Table Of ContentLiving the Policy Process
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Living the Policy Process
Philip B. Heymann
Including extended case studies written by John Buntin,
Kirsten Lundberg, and Esther Scott
1
2008
3
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Heymann, Philip B.
Living the policy process / Philip Heymann.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-0-19-533538-5; 978-0-19-533539-2 (pbk.)
1. Policy sciences—Case studies. 2. Political planning—United States—Case studies.
3. Military assistance, American—Afghanistan. 4. Stinger (Missile) 5. Iran-Contra Affair,
1985–1990. 6. Tobacco use–Government policy—United States. I. Title.
JK468.P64H49 2008
320.6—dc22 2007029031
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
Dedicated to my brother-in-law, Dr. Joseph Ross,
who has taught us what living is all about.
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Preface: The Logic of
Governmental Policy Choice
When we think about the decisions of a government offi cial, we often
imagine a decision maker who has all the information she needs in order
to apply her own set of values to the situation at hand. Conversely, we
often deduce the decision maker’s values by imagining what values, when
applied to predictions based on the best set of facts available, would have
led to a particular decision. All of that was described decades ago by
Graham Allison in his splendid book, Essence of Decision, as “Model One.”
Allison also reminded us that decisions are not really owned and made
by a particular offi cial; they are also organizational (his “Model Two”) and
the product of political contests within bureaucracies (“Model Three”).
Nor are the values that inform both decision making and the assessment
of outcomes necessarily shared.
Moreover, the information relevant to applying her values to a situation
does not come to any decision maker (or player in a political contest) com-
plete or without bias. No one has shown the distorting effects of systematic
fl ows of partial information in a government (or any) bureaucracy better
than Mort Halperin did long ago in his book Bureaucratic Politics.1 The fl ow
is not merely subject to inevitable distortions; often it is carefully manipu-
lated. Supporters lobby, legislators threaten, subordinates shape reports,
and much more. Finally the information is processed by each individual—
in other words, is placed to be analyzed—within a context of assumptions
about the world and the people in it that result from a lifetime of particular
experiences, different from others’ understanding of the same situation.
Despite these complexities, and others almost as serious, there is in
fact a logic to policy choice that is intuitive and familiar. That is the
viii PREFACE
subject of this book. I use richly detailed and, as far as humanly possible,
accurate accounts of real decisions to illustrate that logic in highly con-
crete situations. What makes this form of argument—and in particular its
reliance on case studies—possible is that it builds on what we all know
about the concerns and infl uences at work when individuals are mak-
ing more familiar group decisions. In government, the institutional and
democratic context reshapes that massive body of everyday experience
in ways that are not so familiar to us.
The argument of the book, illustrated by the case studies, is intended
to bring what the reader already understands from his daily life to
bear in the special governmental context. The case studies involve
both foreign and domestic policy decisions. I have worked for years in
each area. The differences, while real, are not critical. In each area the
crucial and special characteristics of the setting to which an individual
must relate are:
• a stream of decisions over time
• to be made by a shifting but overlapping group of players, largely
defi ned by rules
• each of whom has responsibility to the organizational units she
heads or to which she belongs
• as well as concern for her infl uence over future decisions.
The First Three Parts: How Are Policy Choices in Fact Made
in This Baffl ingly Complex Setting?
The argument that follows has a number of pieces that connect in com-
plicated ways. It may help to state it in summary form at the beginning,
providing a blueprint before describing the more detailed specifi cations.
The politics of policy choice—deciding what actions the government
will take on proposals for government action—involves the rich rela-
tionships among, as well as the individually held beliefs and values of, a
group of people. So as good a starting point as any is to identify who par-
ticipates. There are, essentially, two subgroups: First, there are those who
are given a right and obligation to participate because of their assigned
positions, that is, in order to establish an orderly and consistent process
of group choice. Second, there are those who have resources to infl uence
the fi rst group. The second group is wide enough to include everyone
PREFACE ix
from interested constituents to the person who deferred to your strong
preferences last week and expects reciprocal concern now. In the middle
are the press, organized interest groups, legislators, those who furnish
cooperation or money, and more.
Fortunately, not all of these potential participants will want to become
involved in every decision; but, if they do, it will be important to know
what will motivate them. The content of the proposal, the proposal’s
salience and the timeliness of it, and exercises of infl uence by others can
all affect the members of either of these groups. Such matters will affect
a player in the game of policy choice if she sees the matter as related (in
an important way, for they are busy) to the good of society, the welfare
of her organization, her infl uence on future decisions, her moral commit-
ments, or her personal welfare.
Note that what is important for prediction is not so much what the
proposal and those using infl uence for or against it actually mean to an
actor, but what she perceives they mean. That requires us to also examine
differences among players in their very understandings of the signifi cance
of the shared situation in which the group is choosing a policy.
There are only six or seven ways that one individual can infl uence
the position that another will take in governmental choice. These range
from authority and persuasion to bargaining and changing the situation
by a fait accompli (with several others in between). Each of these ways
of exercising infl uence has certain prerequisites; persuasion, for exam-
ple, requires trust. Building and storing these prerequisites—which are
the resources of infl uence—so that infl uence can be exercised over time
and not just now is a central part of living the policy process. Using the
resources effectively, designing and choosing a proposal that infl uential
players will like, and timing the proposal for when it will seem responsive
to a particularly salient demand, need, or opportunity are the three major
tactics of a policy maker.
Thus, Part I of this book is devoted to a careful description of the
bureaucratic politics of decision making. That requires examining who
takes part in any decision, what concerns them as they take a position,
what options there are for the positions they can take on a proposal,
what enters into their understanding of the relationship between their
concerns and the situation that confronts them, and fi nally how they
can seek to infl uence others in the structured process that will pro-
duce a government decision. Merely making that list suggests that the
politics of bureaucratic decision making is a subject worthy of a book
