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Class Notes – POLS 3201 Public Policy Class 1/6/2020 Syllabus Day Syllabus Day Class 1/8/2020 Introduction and Overview Syllabus Day Part II Assigned the final paper that is to be 10 pages and due on the 22nd of April. The discussion posts are to be a paragraph long and we shall have two substantive responses to classmates for each discussion board. Class 1/13/2020 Chapter 1 Definition of public policy, it is broad, public policy is broad. What governments do, or not do, why they do it, and what difference it makes. What governments do? -> they make policy. What do governments NOT do? -> federalism, future evaluation (you take the why’s and learn from them), constraints, costs/benefits, and mainly, agenda setting. Agenda setting (national level) – the most important part of public policy is agenda setting. This is the first stage of the process where you will see governments choose what are the 250, of the thousands of problems, to focus on and solve. If you do not solve the problem and leave the problem alone, that is policy, aka status quo. If you do try and solve the problem, then that is obviously policy. Both are policy.

Question – Why has government grown over time: 1. Need for it. 2. Expanded regulations. 3. Fear. 4. Social contract, easier to give to one central government to build infrastructure, and security of the nation. Government has grown because we have demanded it. How to measure the growth of a nation, GDP. Description -> informing what your government is doing, causes, and consequences -> evaluating policy, are there unintended consequences. 1/15/2020 In Class Notes Five potential problems with public policy – (1) Not all problems are public. Creating a new policy is difficult due to the lack of data/sources. (2) Disagreement on problem/measurement. We disagree on what the problem is and how to measure it. You must be willing to defend what you think the problem is and how to measure/solve it. (3) Subjectivity, you need to be honest with your readers, a disclaimer. (4) Social science does not occur in a lab. If you are studying policy anything you come up with is going to be a partial explanation. You can’t experiment with humans. (5) Partially explaining social science. (6) There is a source for literally everything. Doesn’t mean it’s a good source… 1/27/2020 In Class Notes Models of Policy, try and use one of these models in our paper. Policy Process Model (chapter 3) – a model that analyzes policy as it goes through the various stages. Problem identification, public problems, demand govt action, and private problems.

The number one issue will take away time for a lot of other issues in congress agenda setting. The media’s attention on any given topic will largely influence public policy. The policy process by the founding fathers was designed intentionally for the bills to fail. Almost all change in government will be incremental, on the tails, explosive. Punctuated equilibrium, occasionally there will be enough support for a policy that a new equilibrium will be established. https://www.comparativeagendas.net/us/datasets – Good source for data sets. Group Theory – policy progress and success will be due to groups banding together. 2/10/2020 In Class Notes Why federalism? What are the benefits? Why is it important? Constitutionally, there is a protection against tyranny. Another layer of checks and balances. In order to protect our liberty. Federalism also provides diversity in policy, and conflict management. Problems and solutions across the nation is not always the best, what’s a problem in San Francisco is not a problem in Atlanta. Thus, applying a national solution for a specific issue San Francisco is experiencing could solve that issue, but hurt Atlanta since they didn’t have that issue. Thus, more local government is necessary. Local governments benefits, easier to contact for a citizen, more specialized representation, increase in political participation, and responsiveness. Federalism offers the states the ability to try out new policies, aka laboratories of democracy. Utah’s homeless problem is a great example of this, they gave houses to the homeless. It worked, but more homeless people showed up for the free houses, adding to the problem. Politics of federalism. Liberal view, states will establish negative policies on minorities. Conservative view, large central governments need to be smaller and states need more power. In reality, the both contribute to

large federal government. Federalism has evolved, in the early days the majority of power was held in the states 1787-1865, anti-federalist. Between 1865-1913 there was a hybrid of state power and big national power. National government supreme to state government didn’t come till 1913-1964, the national government was asked to become more involved in domestic policy due to two world wars, and the great depression. 1964-1980 Lindon Johnson moved from social safety net, to declaring a war on domestic poverty. Implementing massive national government policies to eliminate poverty. The 10th amendment became irrelevant and ignored. 1980-1995, Ronald Reagan implemented new federalism, this is where states became responsible for the welfare. Clinton then tried to implement universal healthcare but was largely rejected. We are still in this new federalism, which is keeping the big national government strong, and not giving power back to the states. The opportunity for policy comparisons between different states is a great opportunity for research on public policy. 2/24/2020 In Class Notes Test on Courseden Monday 2nd, Due March 9th before class. Annotated bibliography is due this Wednesday February 26th. Annotated bibliography needs about a paragraph per source. 2/26/2020 In Class Notes...