policy cycle

The policy cycle (also: policy -cycle) is a product from the U.S. political science model that in several, divided usually six or seven steps the policy process and was first formulated in 1956 by Harold Dwight Lasswell. The approach was also taken up in the German Political Science and developed.

As phases of the policy cycle can be distinguished:

• Problem Definition: The cycle of a political program (function, organization, Policy, Program ) begins the moment in which the decision is taken to deal with a problem at all. According to Gabriel Almond initiate this phase of ideal-typical as interest groups or other social support groups.

• Agenda-setting or problem theming: In a next step, set the previously defined problem on the political agenda ( agenda ). This is done in the classical case by political parties bring in the specific policy field-dependent suggestions mostly about their chairman at party, position papers, press releases or statements in the discussion. A political problem also reaches for example, by changing conditions, specified deadlines or medial pressure on the agenda.

• Policy implementation: it Creates a specific theme, to get on the political agenda at a place where changes in legislation appears to be necessary, it comes to the decision-making process between relevant actors, ie mostly those that be actually participated in the final decision be. Depending on the distribution of power, different interests and the structure of the institutions in which these votes and the final decisions take place, there will be a political decision ( eng.: decision ). This point is referred to in German literature as policy formulation.

• Implementation: Once a decision taken is then transformed into law, any adjustments in other laws are made and that the law is implemented in the legal system. This includes the application of the new policy and enforcement (English: execution ) of the law by government departments, authorities or the police.

• Evaluation: As part of its application (eg by court rulings in the affected area or on the basis of this law ) determined by law enforcement authorities and the judiciary, whether and how the law has certain shortcomings with it, which failed to foresee the legislative or in itself have been found during the operation as particularly problematic.

• Re - definition or Termination: At this point, the policy cycle closes. If, during the evaluation of the need for change detected, so put the issue back on the agenda, it comes in a new process for the amendment of existing or creation of new regulations. Otherwise, a political program but also be terminated, with potential benefits through cost savings or reduction of bureaucracy facing a variety of hindrance.

Benefits of the policy cycle and criticism

• In the political science research, the model of the policy cycle is mainly used for analytical structure of the policy process, ie a manageable complexity reducing representation of a program reduction method, which may appear complex and nested particularly in terms of actors and program content and running parallel in reality. Based on the phases of the policy cycles have become so in the 1960s and 1970s, various sub-disciplines of the field of policy research, for example, emerged the implementation research or evaluation research.
• The policy cycle also allows a more detailed analysis of content issues within individual phases.
• He also serves in normative democratic theory, and also respects as a guideline for an ideal policy process.
• Disadvantages arise when the model constructed process is seen as a reflection of political reality. Thus, the individual phases are in reality often not clearly distinguishable, overlap and run simultaneously.
• Furthermore, difficult is the initial definition of the problem, as problems are not objectively identifiable. However, it is assumed in the policy cycle of an existing problem and hides the process of problem perception.
• An application example from the German political science is the analysis of the origin of EADS by the Policy Cycles by Bockstette.