or general
contestation that will demand the policy be changed or utterly revoked.
Policy analysts should learn to give advice to policymakers only after clear
deliberation of the issue to avoid misleading. The same way policy analysis requires evidence
to proceed to the implementation stage; the policy analyst requires evidence before they can
make any final decisions on implementation of the policy. The evidence will include
information from the affected party (Lees, 2016).
Program logic
Fig 1: Program Logic Model (Source: Cairney, 2015)
Program logic models exhibit what a presented plan, new agenda, or focused
transformation effort might include from start to finish. The elements in a program logic
model consist of resources, activities, outputs, short-term outcomes, long-term outcomes, and

impact. For the case of “Their Futures Matter,” the resources are the organizational
infrastructure and financial investment. Activities are the detailed actions that make the
program happen. Here feeding the children, educating the children and providing them with
the necessary council are considered as activities (Kneale, Thomas, & Harris, 2015). Outputs
are the results of the activities, which is the learning of children, healthy children, and well-
fed children. Outputs are often measured in terms of quantity and quality. Outcomes are the
changes that take place within the awareness, skill, behaviour, and knowledge level of the
children after undergoing through “Their Futures Matter” program. The impact is the final
proposed change in an organization or community which in this case is to secure the future of
the children.
Assumptions and Limitations of the above Program Logic Model
A major challenge to the internal validity of a policy program refers to the
confounding variables. Confounding variables are the effect of the factors that were
unintentionally measured during evaluation. For evaluating a policy program, like “Their
Futures Matter,” there can be many factors that affect the future of a child and not necessarily
those conditions they are subjected to.
If a study reveals a great extent of internal validity, then it can be concluded that we
have strong confirmation of causality (Kneale et al., 2015). The reverse is true in case of a
low extent of internal validity. External validity is the degree to which the findings can be
generalized to a larger cluster or another context. If the study lacks external validity, the
results cannot be used to the contexts except the one in which the research has been
conducted. It deals with the representativeness of a population. A major threat to external
validity includes the researcher’s confidence in presenting whether the survey outcomes are
relevant to other groups.
References

Bach, T., Niklasson, B., & Painter, M. (2012). The role of agencies in policy-making. Policy
and Society, 31(3), 183–193. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polsoc.2012.07.001
Brooks, E. (2018). Using the Advocacy Coalition Framework to understand EU
pharmaceutical policy. European Journal of Public Health, 28(suppl_3), 11–14.
https://doi.org/10.1093/eurpub/cky153
Cairney, P. (2015). How can policy theory have an impact on policymaking? The role of
theory-led academic–practitioner discussions. Teaching Public Administration, 33(1), 22–39.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0144739414532284
Cairney, P., & Oliver, K. (2017). Evidence-based policymaking is not like evidence-based
medicine, so how far should you go to bridge the divide between evidence and policy?
Health Research Policy and Systems, 15. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12961-017-0192-x
Erixon, P.-O. (2016). Punctuated Equilibrium—Digital Technology in Schools’ Teaching of
the Mother Tongue (Swedish). Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, 60(3), 337–
358. https://doi.org/10.1080/00313831.2015.1066425
Fischer, A. R. H., Wentholt, M. T. A., Rowe, G., & Frewer, L. J. (2014). Expert involvement
in policy development: A systematic review of current practice. Science and Public Policy,
41(3), 332–343. https://doi.org/10.1093/scipol/sct062
Greer, S. L., Bekker, M., de Leeuw, E., Wismar, M., Helderman, J.-K., Ribeiro, S., &
Stuckler, D. (2017). Policy, politics and public health. European Journal of Public Health,
27(suppl_4), 40–43. https://doi.org/10.1093/eurpub/ckx152
Hansen, E. G., & Spitzeck, H. (2010). Stakeholder governance: how stakeholders influence
corporate decision making. Corporate Governance: The International Journal of Business in
Society, 10(4), 378–391. https://doi.org/10.1108/14720701011069623
King, A. (2016). Science, politics and policymaking. EMBO Reports, 17(11), 1510–1512.
https://doi.org/10.15252/embr.201643381
Kneale, D., Thomas, J., & Harris, K. (2015). Developing and Optimising the Use of Logic
Models in Systematic Reviews: Exploring Practice and Good Practice in the Use of
Programme Theory in Reviews. PLOS ONE, 10(11), e0142187.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0142187

Lees, J. (2016). Deliberative Political Leaders: The Role of Policy Input in Political
Leadership. Politics and Governance, 4(2), 25–35. https://doi.org/10.17645/pag.v4i2.560
Lemke, A. A., & Harris, J. N. (2015). Stakeholder engagement in policy development:
challenges and opportunities for human genomics. Genetics in Medicine : Official Journal of
the American College of Medical Genetics, 17(12), 949–957.
https://doi.org/10.1038/gim.2015.8
Malfait, S., Van Hecke, A., Hellings, J., De Bodt, G., & Eeckloo, K. (2017). The impact of
stakeholder involvement in hospital policy decision-making: a study of the hospital’s
business processes. Acta Clinica Belgica, 72(1), 63–71.
https://doi.org/10.1080/17843286.2016.1246681
Moyson, S. (2017). Cognition and policy change: the consistency of policy learning in the
advocacy coalition framework. Policy and Society, 36(2), 320–344.
https://doi.org/10.1080/14494035.2017.1322259
Onwujekwe, O., Uguru, N., Russo, G., Etiaba, E., Mbachu, C., Mirzoev, T., & Uzochukwu,
B. (2015). Role and use of evidence in policymaking: an analysis of case studies from the
health sector in Nigeria. Health Research Policy and Systems, 13(1), 46.
https://doi.org/10.1186/s12961-015-0049-0
Pierce, J. J., Peterson, H. L., & Hicks, K. C. (2017). Policy Change: An Advocacy Coalition
Framework Perspective. Policy Studies Journal, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12223
Vannoni, M. (2018). A Comparative Test of the Punctuated Equilibrium Theory: Policy
Punctuations in Tobacco Control. Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and
Practice, 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/13876988.2018.1492675
Weible, C. M. (2018). Instrument Constituencies and the Advocacy Coalition Framework: an
essay on the comparisons, opportunities, and intersections. Policy and Society, 37(1), 59–73.
https://doi.org/10.1080/14494035.2018.1417705