Giliberto Capano (University of Bologna, Italy)

Giliberto Capano is Professor of Political Science and Public Policy at the University of Bologna, where he was Dean of the Faculty of Political Sciences.  He is one of the editors of the prestigious and highly-ranked journal Policy & Society. He was a member of the Executive Committee of the International Political Science Association (2009-2014) and of the Executive Committee of the European Consortium of Political Research (2018-2024). In 2014, he was one of the 12 founders of the International Public Policy Association, of which he is still a member of the Executive Committee. He specialises in public administration and public policy. His research focuses on governance dynamics and performance in higher education and education; policy design and policy change; the impact and performance of policy instruments; the social role and impact of political science and public policy; crisis governance; policy capacities and policy making. He has (co-)authored eleven monographs and (co-)edited eighteen books; his work has been published in the leading international journals of public policy and public administration, and he is ranked in the top 2% of the world's most impactful scholars by the Stanford Ranking. He has acted as a consultant and reviewer for various Italian public administrations and has taught executive courses for the National Schools of Public Administration of various countries, such as Italy, Brazil, Spain, Portugal, Australia and Italy.

Course: Designing Policies That Can Work in Critical Times

Why do so many well-intentioned policies fail, while others deliver what they promise? The answer largely lies in how they are designed. The question has rarely been more pressing. Governments today design policies under conditions of deep uncertainty, confronting climate change, rapid digitalisation and the rise of artificial intelligence, geopolitical instability, and recurrent economic and social shocks. In such times, the quality of design makes the difference between policies that can work and those bound to disappoint. Policy design, in this sense, is more than the selection of tools: it is the architecture of collective action. This course offers a systematic framework for understanding, analysing, and assessing the design choices that determine whether, and for whom, policies work in practice.

The starting point is the space within which design takes place. Governments never choose among all conceivable options, but among those that are feasible given legal authority, available resources, and the complexity of the problem at hand. This space is also, and above all, political. What can be designed depends on the support that can be mobilised, the opposition that must be accommodated, the coalitions that sustain a government, and the moment in the political cycle at which choices are made. Understanding this space explains why some solutions become thinkable while others remain off the table, and why the range of what is possible expands or contracts after crises, reforms, or shifts in the political landscape.

Whether a policy works is then decided at the level of its instruments and their finer details (the microdesign): how an intervention is calibrated, whom it is directed at, how much discretion is left to those who implement it, and how compliance is secured. These choices shape the mechanisms through which a policy operates, whether by creating incentives, imposing constraints, fostering learning, or securing obedience. They also determine who gains and who loses, so that the question is never only whether a policy works, but for whom it works. Details that appear merely technical often decide whether a policy delivers or derails, and they carry profound political implications.

Policies rarely work through a single instrument. The course, therefore, examines how instruments operate in combination, as portfolios that express a broader logic of intervention. Combinations may reinforce one another, work at cross purposes, or simply duplicate effort. Some strengthen and stabilise a policy; others slowly erode its coherence. Particular attention is given to how these combinations evolve over time, as new instruments are added to old ones and priorities are reordered.

Even a well-conceived policy cannot work without the capacity to deliver it. The course treats governmental capacity as both an enabler and a constraint on ambitious design, distinguishing the ability to analyse problems, implement solutions, and sustain political support. Designs that demand more than governments can deliver fail; intelligent designs adapt to what is available rather than ignoring it. Attention is also given to what happens after adoption: policies generate feedback once implemented, and designs that work are those that build in mechanisms to learn from this feedback and correct course.

The course culminates with the question of how policies perform in critical times, under constant uncertainty, shocks, and contestation. Here, three properties are carefully distinguished: robustness, the ability of a design to keep delivering when circumstances change; resilience, the ability to absorb shocks and recover; and adaptability, the ability to adjust deliberately as conditions and knowledge evolve. Participants are introduced to a practical framework for stress-testing a policy: probing its underlying assumptions, the fit of its instruments, the capacity it requires, and its ability to adapt when its premises no longer hold.

Throughout the course, concepts are constantly confronted with real cases drawn from today's most demanding policy fields, including climate and energy, digital transformation and artificial intelligence, health, education, and welfare, so that participants leave with an analytical toolkit for studying, and for designing, policies that can work in critical times.

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:

• • • map the political and institutional space within which policy design takes place, and explain why it expands or contracts;
    • analyse policy instruments and their finer details, tracing how design choices shape both effectiveness and distributive outcomes;
    • assess combinations of instruments and their evolution over time, identifying sources of coherence and of erosion;
    • evaluate whether a design matches the governmental capacity available to deliver it;
    • reflect systematically on the vulnerabilities of a policy design: its assumptions, its instruments, and the capacity it requires.

Afternoon Programme

Mornings build knowledge; afternoons sharpen analytical and practical skills. Each afternoon session follows one of two formats. In presentation sessions, participants present their own research on policy design, instruments, or policy capacity and receive targeted feedback to strengthen their conceptual and analytical frameworks. In applied sessions, participants work in groups on real policy cases, examining them through the lenses introduced in the morning lectures and reporting their analysis in a short plenary discussion. To make these sessions productive, participants will be asked to submit in advance either a research abstract or a brief description of a policy case they wish to work on.

The course is designed to be of value to both doctoral researchers and policy practitioners.