It's why we have masters degrees in this stuff

“Policy creates politics” quoted Schneider and Ingram in their article and each of the authors we read for today supported this statement in one way or another. They also touched on the fact that at a basic level, public policy is the day-to-day politics that most citizens will come closest into contact with. If effective (or conversely, ineffective,) public policy impacts the lives and behavior of citizens and subsequently, as Soss contends, their perceptions of government competence as a whole. None of the readings seemed particularly or insightful, but rather re-emphasized and deconstructed truths about policy that seem self-evident in the first place, that is: good policy is essential to democracy and, is incredibly complex and difficult.

Schneider and Ingram touch on one of the main challenges of creating and executing good policy that I would think must be an absolutely basic premise and lesson in policy education. Policy makers must utilize a limited amount of knowledge to affect a large and varied group of people. Target populations share qualities that are reason for being the target of a policy, but within such populations, citizens might encompass a wide range of experience and behavior and therefore, react differently to a policy initiative. Thus, the primary assumptions policy-makers are forced to make are both essential and far-reaching and when these assumptions are based on misrepresentative social constructions, such policy can be ill-informed and ultimately, disadvantageous to certain groups. Look no farther than welfare policy and its surrounding debate. But this sounds like Public Policy 101: know your target population. This knowledge must be grounded in an in-depth and multi-faceted understanding of the needs and behaviors of a given group, not in a surface-level social construction. A balance, however, must be struck between utilizing some stereotypes in order to make the necessary assumptions, while constructively parsing out others.

The policy examples that follow in the other readings sustain one of the premises in Schneider and Ingram’s contentions: that policies are designed based on the needs and characterizations of target participants and recipients. Welfare, the GI Bill and even school security represent a wide range of policy, with very different aims and aimed at very different target groups. From economic to education, from participatory to punitive, policy creation and outcome, while altogether affecting the behaviors of their recipients/participants and those people’s perceptions of citizenship and government, take many forms. With so many variables at play here, it’s illogical to draw broad conclusions about the effectiveness of policy in general. (Although social construction clearly plays a role in their design.) To me, what ultimately comes across is that policy creation requires substantial research and expertise because its consequences are far-reaching for democracy.