Copyright (c) 2008 All rights reserved. http://works.bepress.com/howlett Recent documents in Michael Howlett en-us Thu, 03 Jan 2008 02:48:48 PST 3600 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/12 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/12 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:18:55 PST Michael Howlett http://works.bepress.com/howlett/11 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/11 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:14:17 PST Michael Howlett http://works.bepress.com/howlett/10 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/10 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:11:47 PST Michael Howlett http://works.bepress.com/howlett/9 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/9 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:04:20 PST This article evaluates four general models of historical change processes which have emerged in various fields in the social sciences - namely stochastic, historical narrative, path dependency and process sequencing - and their application to the study of public policy-making. The article sets out and assesses the merits and evidence for each, both in general social research and in the policy sciences. The article suggests that more work needs to be done examining the assumptions and presuppositions of each model before it can be concluded that any represents the general case in policy processes. However, since neither the irreversible linear reality assumed by narrative models, nor the random and chaotic world assumed by stochastic models, nor the contingent turning points and irreversible trajectories required of the path dependency model are found very often in policy-making, these models are likely to remain less significant than process-sequencing models in describing the overall general pattern of policy dynamics. Michael Howlett http://works.bepress.com/howlett/8 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/8 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:01:48 PST New policy initiatives are increasingly embedded in novel governance strategies. These new modes of governance differ from existing policy mixes in that they are specifically designed to reduce the number of instances of counterproductive policy instrument use; to function effectively and meet public policy goals in an era of decreased national state capacity and autonomy; and rely much more heavily than existing instrument mixes have done on the involvement of private actors in both policy formulation and implementation. These instances of contemporary policy design require careful analysis in order to understand where and when such designs may be adopted and, more importantly, prove effective. This article examines efforts made in Europe and Canada to develop "next-generation" forest policy strategies and finds considerable divergence in the new regulatory processes put into place in different countries. Following Knill and Lehmkuhl, this divergence is attributed to changing patterns of domestic actor capacities in the face of weak international regimes. Michael Howlett http://works.bepress.com/howlett/7 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/7 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:58:56 PST To analyse convergence and divergence in Natural Resource New Governance Arrangements (NRNGAs) two regimes in the environmentally-related areas of forest and fisheries management are examined. The findings reveal limited convergence across sectors and countries in the general aims and ideas behind NGAs and evidence of significant policy divergence in the tools and mechanisms created for their implementation. The reasons for the differences lie primarily in the policy formulation process. While the impetus for the adoption of both NRNGAs is in the international and regional realms, without the force of either international law or competitive advantage, pressure for convergence is weak. Aspects of the policy formulation process, especially the manner in which the changing capacities of domestic public and private actors active in the affected resource policy arena interact to influence policy design, are critical for explaining policy convergence and divergence. Specifically, the interplay between the effect of the internationalization of resource policy issues, tending to increase private capacities at the expense of the public one, and the declining importance of primary industries, which has the reverse effect, is shown to have played an important role in NRNGA policy dynamics. Michael Howlett http://works.bepress.com/howlett/6 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/6 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:54:37 PST Michael Howlett http://works.bepress.com/howlett/5 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/5 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:48:07 PST Over the past two decades thinking about the role of politics in the policy process has taken several different shapes. Analysts in the "positivist" school of policy analysis have tended to use restricted notions of politics in their search for policy determinants or causes of policy change. This approach can be contrasted usefully with "postpositivist" analyses, which emphasize the role played by policy discourses in the policy process. This article discusses the manner in which policy networks and policy communities integrate ideas and interests in public policymaking and provide an opportunity to overcome the positivist/post-positivist conceptual dichotomy. It proposes a model setting out how different subsystem configurations relate to paradigmatic and intraparadigmatic processes of policy change. The paper suggests that the identification of the nature of the policy subsystem in a given policy sector reveals a great deal about its propensity to respond to changes in ideas and interests and is therefore a good indicator of the likely effect "politics," in either the restrictive or broad sense of the term, will have on policymaking. Michael Howlett http://works.bepress.com/howlett/4 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/4 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:44:06 PST Relatively recent contributions to the policy literature have called into question the utility of the "network" approach to the study of public policy making, including a challenge to long-held views concerning the impact of the structure of policy subsystems on policy change. This article uses empirical evidence accumulated from case studies of four prominent Canadian federal policy sectors over the period 1990-2000 to address this issue. It sets out a model that explains policy change as dependent upon the effects of the articulation of ideas and interests in public policy processes, and generates several hypotheses relating different subsystem configurations to propensities for paradigmatic and intra-paradigmatic policy dynamics. It suggests that the identification of the nature of the policy subsystem in a given policy sector reveals a great deal about its propensity to respond to changes in ideas and interests. Michael Howlett Public Policy http://works.bepress.com/howlett/3 http://works.bepress.com/howlett/3 Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:41:48 PST Past studies of the dynamics of U.S.-Canada environmental policy and policy-making have found little evidence of 'weak' convergence in this sector; that is, of Canadian policy moving towards the U.S. model of adversarial legalism, an implementation style based upon procedural policy instruments such as action-forcing statutes, citizen suits, and judicial activism. However, recent efforts at de-regulation and the reformation of government in the U.S., and moves towards multi-stakeholder policy-making in Canada, have altered the standard against which trends towards Canadian^ American convergence must be assessed. These reforms have moved the U.S. environmental regulatory system closer to that existing in Canada, in which regulations and other elements of the environmental regime are developed through negotiation rather than litigation. Since Canadian environmental implementation has also been altered over the same period, however, it is argued that a form of 'strong' convergence is emerging, in which both countries are moving not towards each other but towards a third, common, style, that associated with the development of self-regulation and voluntary initiatives under the influence of New Public Management ideas and principles. Michael Howlett