Social experimentation randomly assigns individuals or groups to coverage by the policy of interest or a control group and then the groups are compared in terms of outcome. Greenberg (economics, U. of Maryland), Linksz (mathematics, science, and engineering, Community College of Baltimore County), and Mandell (policy sciences, U. of Maryland) seek to assess whether the substantial investment in social experimentation in the United States has resulted in significant public policy changes. After explaining the general concepts behind social experimentation, they analyze five case studies and determine that they are not of decisive importance in state policy making, but they often serve useful purposes of policy formation. Annotation (c)2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com).

This is part of a ten volume set of reference books offering authoritative and engaging critical overviews of the state of political science. This work explores the business end of politics, where theory meets practice in the pursuit of public good.

This volume provides a single collection some of the best articles on social experimentation and program evaluation that have appeared in the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management (JPAM). Provides exposure to a variety of well-executed social experiments and evaluations for evidence-based public policy Examines the theory and conduct of evaluations and social experiments as they relate to their practical implementation in evidence-based policy making Provides exposure to the fundamental issues surrounding the conduct of evaluations as well as to the relative merits of social experiments and the ethics and use of evaluations

Welfare experiments conducted at the state level during the 1990s radically restructured the American welfare state and have played a critical—and unexpected—role in the broader policymaking process. Through these experiments, previously unpopular reform ideas, such as welfare time limits, gained wide and enthusiastic support. Ultimately, the institutional legacy of the old welfare system was broken, new ideas took hold, and the welfare experiments generated a new institutional channel in policymaking. In this book, Rogers-Dillon argues that these welfare experiments were not simply scientific experiments, as their supporters frequently contend, but a powerful political tool that created a framework within which few could argue successfully against the welfare policy changes. Legislation proposed in 2002 formalized this channel of policymaking, permitting the executive, as opposed to legislative, branches of federal and state governments to renegotiate social policies—an unprecedented change in American policymaking. This book provides unique insight into how social policy is made in the United States, and how that process is changing.

The study of public policy and the methods of policy analysis are among the most rapidly developing areas in the social sciences. Policy analysis has emerged to provide a better understanding of the policymaking process and to supply decision makers with reliable policy-relevant knowledge about pressing economic and social problems. Presenting a broad, comprehensive perspective, the Handbook of Public Policy Analysis: Theory, Politics, and Methods covers the historical development of policy analysis, its role in the policy process, and empirical methods. The handbook considers the theory generated by these methods and the normative and ethical issues surrounding their practice. Written by leading experts in the field, this book- Deals with the basic origins and evolution of public policy Examines the stages of the policy-making process Identifies political advocacy and expertise in the policy process Focuses on rationality in policy decision-making and the role of policy networks and learning Details argumentation, rhetoric, and narratives Explores the comparative, cultural, and ethical aspects of public policy Explains primary quantitative-oriented analytical methods employed in policy research Addresses the qualitative sides of policy analysis Discusses tools used to refine policy choices Traces the development of policy analysis in selected national contexts The Handbook of Public Policy Analysis: Theory, Politics, and Methods describes the theoretical debates that have recently defined the field, including the work of postpositivist, interpretivist, and social constructionist scholars. This book also explores the interplay between empirical and normative analysis, a crucial issue running through contemporary debates.

Field experiments -- randomized controlled trials -- have become ever more popular in political science, as well as in other disciplines, such as economics, social policy and development. Policy-makers have also increasingly used randomization to evaluate public policies, designing trials of tax reminders, welfare policies and international aid programs to name just a few of the interventions tested in this way. Field experiments have become successful because they assess causal claims in ways that other methods of evaluation find hard to emulate. Social scientists and evaluators have rediscovered how to design and analyze field experiments, but they have paid much less attention to the challenges of organizing and managing them. Field experiments pose unique challenges and opportunities for the researcher and evaluator which come from working in the field. The research experience can be challenging and at times hard to predict. This book aims to help researchers and evaluators plan and manage their field experiments so they can avoid common pitfalls. It is also intended to open up discussion about the context and backdrop to trials so that these practical aspects of field experiments are better understood. The book sets out ten steps researchers can use to plan their field experiments, then nine threats to watch out for when they implement them. There are cases studies of voting and political participation, elites, welfare and employment, nudging citizens, and developing countries.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

First Published in 2007. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an Informa company.

We inhabit a perpetually accelerating and increasingly interconnected world, with new ideas, fads, and fashions moving at social-media speed. New policy ideas, especially “ideas that work,” are now able to find not only a worldwide audience but also transnational salience in remarkably short order. Fast Policy is the first systematic treatment of this phenomenon, one that compares processes of policy development across two rapidly moving fields that emerged in the Global South and have quickly been adopted worldwide⎯conditional cash transfers (a social policy program that conditions payments on behavioral compliance) and participatory budgeting (a form of citizen-centric urban governance). Jamie Peck and Nik Theodore critically analyze the growing transnational connectivity between policymaking arenas and modes of policy development, assessing the implications of these developments for contemporary policymaking. Emphasizing that policy models do not simply travel intact from sites of invention to sites of emulation, they problematize fast policy as a phenomenon that is real and consequential yet prone to misrepresentation. Based on fieldwork conducted across six continents and in fifteen countries, Fast Policy is an essential resource in providing an extended theoretical discussion of policy mobility and in presenting a methodology for ethnographic research on global social policy.

Evaluation is a controversial and little-understood strategy of public governance, control, and decision making. As early as classical antiquity, scholars were summoned to court to counsel kings. Public policy and program evaluation is a recent addition to the great chain of attempts to use the brainpower of scholars and scientists to further the interests of the state. Evaluation scholars are asked to provide retrospective assessments of the implementation, output, and outcome of government measures in order to effect deeper understanding and well-grounded decisions on the part of those in charge of government operations. Evaluation is the process of distinguishing the worthwhile from the worthless, the precious from the useless; evaluation implies looking backward in order to be able to steer forward better. Written from a political science perspective, Public Policy and Program Evaluation provides an overview of the possibilities and limits of public sector evaluation. Evert Vedung examines evaluation as a mechanism for monitoring, systematizing, and grading government activities and their results so that public officials, in their future-oriented work, will be able to act as responsibly, creatively, and efficiently as possible. Topics discussed include: "Evaluation, Rationality, and Theories of Public Management"; "Models of Evaluation"; "Internal or External Evaluation"; "Impact Assessment as Tryout and Social Experimentation"; "Process Evaluation and Implementation Theory"; "The Eight-Problems Approach to Evaluation"; and "Uses and Users of Evaluation." All evaluation rests upon the idea that perceptions, opinions, intentions, judgments—in short, everything concerned with the world of human consciousness—play such interesting roles in political and administrative action that their functions are worth investigating. Through experience, humans may learn from past actions. The interventions of the modern state are so extensive, their execu