‘Black magic’ and ‘gold dust’: the epistemic and political uses of evidence tools in public health policy making

Stewart, Ellen; Smith, Katherine E.

doi:10.1332/174426415x14381786400158

Cited by 43 publications

(37 citation statements)

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“…Individuals seek cognitive shortcuts to avoid decision-making 'paralysis'-when faced with an overwhelming amount of possibly-relevant information-and allow them to process information efficiently enough to make choices (Gigerenzer and Selten, 2001). They combine 'rational' shortcuts, including trust in expertise and scientific sources, and 'irrational' shortcuts, to use their beliefs, emotions, habits, and familiarity with issues to identify policy problems and solutions (see Haidt, 2001;Kahneman, 2011;Lewis, 2013;Baumgartner, 2017;Jones and Thomas, 2017;Sloman and Fernbach, 2017). Therefore, we need to understand how they use such shortcuts to interpret their world, pay attention to issues, define issues as policy problems, and become more or less receptive to proposed solutions.…”

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confidence: 99%

The dos and don’ts of influencing policy: a systematic review of advice to academics

2019

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Many academics have strong incentives to influence policymaking, but may not know where to start. We searched systematically for, and synthesised, the 'how to' advice in the academic peer-reviewed and grey literatures. We condense this advice into eight main recommendations: (1) Do high quality research; (2) make your research relevant and readable; (3) understand policy processes; (4) be accessible to policymakers: engage routinely, flexible, and humbly; (5) decide if you want to be an issue advocate or honest broker; (6) build relationships (and ground rules) with policymakers; (7) be 'entrepreneurial' or find someone who is; and (8) reflect continuously: should you engage, do you want to, and is it working? This advice seems like common sense. However, it masks major inconsistencies, regarding different beliefs about the nature of the problem to be solved when using this advice. Furthermore, if not accompanied by critical analysis and insights from the peer-reviewed literature, it could provide misleading guidance for people new to this field.

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The dos and don’ts of influencing policy: a systematic review of advice to academics

2019

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“…There is also the advocacy model, where researchers develop policy solutions and attempt to convince policymakers to adopt them [31, 32]. Most of this literature focuses on techniques (e.g.…”

Section: How To Maximise the Use Of Evidence In Policymentioning

confidence: 99%

Evidence-based policymaking is not like evidence-based medicine, so how far should you go to bridge the divide between evidence and policy?

Cairney

Oliver

2017

Health Res Policy Sys

302

280

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There is extensive health and public health literature on the ‘evidence-policy gap’, exploring the frustrating experiences of scientists trying to secure a response to the problems and solutions they raise and identifying the need for better evidence to reduce policymaker uncertainty. We offer a new perspective by using policy theory to propose research with greater impact, identifying the need to use persuasion to reduce ambiguity, and to adapt to multi-level policymaking systems.We identify insights from secondary data, namely systematic reviews, critical analysis and policy theories relevant to evidence-based policymaking. The studies are drawn primarily from countries such as the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. We combine empirical and normative elements to identify the ways in which scientists can, do and could influence policy.We identify two important dilemmas, for scientists and researchers, that arise from our initial advice. First, effective actors combine evidence with manipulative emotional appeals to influence the policy agenda – should scientists do the same, or would the reputational costs outweigh the policy benefits? Second, when adapting to multi-level policymaking, should scientists prioritise ‘evidence-based’ policymaking above other factors? The latter includes governance principles such the ‘co-production’ of policy between local public bodies, interest groups and service users. This process may be based primarily on values and involve actors with no commitment to a hierarchy of evidence.We conclude that successful engagement in ‘evidence-based policymaking’ requires pragmatism, combining scientific evidence with governance principles, and persuasion to translate complex evidence into simple stories. To maximise the use of scientific evidence in health and public health policy, researchers should recognise the tendency of policymakers to base judgements on their beliefs, and shortcuts based on their emotions and familiarity with information; learn ‘where the action is’, and be prepared to engage in long-term strategies to be able to influence policy; and, in both cases, decide how far you are willing to go to persuade policymakers to act and secure a hierarchy of evidence underpinning policy. These are value-driven and political, not just ‘evidence-based’, choices.

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“…Seeing the role of evidence as simply technical, however, stands in contrast to critical scholars who have explored the decidedly political nature of evidence utilisation (in both public health and other policy realms). Stewart and Smith (2015) for example have recently discussed how particular 'evidence tools' -including systematic reviews, impact assessments or economic decision-support tools (such as cost-effectiveness analyses)serve political functions in addition to the provision of technical guidance, "primarily in their symbolic value as markers of good decision making"(p. 415). This includes conveying credibility to external audiences as well as providing clear and quantifiable answers to policy questions.…”

Section: Evidence Use As a Power/knowledge Nexusmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evidence and Policy in Aid-Dependent Settings

Parkhurst

Leir

Walls

et al. 2018

International Series on Public Policy

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As has been noted in earlier chapters of this book, comparative institutional analyses can be particularly difficult when national contexts differ widely. As such, identifying common features in the political or institutional contexts across different settings can be important. One highly relevant contextual feature that is shared across a range of lower income settings is the presence, and potential influence, of international donor

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‘Black magic’ and ‘gold dust’: the epistemic and political uses of evidence tools in public health policy making

Cited by 43 publications

References 28 publications

The dos and don’ts of influencing policy: a systematic review of advice to academics

The dos and don’ts of influencing policy: a systematic review of advice to academics

Evidence-based policymaking is not like evidence-based medicine, so how far should you go to bridge the divide between evidence and policy?

Evidence and Policy in Aid-Dependent Settings

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