Policy Studies Journal, Vol. 17, No.

2, Winter, 1988-89

THE CONíEXílJAL BUR ENS

OF POUCY DESIGN y
Peter deleon
University of Colorado--Denver

IS THERE A MALADY?

The very perceptive historian Barbara Tuchrnan (1984:4) begins

her The March of Folly by observing that

Mankind, it seerns, rnakes a poorer performance of govern-

rnent than of alrnost any other hurnan activity. In this
sphere, wisdorn, which may be defined as the exercise of
judgrnent acting on experience, cornrnon sense and available
inforrnation, is less operative and more frustrated than it
should be.

Recent pollical events, such as the lrancontra arrns scandals and the
appallingly large national debt certainly do not offer persuasive
evidence to the contrary. Thus it is not surprising that a recent
Times-Mirror survey conducted by the Gallup organization found that
the Arnerican public trusts television news reporters more than 1does
President Reagan; other polls rate congressrnen below used car sales-
rnen. One shudders as to the place of policy analysts on this scale.
PuMic servants are cornrnonly viewed as an unfortunate rnix of the
ideologue, the mediocre, and the lustful--at best, scapegoats, at worst,
as sure a recipe for a kakistocracy (frorn the Greek, "governrnent by
the worst") as one rnight imagine. Orninously, the regrettable reputa-
tion could becorne a self-fulfilling prophecy. In a sentence, govemrnent
of the peopie, by the people, and for the people has a poor reputation
arnongst the people. Unquestionably this is a lamentable condlion.
To be sure, the reputations are not entirely ill-founded. Liberals
and conservatives have agreed that the rnulti-billion dollar War on
Poverty programs initiated in the 1960s have produced few if any vic-
tories. More tellingly, Charles Murray (1984) argues that many of the
prograrns have perpetuated, even worsened the very situations they
were rneant to alleviate; we are, he tells us, Losing Ground. President
Reagan's apparent atternpt to obtain the release of Arnerican hostages
held in the Middle East, his devastating budget and trade deficits, and
his truculent nornination of Judge Robert Borke to the Suprerne Court
have threatened governrnental paralyses of monumental rnagnitude.
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 Contextoal Burdens of Policy Design 299

understandably prefer to handle their problerns thernselves with a rnini-

rnurn of externa1 interíerence or outside involvernent. It is only when
their problerns grow too large or curnbersorne or cornplex or difíicult
that they turn to governrnent, when private needs becorne public goods
(Hirschrnan, 1982). Farrners and bankers during the Great Depression
appealed to the governrnent when they could no longer stern the tide
of foreclosures. Low incorne groups enlisted the governrnent's aid to
cornbat poverty's econornic and social depriwations in the 1960s when it
becarne apparent that they lacked the support and resources to do so
on their own. Similar exarnples can be found in today in such diverse
areas as health care, education, and environmental protection. Sirnply
stated, public goods are more difíicult to deliver than private goods.
Governrnents typically do not get engaged in "workable" problerns, ones
with ready solutions. So it should not be surprising that they have a
perceived high failure rate.
In short, policy conception and forrnulation are rarely straight-
forward exercises; policy irnplernentation often rnakes up in failure
what it lacks in fidelity; and policy evaluation (or correction) is
inherently error prone. Many times governrnents are literally forced to
take on intractable, rnaybe insolvable problerns which would defy solu-
tion even if the responsible agencies possessed sufficient acurnen,
inforrnation, and political clout. Moreover, this condition is intensified
by conflicting political and social objectives, illurninated by the klieg
light of public scrutiny and disclosure; large failures are never private
affairs. The experience of the Elernentary and Secondary Education Act
(ESEA) is indicative of the endernic travails of creating and executing
public policy; in Bailey and Mosher's cautioning description:

When, as in the case of ESEA, a law unprecedented in scope

had to be adrninistered through state and local instrurnen-
talities, on an irnpossible time schedule, by an understaffed
agency in structural turrnoil, beset by a deluge of cornplaints
and dernands for clariiication of the legislation at hand, as
well as cognate legislation already on the books, the wonder
is not that rnistakes are rnade--the wonder is that the law
is irnplernented at al1 (1968:69).

The second reservation is that it is far frorn clear that the

often-posed alternative--the nominal Arnerican paragon--of the
"private" sector, períorrns any more respectably than the rnaligned
public sector. The revelations and indictrnents frorn Wall Street insider
activities and the alleged irnproprities displayed by contractors bidding
for Navy systerns indicate that the heart of Arnerican capitalisrn is far
frorn pure and trustworthy. Eastern Airlines agreed to pay a $9.5
300 Policy Studies Journal

million fine after a government audit found more than 78,000 viola-
tions of maintenance and safety regulations. Pharmaceutical houses are
consistently sued for marketing products detrimental to the public
health. For years, industrial concerns dumped their poisonous by-
products into the public domain; Love Canal was only the most visible
of these derelictions of public trusts. More than half of the businesses
started each year fail. The threatened insolvency of America's thrift
insitutions, newly freed from the constraints of government oversight,
offers yet another illustration of the private sector's troublesome
inability to serve the pubiic weal. Furthermore, there are many
government programs that were directly occasioned by private sector
failures and have been resounding successes (for example, health
inspections, access to medical facilities, the FLIC, and rural economic
development). Yet merits for these accomplishments are rarely credited
against the criticisms.
In brief, it would seem that the shortcomings insistently ascribed
to government are biased in that direction. The public sector is only
given the most difficult problems, those which have already been char-
acterized by the private sector's inability to resolve them. Is it any
surprise, then, that public policy analysis is not able to cleave the
Gordian knot of public trust in government? The reversion to the pri-
vate sector espoused by some would not be easy, let alone the answer.
The private sector has a rich history of failures, bankruptcies, and
corruptions. This is what is meant when I suggested that profligate
criticism of the government might be justified, but upon balanced
reflection, is fundamentally unfair.
It is in this worid--one of unbridled social complexity, limited
resources and alternatives, and fierce political competition--that the
policy sciences have chosen to operate. Its practitioners, perhaps in
recognition of their inability to structure analytically the contextual
environment in which their recommended analyses must operate, have
devoted their best attentions to approaches and methodologies. But if
the main constraints to producing relevant policy analysis are the
contextual conditions, this epistemological emphasis is dangerously
close to rendering the policy sciences all-but-otiose in the real-life
political arenas.
This relatively detached or insulated focus could have a very
tangible and damaging effect beyond the debilitating crisis of credibi-
lity in public policy analysis it could produce (as explained by Boze-
man, 1986). One obvious reaction would be violent swings in govern-
mental policies, uninformed and unbuffered by the temporizing effects
of good pdicy research. One example would be a general retreat from
public-conducted programs, as currently reflected in the political
movement to remove the public sector from many of the very activi-
 Contextoal Burdens of Policy Design 301

ties it had previously been asked to assume, to reenlist Marshall's

canonized "hidden hand" or, in the new (and unseemly) terminology,
"privatization."2 Private vendors are now providing a broad spectrum
of social services, ranging from trash collection to education to hous-
ing the homeless to incarcerating criminals. Govemment deregulation
policies have a similar underlying theme and are equally prevalent
(e.g., airlines, savings and loans, and interstate commerce). Yet it is
far from demonstrated or even likdy that the private sector can
provide these services with the efficiency, equity, and assuredness of
the public sector. Private vendors gouge the New York Cty welfare
coffers by charging $3,000 a month to house a homeless family in a
dilapidated hotel room. The nowderegulated airlines cut back on
essential aircraít maintenance while deregulated telephone companies
charge more and provide reduced services. Wih this record, one can
easily foresee a public reaction returning to increased government
intervention as private sector programs prove deficient and, even
worse, isolated from direct public outcry and correction. Already one
hears congressional demands that the stock exchange should be sub-
jected to greater scrutiny in the wake of the insider information
scandals and the wild fluctuations in the Dow-Jones averages. The
Department of Transportation is compiling complaints about airline
travel in the wake of deregulation. 'Thermodorian" will be the next
policy cachet.

IS THERE A REMEDY?

There is, it would appear, a genuine irony here. There is a large

and increasing demand for societally provided (either government or
privately supplied) services. Day care is a service which was virtually
non-existant until aíter World War II. This requirement implies a
heightened demand for good policy analysis so that these goods and
services can be effectively and efficiently rendered. Yet, in the face
of this demand, the policy research community is confronted with the
disturbing realization that it has not been able to deliver, in spite of
its positivistic promises, a product of value. There is no ready remedy
for this dilemma, for it is a matter of perceptions which are notably
resistent to change. This should not, however, free the professional
policy communty from its Lasswellian charter of devising "the means
by which al1 who participate in a policy-forming and pdicy-executing
process can live up to their potential for sound judgment (Lasswell,
1971:62-M)." The spirit, the very raison d'etre of the policy sciences
insists that they participate in the improvement of governing. The
question, then, is not so much if, rather how.
302 Policy Studies Journal

A cursory review of the development of the policy sciences indi-

cates that since their general conceptualization in the 1950s and their
full emergence in 1960s and 1970s, the policy sciences have indeed
taken an active involvement in public policy matters, in trying to
improve the quality of governmental programs and the policy process
(deLeon, 1989). In order to shore up perceived programmatic short-
comings, special attention was paid to individual stages of the policy
process: first program formulation, then evaluation; implementation
later assumed a fesearch preeminence, followed shortly by policy
termination. Although a great deal was learned, it is not clear to the
indifferent observer that policymakers are any better off in terms of
the qualRy of the advice they receive than an earlier generation of
decisionmakers received thirty years ago, a fear voiced by many within
the policy research communities as well.
Some have argued that the root problem behind the various fail-
ures of public policy analysis, both in terms of individual programs and
generically, is an initial misspecification of the problem and the
consequent policy recommendation. If the problem is not well under-
stood, how can it reliably be solved and the solution implemented?
Furthermore, a policy must be consciously customized to fi the politi-
cal and social context in which it is to operate prior to its inter-
vention. This, rather naturally, leads this school of thought to focus
on policy formulation or, in its proponents' revised jargon, policy
design. Linders and Peters (1984) define and advocate: "In the context
of policy problems, [policy] design involves both a systematic process
for generating basic strategies and a framework for comparing them."
As lngraham (1987:611) elaborates:

An emphasis on policy design will raise new questions,

directed towards a new set of concerns: the match between
problems and solution, the consideration of possible policy
options, and the extent to which more rigorous considera-
tion of the components of design can realistically ' be
incorporated into existing policy processes. . . . Unless we
understand the problem we wish to solve and the techniques
we will utilize to solve it, we are likely to enter recurring
cycles of policy failure.

The policy design proponents are correct in that relatively little

has been written on policy design, policy innovation, or policy initia-
tion per se, Polsby (1984) and Kingdon (1984) being the principal
exceptions. Moreover, they claim that even less attention has been
paid to the contextual and value components of policy design, a ser-
ious flaw in any policy formulation exercise, because "policy design,
 Contextual Burdens of Policy Design 303

like any kind of design, involves the pursuit of valued outcomes

through activities sensitive to the context of time and place" (Bobrow
and Dryzek, 1987:19). Finally, they stress that poiicy design should
consider al1 phases of the policy process--from formulation to termina-
tion--not just the "simple" creation of the policy. As evidence to this
particular shortfall, they point to the surfeit of poverty programs
which were established pell-mell during the initial campaigns of the
War on Poverty, programs which were later seen to have been (at
best) ill-formulatedand (at worst) counter-productive.
Few would argue against the bedrock assumptions of the policy
design movement, that policies need an accurate knowiedge foundation
upon which to base their analyses, lest public pdicy successes be
relegated to litile better than random chance. Or that al1 phases of
the policy process be deliberately addressed. But before the policy
research community turns en masse to pdicy design activities, it would
be politic to investigate the potential hazards that repose in a policy
design emphasis. We can inquire as to the innovativeness in the
approach, that is, what it brings that is new to the policy sciences,
what pitfalls lurk, and how they might best be avoided. Thus prepared,
policy design can aspire to be more than just another research fad,
one to be callously discarded when it proves disappointing in terms of
better policies, as was the case of implementation research (Linder and
Peters, 1987).
First, it should be recognized that policy design might be a new
label, but it hardly represents a set of totally new concepts. Lasswell,
in his A PreView of Policy Sciences (1971), spends considerable time
discussing the irnportance of values in the formulation of pdicy.
Brewer and deLeon (1983: Part I), drawing heavily upon the Lass-
wellian paradigm, emphasize problem recognition, objectives definition,
and the subsequent consequences of pdicy initiation activities;
stressing innovation, they explicitly link pdicy initiation tasks to the
later stages of the policy process. Alexander (1982), drawing upon the
urban planning paradigms, suggests that policy initiation constraints
have too often restricted the policymaker's creativiy, purview, and
choice, while Hambrick (1974) has proposed ways for choosing among
policy alternatives. Simon (1978, 1981:121) has been especially insistent
upon search mechanisms and careful policy design:

We need to understand not only how people reason about

alternatives but where the alternatives come from in the
first place. The theory of the generation of alternatives
deserves, and requires, a treatment that is just as definitive
and thorough as the treatment we give to the theory of
choice among prespecifiedalternatives.
304 Policy Studies Journal

In summary, while the policy design literature is not as rich as

that describing implementation or evaluation, it is clear that the policy
design proponents are not beginning from a tabular rosa. Thus, to
their benefi and credit, they have drawn upon prior research and
experience.
Second, two relatively innovative aspects of the policy design
emphasis merit special attention, its contextual focus and its integra-
tive aspects. The first refers to the realization that any policy exer-
cise must take into full account the confusion and complexity of the
political and social environments, not only those that exist at the
moment but those which could occur in the future. The second recog-
nizes that activiies which take place during the policy design stages
will have a significant infiuence on the subsequent stages of the policy
process; for instance, objectives defined during this stage will be the
basis for later policy selection and program evaluation. Hence, policy
designers urge that the entire pdicy stream be incorporated in and
accounted for during the policy design exercise.
Both of these are important insights, but one might wonder if
they are feasible. Certainly one cannot argue against the proposition
that context counts. But one can usefully ask more precisely what that
adage means and how it might be operationalized. Is it meaningful to
distinguish between an interna1 context (the policyrnaking mechanisms)
and an externa1 context (the political environs) and, if so, what are
their respective weights? What guidelines does one employ to difíeren-
tiate between "signals" and "noise"? Or the essential from the irrele-
vant? Adm. Poindexter and Lt. Col. North might wonder when a "policy
window" (¡.e., freeing the hostages) becomes a "policy trap." More
exactly, how does the identified context affect policy? Certainly the
"objective" context of a posslble epidemic could trigger a puMic health
policy. The AlDS situation is only the most recent example and even
in public health, a field replete with quantitative measures and
scientific estimates, the "objective" nature of the context (read:
evidence) can be highly suspect, as President Ford's reaction to the
feared swine flu epidemic illustrates. Thus, the affective role of
contexts in policy formulation is often obscure and almost always
contentious. Why did civil rights legislation and programs proliferate
during the 1960s when the objective and objectionable conditions of
racial discrimination were prevalent long before? This suggests that
the contextual conditions the policy designers stress are highly
manipulable and therefore worrisome as a basis for unvested policy
design. One might be more tempted to use context as a surrogate win-
dow of opportunity or a persuasive element. In any case, the emphasis
on context in the policy design activiy seemingly presents a series of
 Contextual Burdens of Policy Design 305

concerns which need to be frontally addressed before going much

further.
The emphasis on integrating or, at worst, coordinating policy
design with subsequent stages in the policy process is, on the surface,
sirnilarly unexceptionable. But, again, putting the concept into
operation portends sorne nagging problerns. Most specifically, policy
designers should have little confidence that they can safely predict
what effect various prograrns will have in future contexts. Ascher
(1978) has documented the shortcornings of cornputer sirnulations in
this regard, in spite of monumental technological advances; Aaron
(1978) has dernonstrated how the extant social science theory (espe-
cially welfare and labor econornics) was thoroughly deficient in design-
ing effective social welfare prograrns for the Great Society. The
energy crises of the 1970s should be daunting evidence to the difficul-
ties of designing policies for future contingencies (Greenberger, 1983).
In this regard, one is rerninded of the "irnplernentation analysis"
school which suggested that irnplernentation failures could be avoided
merely by considering possible implernentation obstacles and planning
accordingly (Williarns, 1975; Wolf, 1979). This approach was quickly
surrendered when Berman (1980) pointed out the tensions between pro-
grarnrned and adaptive irnplernentation while Wirock and deLeon
(1986) argued that irnplernentation was airning at a "moving target."
Successful irnplementation analyses rnight be possible, but highly
unlikely. More likely would be that they would lock adrninistrators into
an unproductive bind. There is no reason to suppose that policy
designers can be any more prescient than their irnplementation col-
leagues, that their atternpts to design perfect prograrns would founder
of the shoals of later realities. It would therefore follow that their
atternpts to plan out the entire prograrnmatic strategy during the
design stage would place irnpossible--possibly paralyzing--burdens upon
thern, thereby underrnining the irnputed value of the approach.
A more subtle concern should be surfaced, narnely, can there be
too rnuch clarity in policy design and forrnulation? If compromise is
the touchstone of dernocratic politics, then, as Rein (1976:22) observes,
"arnbiguity seems to be essential for agreernent." Too clear a delinea-
tion of objectives in an interest group environrnent could conceivably
lead to public staternents of irreconcilable positions, effectively
eviscerating the policyrnaking process. The inability of contending
groups to define a consensual national energy policy is discouraging
testarnent to this potential and its debilitating effect.
These "reality testings" or conceptual "vetting" should not be
mistaken as fatal counsels of despair or as terrninally discouraging to
the policy design rnodel. Rather, they are presented as eariy cor-
rectives such that policy design does not assume (or be ascribed)
306 Policy Studies Journal

trappings it cannot deliver. Winess how policy evaluation was dis-

credited, largely as a function of its early and unrequited promises.
Surely the policy sciences and the policy communities have no need
for another cure-all, a programmatic snake oil. There are definite
benefis to be gained by exploring some of the concepts stressed by
the policy design proponents. For example, a concrete definition of
context and its effect upon policy would help immensely in designing,
choosing, implementing, and evaluating policies. The emphasis on
articulating and including values mirrors and reinforces the salutary
"post-positivism" and "participatory policy analysis" trends. Design
theories, such as proferred by Linder and Peters (1987), straight-
forward typologies, such as proposed by lngraham (1987), or rules of
thumb, such as those offered by Bobrow and Dryzak (1987:208-210),
are useful measures but should not be mistaken as operational
hypotheses or endgames per se.
The key, then, is not to abandon the policy design approach pre-
maturely. Rather, it becomes important to understand its strengths and
weaknesses and to plan accordingly. That is, we should define exactly
what one can (and cannot) reasonably expect from enhanced policy
design activiies. This should be done prior to committing sizeable
intellectual and institutional resources so that recipients can have an
accurate estimate as to what might be gained. It would serve scant
purpose to relive the burst balloon of policy evaluation or the inflated
promises of implementation analysis. In this light, the rather modest
claims for policy design advanced by Bobrow and Dryzek, '70 improve
the quality of debate, as proposals, frameworks, and their adherents
confront one another in the policy arena," would seem entirely fitting
and obtainable (1987:210).

This paper has presented two somewhat distinct arguments. The

first is that governing is not an easy task, that the public sector is
often required to muck the contemporary Augean stables. Not surpris-
ingly, government does not receive particulatiy high marks nor, by
implication, does the policy research community. This charge is not
entirely fair for two reasons: first, the stables really are dirty and
have, for years, defied conventional means to alleviate the problem;
and second, unlike Heracles, the present policymaker has no available
river with which to cleanse the problem. The policy research commun-
ity cannot readily affect the former, but it can address the latter,
which is this paper's second thesis.
This second assertion, that the policy sciences can improve the
quality of government and the policy process, should not be accepted
 ContextualBurdens of Policy Design 307

on face value or simple hope. Since Lerner and Lasswell first coined
the phrase "policy sciences" more than thiriy-five years ago, such
endeavors have produced many more serious disappointrnents than tri-
umphs, more skepticism than credibility arnong both consumers and
producers. It is therefore incumbent upon policy scientists to turn
their analytic light on their own discipline and product, to ask if and
how new theories will operate in the cauldron of the political kichen.
Specifically, what improvements can we plausibly expect from focusing
on policy design criteria? Or what do we mean in an operational (or
even testable) sense when we talk of "context" or "values"?
This paper has argued that the benefis ascribed to policy design
activities are not withoui problems, are not withoui costs. Yet, they
are not without hope. On balance, it would seem that the principal
tenets of policy design--greater value and goal clarifications, conscious
integration into the mainline policy stream, and increased policy
creativity--are certainly worth the candle. Bui before proposing the
new game, in these days of energy conservation, we would be short-
sighted not to examine the candle itself so we can illuminate more
precisely just how much light is shed.

1. I would like to thank Professors Helen lngram (University of

Arizona), Anne Schneider (Arizona State University), and my
University of Colorado-Denver colleagues: E. Samuel Overrnan and
Mark Emmert, and Linda deLeon for their constructive comments.
2. A highly contentious topic; see the articles assembled by Park,
1987.

REFERENCES
Aaron, Henry J. 1978. Politics and the Professors: The Great Society in
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