Thinking About Public Policy: How Choices Are Made

This chapter aims to provide an overview of some of the most cutting-edge policy theories in use today. Much of contemporary public policy is constructed by highly technical individuals working in the physical and policy sciences. The institutional analysis and development (IAD) framework was first proposed by world-renowned professor Elinor Ostrom. Over approximately the last 20 years, the IAD framework has been applied effectively to public policy dilemmas in numerous settings globally. In the IAD framework, policymaking and shared governance decisions are made within an “action arena.” As is the case with the IAD model, the advocacy coalition framework for policymaking is a highly sophisticated approach to understanding and building effective policymaking processes. The multiple streams model is one way to think about public policy. According to John Kingdon, there are three “streams” in the policy process that must converge in order for policy to be made: the problem stream, the policy stream, and the politics stream.