A Conceptual Framework for the Comparative Analysis of Policy Change: Measurement, Explanation and Strategies of Policy Dismantling

Abstract

The analysis of policy change has so far concentrated on the assessment and explanation of different degrees of change. The distinctions between radical versus incremental, pathbreaking versus path-dependent or self-reinforcing versus reactive sequences have dominated the debate while the precise direction of policy change has rarely been taken into account. This article therefore concentrates on the extent to which policy change implies a "reduction", "decrease" or "diminution" of existing policy arrangements. It conceives of this direction of policy change as "policy dismantling". In developing analytical tools to identify and explain policy dismantling, the article aims to elucidate some of the causes, conditions and strategies of policy dismantling and to establish policy dismantling as a distinct category of policy change.

“Donate your organs, donate life!” Explicitness in policy instruments

“…The explicitness of policy instruments has proven more insightful than the coerciveness of policy instruments in terms of understanding the empirical cases discussed here. By not accounting for degrees of explicitness, researchers might actually overlook an important part of the picture behind the emergence, change and effects of policy instruments Bauer and Knill 2014;Knill et al 2012;Schaffrin et al 2015). Including this perspective can, therefore, contribute to a better understanding of how governments define and resolve problems in their continuous attempt to balance responsiveness to target populations with social change.…”

“…As another aspect of substantial intensity, the explicitness dimension complements the traditional focus on instrument density, formal intensity and restrictiveness when thinking about the settings and calibration of policy output (Bauer and Knill 2014;Knill et al 2012Knill et al , 2015Engeli et al 2013;Hood 2007;Howlett 2009;Sager 2009;Schaffrin et al 2015;Vedung 1998).…”

“…Regulatory density tells us about the formal extent and breadth to which governmental activities address a certain policy area (Bauer and Knill 2014). This dimension captures the amount of government activity in terms of the degree of regulatory penetration, complexity and internal differentiation (Knill et al 2012).…”

“…Essentially, formal and substantive intensities describe the power relationship between the government and the target population (Bauer and Knill 2014;Hood 2007;Howlett and Cashore 2009;Sager 2009;Schaffrin et al 2015;Vedung 1998). These existing taxonomies focus on regulatory content either as the governments' resources at hand, or as the relationship between public authorities and private actors (Schaffrin et al 2015).…”

Unpopular Social Policy Reform and Strategic Communication: An Introduction

“…This is mainly due to the fact that the welfare state is very popular among voters (Brooks and Manza 2007;Jensen 2012;Zohlnhöfer et al 2013). The second reason is that focusing on unpopular social policies enables us to link the findings of this special issue to the important research on welfare state retrenchment and policy dismantling (Bauer and Knill 2014) which for their part gave birth to the literature on blame avoidance strategies.…”