exam gozmo

• Policy analysis


  The process of identifying potential policy options that could address a problem and then comparing them to choose the most effective, efficient, and feasible one
• Policy analyst


  A person responsible for the research and analysis of information, consulting with stakeholders, and government officials to develop recommendations to address a wide range of public policy issues
• Client


  The person/organization the policy is developed for (that hired a policy analyst to solve a public policy issue)
• Decision makers


  The individuals or entities responsible to approve the policy and implement it, could include Governmental organizations (Ministry of Health)
• Policy advocacy can come in many forms such as raising awareness through campaigns
• Law


  Enforced by the government using the legal system
• Public Health Policy


  Programs, Campaigns, Services, Priorities set by Government and Private groups
• The importance of the public policy analysis process is that it ensures a systematic process to choose the best policy option, includes relevant stakeholders and decision makers, and is evidence-based
• Public health policy is a fundamental tool that supports governments in protecting people from health threats, preventing disease, and striving for healthy populations
• The Eightfold Path


  • Define the problem
  • Assemble the evidence
  • Construct the alternatives
  • Select the criteria
  • Project the outcomes
  • Confront the trade-offs
  • Decide
  • Tell your story
• Issue rhetoric


  How an issue is framed from the perspectives of different parties to inform or persuade them
• The initial problem definition comes from the client and derives from their political environment and background
• Framing an issue from an economic vs. environmental health perspective


  • Economic: A "ban on fracking would eliminate 7% of world oil and 17% of world gas supply in a global commodity market where even small changes of the supply/demand balance trigger huge price swings
  • Environmental Health: Fracking sites contribute to air pollution which can lead to an increase in childhood leukemia, cardiac problems, birth defects, asthma symptoms, and cancer
• Quantifying the problem can shed light on the magnitude of the issue
• Identifying latent opportunities, or missed opportunities for improvement, is an important part of defining the problem
• Defining the solution into the problem statement can prevent thinking about alternative solutions
• Primary data


  Data collected by you or your research team (quantitative or qualitative)
• Secondary data


  Data collected by others (literature review, datasets)
• Surveying best practices is important as the problem is likely not unique
• Alternatives


  The "policy options" that could solve the issue
• Start comprehensive in the beginning, end up focused - you won't want to assess more than 2-3 principal alternatives in the final stages
• Evaluative criteria


  The primary objectives of the policy action to be achieved and how to evaluate whether they were met
• The evaluative criteria should be selected with careful attention to the context, conditions, and problem at hand
• Alternatives


  In the last stages of your analysis, you won't want to be assessing more than two or three principal alternatives. However, at this stage make a comprehensive list of all the alternatives you might wish to consider in the course of your analysis. Later on, you will discard some, combine others, and reorganize them.
• Select the primary objectives


  1. Select the primary objectives of the policy action to be achieved

  2. Evaluate whether they were met or not
• The Eightfold path emphasizes that the step of selecting primary objectives should be done with careful attention to the context, conditions, and problem at hand
• Evaluative criteria to determine a policy's potential successes

  • A target: a particular goal and time (such as a decrease in percentage by a certain date)
  • Efficiency: How do the policy options compare in their benefit-to-cost ratio? Are some clearly more or less "wasteful" or costly?
  • Equity, and justice: How do the policy options compare in their ability to correct past inequality or discrimination?
  • Political feasibility: Are some policy options more likely than others to be effective in the country you're implementing your policy in
• The United States has the highest number of mass shootings in the world
• The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution states that citizens have the right to own guns
• Project the outcomes


  Be realistic and predict all the outcomes of each of your alternatives that your client will be concerned with
• Policy is about the future, not about the past or the present
• Establish a base case


  Review the existing evidence (however, trends might be the basis of projections)
• Quantification


  Projecting outcomes often requires thinking not just about the general direction of an outcome but about its magnitude
• Moral hazard


  The ethical policy analyst always poses the question, "If people actually were to follow my advice, what might be the costs of my having been wrong, and who would have to bear them?"
• Increasing the size of unemployment benefits has the side effect of reducing the motivation to search for a job
• Confront the trade-offs


  Compare the outcomes of different alternatives against the criteria and estimate how each alternative will perform
• A common pitfall is to think of the trade-offs as being across alternatives rather than across their projected outcomes
• Decide!


  Ensure that at least one of the alternatives would be an excellent choice to take aim at solving, or mitigating, the problem
• Twenty-Dollar-Bill Test


  Look for similar policies in the past and why they didn't work: the most common sources of failure are neglecting to consider the political resistance and the resistance of other stakeholders
• Tell your story


  1. After going through all the previous steps, you should now be able to tell your story to the target audience

  2. Consider what medium to use: oral (such as a speech given to the public or a TV interview) or written (articles, social media etc.)

  3. It could be helpful to have someone to advocate your policy