LIST OF WORKSHOPS

Policy-makers and scholars must deal with many policy risks including not only ‘external’ threats but also those internal risks stemming from the ‘dark side’ of policy-making. These latter risks include activities such as (mis) behaviour on the part of policy-makers and policy takers who may mispromote ‘client’ interests; maliciously penalize or punish their opponents; (mis)use their power and position to enrich themselves of their allies; and manipulate policies for electoral or personal gain. These aspects of policy-making are some of the ‘inherent vices’ of the subject, meaning they are part of the very nature of policy, which makes it volatile or prone to failure. This workshop will examine these risks, assess whether they are growing in the contemporary period and especially look at how they can be managed through effective policy design.

SCIENTIFIC RATIONALE
Cousins (2018) has identified the emergent volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (‘VUCA’) of this world as the central characteristics of the contemporary  policy environment. His work has begun the process of drawing out the consequences of VUCA for public policy-making. It is reasonable to ask if the policy science developed in an earlier era of more proactive, and apparently competent, government remains capable of dealing with the ‘new reality’ of not only interwoven and ambiguous policy problems but also to what extent contemporary thinking about policy-making is able to deal with this decidedly non-Panglossian reality.

            The malaise facing policy-makers and takers, however, is more than simply a capacity challenge. Howlett & Leong (2021) suggest that only some of the problems encountered by policy-makers and policy thinkers in the present era are due to changes in the external environmental, proposing rather that some problems have always been with us but have tended to be ignored by policy science; and can no longer be. That is, they suggest that there are certain inherent vices or risks to public policy  - including uncertainty in policy-making; malice in policy-makers; and non-compliance in policy-takers - which together challenge many aspects of contemporary policy theory developed in earlier periods when these vices or risks were largely ignored in the pursuit of the holy grail of better (meaning not just more effective but optimal) policies and policy-making.

These risks to policy-making can be framed as sources of policy volatility or the likelihood/propensity of any policy design to fail and Howlett and Leong argue policy designs must deal with them head-on rather than assume all will work out well in the best of all possible worlds (Howlett & Leong, 2021). And, as Legrand (2021) argues, some current problems in policy theory and practice are also the product of a crisis in the core values of liberal democracy which previously defined the telos of ‘the good state” towards which all policies were thought to be oriented or at least should be oriented towards. This crisis has been brought about by events such as: the ‘war on terror’ in the wake of 9/11, which, among other things, ushered into liberal democratic regimes many aspects of the surveillance state which are incompatible with many liberal freedoms; the financial collapse of 2007-2008, which ushered in more rapid growth of income inequality and has undermined belief in the equality of opportunity; and the challenges posed to nation states by immigration and refugee flows in the Post-Arab Spring era in the Middle East and Europe which has destabilised moves towards open borders and the free movements of goods and people. Many of these trends only promise to increase as wars and climate change impacts increase in a highly interconnected world and are only loosely related to, or encompassed by, thinking about the origins and consequences of a VUCA world. Commensurate to, and perhaps caused by events such as these, liberal democracies are undergoing an erosion in the rule of law; declining trust in institutions; extensive regulatory capture, especially by powerful energy firms; the normalisation of policy goals that transgress human rights; and deliberate obfuscation of the policy process by its core players in many countries who lambast the media and engage in corrupt and venal practices in government. This is the ‘dark side’ of policy-making, that citizens and policy-makers both must be alert to – the world of officials, companies and citizens, who mispromote ‘client’ interests; game rules and regulations, maliciously penalize or punish; (mis)use to enrich; and manipulate policy processes (for electoral or personal gain). (Howlett, 2020; Taylor et al (2021)).

                   While these flaws and vices have been with us for some time, they flourish in volatile policy environments, and amidst the ‘dark’ misalignment of the public interest and policy settings which has accompanied the crisis of liberal democracy, it must be asked what are the prospects for policy studies to help resolve global challenges such as climate change, resource scarcity, displaced peoples, Covid-19, and state fragility in such contexts?
 

A Fundamental Task for the Contemporary Policy Sciences: Understanding the Origins of Policy Volatility

How is policy ‘malign’? As stated above, it is axiomatic to liberal democracy that policy-making should align with liberal democratic principles. Policy goals are thus expected to be produced through open mechanisms and participatory procedures through which the public can articulate its preferences to policy-makers and policy-makers are expected to listen to what has been said in determining their governments’ courses of action. The ethical basis of public policy is thus its alignment with liberal democratic principles, and it is thus malign where it does not do so. 

The ‘dark side’ outlined above is metaphorical in two senses: it refers to the opacity of decision-making process, and also to the malign motives of those responsible. This manifests in this special issue in several ways. First, malign policy is often opaque and moves in this direction are often telltale signs of non-Panglossian intent. Democracy demands that the public can properly evaluate government’s performance and reward or punish them in elections, and they require information in order to do this, which is largely provided by a free, untrammelled press corps.  Hallsworth, et al. (2010) make this point succinctly: ‘The more that this process is illusory, the more democracy is undermined’. Second, malign policy is non-inclusive. The exclusion of the public, selectively or blanket, from participation in a policy is another non-Panglossian ‘tell’: structural & agential strategies to shape how policy is made (exclude, occlude, preclude and ostracise) are giveaways that objectives other than liberal democratic ones are being pursued (Legrand, 2021).

Both these trends are exacerbated by the nature of the contemporary scholar-practitioner relationship where scholarship follows the funding set out for it by non-disinterested governments, NGOs, foundations and private companies.  Increasingly the scholar-practitioner relationship is one in which government agencies act as agenda-setters and research-takers. Perhaps unintentionally, the discipline has flirted with regulatory capture whereby the scope of policy research is determined and its validity rubber-stamped (or not) by the subjects of the research itself – usually government. This would only be possible, however, in the Panglossian circumstance where the putatively shared goal of the policy scientist and the policy-maker is to serve and secure the public interest rather than, for example, their own electoral or career interests.

The question of how policy scholars should engage with normative democratic principles continues to divide the policy sciences (see Wagle, 2000, for an excellent exposition). Although a distinct wave of ‘post-positivist’, critical and/or interpretivist scholarship emerged in the last two decades of the 20th century engaging with the role of values and beliefs – that is, politics – in decision-making, the larger thrust of research remains firmly oriented towards the production of modelling and generalizable insights that accrues from a dispassionate, scientific engagement with policy-making as a process that can, and should, be made more efficient in delivering government goals (see Farr, Hacker & Kazee, 2006; Durnova & Weible, 2020).

We propose the use of terms such as policy volatility and policy malignancy as not as a new platform for research, but rather as a means to marshal the existing range of theoretical and conceptual viewpoints on these two aspects of contemporary policy-making and policy design as a shared research agenda for the policy sciences and especially those related to policy design. Specifically, we draw from recent work in policy studies that draws attention to these kinds of behaviours. On malign agents and their strategies in the policy process, Allan McConnell’s work is path-finding in its  uncovering of ‘hidden agendas’ in policy-making: policies with covert aims behind their ostensible purpose (McConnell, 2018).

Legrand (2021) adopts a similar perspective, showing how officials have manipulated the terms and structures of debates in Australia and elsewhere in order to diminish public scrutiny and exclude voices critical of security state initiatives from the political sphere. This is a topic of importance. Opacity in policy settings creates uncertainty & insecurity – a subject Stefan Bachtold examines in his work on the control of social media in Myanmar in the effort to damp down discontent with regime activity, from the Rohinga genocide to opposition to the recent military coup. (Bächtold, 2021; cf. Howlett/Leong, 2021). Relatedly, Taylor, McDonnell & Duong focus on ‘bureaucratic gaming’, drawing out policy-makers’ deliberate use of dubious behavioral practices in order to gain an advantage over one’s competitors, personal prestige and budget maximization, among other non-Panglossian goals and ambitions (Taylor, McDonnell, Duong, 2021).

It is only fairly recently that the literature on policy design study and practice has recognised the importance of identifying and accounting for ‘risk’ (McConnell, 2010). Many policy-related literatures, especially those that fall under or overlap with political science, have long-accepted that the ideal of good governments is continually undermined by a range of pathologies, which variously include explanations of: how badly-construed information can skew government policy, especially where state and governance knowledge bases and capacities are limited; how decision-making might be motivated by interests other than the creation of public value, and; how policy targets – those whose behaviours government attempts to manage with policy instruments –   embark in forms of lawful and unlawful ‘misconduct’, such as fraud, gamesmanship, evasion, deliberate non-compliance, and others, to undermine government intentions. Yet wider recognition of these pathologies has yet to carry over into the policy literature (Howlett, 2021 forthcoming; Howlett, 2020; Arestis & Kitromilides, 2010).

As such, policy design thinking been criticised for its neglect of the ‘inherent vices’ of policy-making and policy design - the uncertainty inherent to real-world political settings, as well as endemic recalcitrance in policy-makers and policy-takers (Colebatch, 2018; Turnbull, 2018; Howlett, 2019).

Identifying Possible Correctives

In addition to simply emphasizing and better describing and classifying these behaviours and outcomes, scholars also wish to seek out correctives. New methodological means for assessing the risks of policy failure are important as are possible correctives or solutions to the impasse of Panglossian policy advice in the face of a VUCA world.

For those who recognise these challenges, the risks of failure can be mitigated by incorporating safeguarding principles in the design process. Some, such as Walker, Haasnoot, & Kwakkel (2013), posit essential qualities that, when strengthened, can help deliver effective policy designs. This includes designing for:

1.     resistance: planning for the worst possible case or future situation

2.     resilience: making sure that the system can recover quickly whatever happens in the future

3.     static robustness: aiming at reducing vulnerability in the largest possible range of conditions

4.     dynamic robustness (or flexibility): planning to change policies over time, in case conditions change

Policies can also be usefully framed as portfolios of risks. This approach borrows concepts from financial investment to suggest that diversification in ‘packages’ of policy approaches can balance out uncertainties and mitigate uncertainties involved in forecasting outcomes, and which can also be tailored to specific risk preferences (Teller & Kock, 2013; Project Management Institute, 2008; McFarlan, 1981; Olsson, 2008; Pellegrinelli, 1997; Sanchez et al., 2008; Archer & Ghasemzadeh, 1999; Sanchez, Robert, Bourgault, & Pellerin, 2009).

Institutionalizing ‘foresight agencies’ tasked with anticipating or predicting contingencies, so as to diminish the risk of surprises affecting government agendas, can be an effective tool in some instances, as is enhancing and normalising evaluation and measurement activities in policy-making processes to counter or reduce the risk of incomplete or non-learning occurring (Dudley & Xie, 2020b; Dudley, 2020).

The Open Questions

Raising attention to these kinds of policy risks highlights the need to be better ordered both from atheoretical and an empirical point of view.

From a theoretical point of view we need:

1.     to better understand how these risks arise;

2.     to better conceptualize the link between risks and management/mitigation strategies; and

3.     to better theorize about policy risk classifications in order to simplify and thus better order the study of the complexity of the real world of policy design.

4.     To better translate theoretical insights on risk into substantive principles of policy design.

From an empirical point of view we need:

1.     to better describe the policy risks present in different policy fields;

2.     to better understand the diachronic evolution of such policy risks to understand how and why they have evolved in the specific ways they have;

3.     To conduct comparative analysis to see whether, how, and why the same general families of policy instruments  and the same general policy principles may lead to the mitigation (or not) of different types of policy risks in the same policy fields in different circumstances;

4.     To conduct evaluative analyses capable of showing under which conditions it is possible to design (more) effective risk management mixes; and

5.     To conduct more focused empirical research into understanding the diachronic evolution of policy risks.

References

Archer, N. P., & Ghasemzadeh, F. (1999). An integrated framework for project portfolio selection. International Journal of Project Management, 17(4), 207-216.

Arestis, P., & Kitromilides, Y. (2010). What economists should know about public policymaking?. International Journal of Public Policy, 6(1-2), 136-153.

Bächtold, S. (forthcoming) Myanmar’s digital conflicts. Malign policies, malign actors, or malign policy arrangements? The International Journal of Public Policy.

Colebatch, H. K. (2018). The idea of policy design: Intention, process, outcome, meaning and validity. Public Policy and Administration, 33(4), 365-383.

Cousins, B. (2018). Design thinking: Organizational learning in VUCA environments. Academy of Strategic Management Journal, 17(2), 1-18.

Dryzek, J.S., 1989. Policy sciences of democracy. Polity, 22(1), pp.97-118.

Dudley, S. E. (2020). The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs and the durability of regulatory oversight in the United States. Regulation & Governance.

Dudley, S. E., & Xie, Z. (2020). Designing a choice architecture for regulators. Public Administration Review, 80(1), 151-156.

Durnová, A. P., & Weible, C. M. (2020). Tempest in a teapot? Toward new collaborations between mainstream policy process studies and interpretive policy studies. Policy Sciences, 53, 571-588.

Farr, J., Hacker, J. S., & Kazee, N. (2006). The policy scientist of democracy: The discipline of Harold D. Lasswell. American political science review, 100(4), 579-587.

Hallsworth, 2010. Policy Making In The Real World Evidence and Analysis

Haasnoot, M., Kwakkel, J. H., Walker, W. E., & Ter Maat, J. (2013). Dynamic adaptive policy pathways: A method for crafting robust decisions for a deeply uncertain world. Global environmental change, 23(2), 485-498.

Howlett, M. (2019). The policy design primer: Choosing the right tools for the job. Routledge.

Howlett, M., 2020. Dealing with the dark side of policy-making: Managing behavioural risk and volatility in policy designs. Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice, 22(6), pp.612-625.

Howlett, M. & Leong, C. (forthcoming) “Inherent Vices” of Policy-Making and Policy Design: Dealing with Risk, Volatility and the Propensity of Policies to Fail. The International Journal of Public Policy.

Huber, J.D. and Powell, G.B., 1994. Congruence between citizens and policymakers in two visions of liberal democracy. World Politics, 46(3), pp.291-326.

Jensen, O. (forthcoming). Climate risk perceptions and policy ambition. The International Journal of Public Policy.

Leong, C., & Howlett, M. (2020). Theorizing the behavioral state: Resolving the theory-practice paradox of policy sciences. Public Policy and Administration, 0952076720977588.

Legrand, T. (forthcoming) The Malign System in Policy Studies: structural and agential assemblages of political exclusion. The International Journal of Public Policy.

Legrand, T. (2021). The Architecture of Policy Transfer: Ideas, Institutions and Networks in Transnational Policymaking. 

Masters, A. (2020). Robustness and the Governance Sin of Bureaucratic Animosity. In Quality of Governance (pp. 215-234). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.

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Plehwe, D & Günaydin, K. (forthcoming). From infamous denial to mundane obstruction in Germany: Business Lobbies, Think Tanks and the Renewable Energy Sources Act. The International Journal of Public Policy.

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Taylor, T. McDonnell, J. & Duong, H. (forthcoming). Gaming of performance measures and targets in the public sector: Implications for policymaking. The International Journal of Public Policy.

Teller, J., & Kock, A. (2013). An empirical investigation on how portfolio risk management influences project portfolio success. International Journal of Project Management, 31(6), 817-829.

Turnbull, N. (2018). Policy design: Its enduring appeal in a complex world and how to think it differently. Public Policy and Administration, 33(4), 357-364.

 
Wagle, U., 2000. The policy science of democracy: The issues of methodology and citizen participation. Policy Sciences, 33(2), pp.207-223.

Wilson, W. (1886). The study of public administration.

This Workshop is directly focused on emerging risks to policy design. It aims to identify the sources of volatility in the policy environment, and their theoretical and empirical relevance for studies of policy instruments, policy formulation, implementation and design. We want to deepen the theoretical and empirical knowledge of policy risk and how it relates to policy management and design. This will help us better understand what the latent risks are, how they are changing, and how they affect policy choices and designs on the ground.

Thus the aim of the workshop is thus to bring  together scholars in public policy, public administration, policy design, and policy analysts working in different policy domains interested in better conceptualization and more empirical evidence on the nature of policy risks, both the external risks – such as environmental changes, political upheaval and other similar factors – as well as internal ones linked to malign and malicious policy-maker and policy-taker behaviour.

The workshop will present theoretically informed empirical papers that, often from a comparative perspective, are focused on:

-       the diachronic evolution of policy risks;

-       the relationship between policy risks and policy management;

-       the criteria adopted by decision-makers when they have deal with such risks; and

-       the nature of policy designs which can successfully eliminate or mitigate such risks.

Purely theoretical papers are also welcome if focusing on:

-       a better conceptualization of the linkage between policy risks and policy design; or

-       the conceptual clarification of the most adopted  criteria of the identification and assessment of policy risks; or

-       better classifications of policy risks allowing scholars and practitioners to simplify and thus to better order  and understand the complexity of the real world of policy making and policy design.

Policy-makers and scholars must deal with many policy risks including not only ‘external’ threats but also those internal risks stemming from the ‘dark side’ of policy-making. These latter risks include activities such as (mis) behaviour on the part of policy-makers and policy takers who may mispromote ‘client’ interests; maliciously penalize or punish their opponents; (mis)use their power and position to enrich themselves of their allies; and manipulate policies for electoral or personal gain. These aspects of policy-making are some of the ‘inherent vices’ of the subject, meaning they are part of the very nature of policy, which makes it volatile or prone to failure. This workshop will examine these risks, assess whether they are growing in the contemporary period and especially look at how they can be managed through effective policy design.

Michael Howlett is Burnaby Mountain Chair in the Department of Political Science at Simon Fraser University, Canada, and Professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. He specializes in public policy analysis, political economy, and resource and environmental policy. He is the author of Canadian Public Policy (2013) and Designing Public Policies (2011), and coedited Policy Work in Canada (2014). He is editor of the Annual Review of Policy Design and Policy Sciences, and is co-editor of the Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis and of  Policy & Society. His articles have been published in numerous professional journals in Canada, the United States, Europe, Latin America, Asia, and Australia and New Zealand.

Tim Legrand

Tim Legrand is Associate Professor in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Adelaide. Tim's interdisciplinary research concerns transgovernmental networks, political exclusion, policy transfer and security politics. He is the author of The Architecture of Policy Transfer: Ideas, Institutions and Networks in Transnational Policymaking (2021, Palgrave Macmillan) and Banning Them, Securing Us? The Politics of Proscription. (2020, Manchester University Press, with Lee Jarvis)