Punctuating Which Equilibrium? Understanding Thermostatic Policy Dynamics in Pacific Northwest Forestry

Abstract

that "external perturbations" outside of the policy subsystem, characterized by some type of societal upheaval, are critical for explaining the development of profound and durable policy changes which are otherwise prevented by institutional stability. We argue that these assumptions, while useful for assessing many cases of policy change, do not adequately capture historical patterns of forest policy development in the U.S. Pacific Northwest. Differences in policy development concerning state and federal regulation of private and public forest lands governing the same problem, region, and population challenge much of the prevailing orthodoxy on policy dynamics. To address this puzzle, we revisit and expand existing taxonomies identifying the levels and processes of change that policies undergo. This exercise reveals the existence of a "thermostatic" institutional setting governing policy development on federal lands that was absent in the institutions governing private lands. This thermostatic institutional arrangement contained durable policy objectives that required policy settings to undergo major change in order to maintain the institution's defining characteristics. Policy scientists need to distinguish such "hard institutions" that necessitate paradigmatic changes in policy settings from those that do not permit them. The Study of Policy DynamicsP olitical scientists studying public policy have, in the last 20 years, been involved in three projects related to the study of policy dynamics: understanding how longstanding policies might become "punctuated" and shift toward a new "equilibrium" (Jones, Baumgartner, and True 1998;Jones, Sulkin, and Larsen 2003;True, Jones, and Baumgartner 1999) and investigating the dual interaction of enduring institutions on the one hand, and subsystem coalitions on the other, in explaining and shaping this pattern of policy development (Clemens and

Presentación Dossier. Lecciones de América Latina sobre las dimensiones racionales, cognitivas e institucionales del cambio de políticas

“…La teoría del equilibrio puntuado se ha difundido de tal modo que ha sido tildada de "nueva ortodoxia" (Cashore y Howlett 2007), en referencia a la "ortodoxia" del incrementalismo. Esta última se destaca por hacer hincapié en la dimensión histórica del desarrollo de las políticas, por tratar las instituciones políticas como mecanismos de reproducción de políticas, por considerar que los cambios mayores de políticas surgen por perturbaciones externas y por esperar un conjunto típico de procesos de estabilidad (dependencia de la trayectoria), un patrón típico de cambio de política (equilibrio puntuado) y una explicación típica de por qué ocurre (como un cambio en las creencias o una perturbación societal) (Howlett 2009).…”

“…De las políticas económicas en Europa (Campbell 1998; Oliver y Pemberton 2004; Hodson y Mabbett 2009) y América Latina (Babb 2013), se ha difundido a las políticas de cultura en Francia (Surel 1997), forestal en Estados Unidos (Cashore y Howlett 2007), migratoria en Israel (Shpaizman 2014), de desarrollo sostenible y energía (Cox y Béland 2013;Kern y Kuzemko 2014). En la teoría de las revoluciones científicas de Thomas Kuhn, un paradigma designa una serie de resultados reconocidos universalmente por una comunidad científica que la provee con unos patrones comunes de problemas y soluciones (Kuhn 1971, 14).…”

The innovativeness of national policy portfolios – climate policy change in Austria, Germany, and the UK

“…Third, cumulative incrementalism describes a number of approaches all criticising process sequencing on the basis of empirical cases where 'shocks do not always result in institutional change, and institutional change does not always come from such shocks' (Van der Heijden 2010, p. 231, Genschel 1997, Pierson 2004 but rather as a result of cumulative adaption (Coleman et al 1996, Capano 2003, Lee and Strang 2006, Cashore and Howlett 2007. Here, 'bottom-up' processes of increasing returns and policy learning through incremental changes of the meso-level of policy instruments finally reach a tipping point for a more radical change in the instrumental logic at the highest policy level (Pierson 1993, Coleman et al 1996, Howlett and Cashore 2009, Daugbjerg and Sønderskov 2012.…”

“…This categorisation builds on Hall's (1993) distinction between incremental and radical policy change. Hall argues that first-order change in settings or calibrations and second-order changes of objectives and types of instruments are considered to be incremental, whereas third-order change is more paradigmatic and constitutes a radical shift in goals and the instrumental logic Howlett 2007, Howlett andCashore 2009). …”

“…We aim to contribute to the literature on policy innovation when analysing tipping points and symbolic innovations by considering the complexity of policy innovations with regard to different levels of policies, the policy portfolio, and policy dynamics over time. In order to combine all three elements in an analysis of policy innovation, we take as our starting point the mainstream literature of policy change (Hall 1993, Cashore and Howlett 2007, van der Heijden 2013.…”