POLITICS 222

Public Policy: Actors, Processes and Politics

Please note: this is archived course information from 2014 for POLITICS 222.

Description

Designed to enable development of a conceptual "toolkit" for the explanation and evaluation of public policy. Examines the role of policy actors such as interest groups, business, technical experts and government agencies; the way in which the international economy and domestic political institutions shape policy outcomes, the recognition and diagnosis of policy problems and the rationality of policy decision-making. The questions asked in this course include: Why does policy matter? Who makes policy and how? What impact does the global environment have on what domestic governments deliver? In answering these questions the focus is on those that play a key role in the making of public policy: ministers, bureaucrats, minders and media, interest groups, public opinion and think tanks. It examines how policy is made from the point at which an issue hits the public agenda, to the point when a policy is implemented.

Availability 2014

Semester 1

Lecturer(s)

Coordinator(s) Dr Julie MacArthur

Reading/Texts

Howlett and Ramesh, Studying Public Policy, 3rd ed. (Oxford University Press, 2009)

 

Recommended Reading

Eichbaum and Shaw, Public Policy in New Zealand, 3rd ed. (Pearson Education, 2011)

 

Assessment

Points

POLITICS 222: 15 points

Prerequisites

Any 30 points at Stage I in Political Studies or Politics and International Relations or Māori Studies or MĀORI 130, or 30 points passed in Stage I listed in Social Science for Public Health

Corequisites

Restrictions