Table Of ContentSOCIAL PROGRAM
IMPLEMENTATION
Edited by
WALTER WILLIAMS
Graduate School of Public Affairs
and Institute of Governmental Research
University of Washington
Seattle, Washington
RICHARD F. ELMORE
Graduate School of Public Affairs
University of Washington
Seattle, Washington
ACADEMIC PRESS New York San Francisco London
A Subsidiary of Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Publishers
COPYRIGHT © 1976, BY ACADEMIC PRESS, INC.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
NO PART OF THIS PUBLICATION MAY BE REPRODUCED OR
TRANSMITTED IN ANY FORM OR BY ANY MEANS, ELECTRONIC
OR MECHANICAL, INCLUDING PHOTOCOPY, RECORDING, OR ANY
INFORMATION STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL SYSTEM, WITHOUT
PERMISSION IN WRITING FROM THE PUBLISHER.
ACADEMIC PRESS, INC.
Ill Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10003
United Kingdom Edition published by
ACADEMIC PRESS, INC. (LONDON) LTD.
24/28 Oval Road, London NW1
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Main entry under title:
Social program implementation.
(Quantitative studies in social relations series)
Includes bibliographical references.
1. United States-Social policy-Addresses, essays,
lectures. 2. Social action-Addresses, essays, lec-
tures. 3. Education and state—Addresses, essays, lec-
tures. 4. Evaluation research (Social action programs)
-United States-Addresses, essays, lectures. I. Wil-
liams, Walter. II. Elmore, Richard F.
HN65.S576 1976 658'.9l'309173 75-40618
ISBN 0-12-756850-6
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Numbers in parentheses indicate the pages on which the authors' contributions begin.
BERNARD A. BANET, High/Scope Educational Research Foundation
(125)
EDWARD C. BANFIELD, Department of Government, Harvard Uni-
versity (183)
MARTHA DERTHICK, The Brookings Institution (219)
RICHARD F. ELMORE, Graduate School of Public Affairs, Univer-
sity of Washington (101)
EDWARD M. GRÄMLICH, The Brookings Institution (149)
PATRICIA P. KOSHEL, Consultant, Washington, D. C. (149)
MILBREY MCLAUGHLIN, The Rand Corporation, Santa Monica,
California (167)
JEROME T. MURPHY, Graduate School of Education, Harvard Univer-
sity (77)
JOHN PINCUS, The Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, California (43)
BERYL A. RADIN, Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, The
University of Texas at Austin (243)
DAVID P. WEIKART, High/Scope Educational Research Foundation
(125)
WALTER WILLIAMS, Graduate School of Public Affairs and Institute
of Governmental Research, University of Washington (3, 15, 267)
IX
PREFACE
Implementation is fast becoming the newest shibboleth among
academics and policy analysts concerned with complex social programs.
Defined most simply as the stage between decision and operations, im-
plementation can range from the trivial case of one individual's deciding
to do something and then doing it to a lengthy process among many actors
across several layers of government. But whether we are talking about
simple or complex cases, the fundamental implementation question re-
mains whether or not what has been decided actually can be carried out in
a manner consonant with that underlying decision. More and more, we
are finding, at least in the case of complex social programs, that the
answer is no. So it is crucial that we attend to implementation.
Yet both editors of this volume greet implementation's sudden popu-
larity with mixed emotions. On the one hand, our separate experiences
have led us to view implementation as the crucial barrier to improving the
quality of social programs. We are intrigued by how long it has taken for
the saliency of implementation to emerge and pleased that the long ne-
glect of this critical topic is ending. On the other hand, we are leery of the
consequences that can follow from a faddish concern with the problem.
There has been a disturbing tendency toward faddishness in policy
analysis that carries with it the danger of unrealistically high expectations
about progress—a headlong leap into an area and then discouragement
XI
Xll Preface
because unrealistic goals were not fulfilled. Hence the study of implemen-
tation, which will require extended and often tedious efforts, stands the
risk of being cast out prematurely as an unproductive research area
because it does not yield a quick payoff.
The failure to focus on implementation has blighted not only pro-
gram administration but also policy research and analysis. In the former
case, policy ideas that seemed reasonable and compelling when decisions
were made often have become badly flawed and ineffective programs as
they drifted down the bureaucratic process. It is not just that the pro-
grams fall short of the early rhetoric that described them; they often
barely work at all. Ignoring implementation has been equally disastrous
for research and analysis. Indeed, it is possible that past analysis and
research that ignored implementation issues may have asked the wrong
questions, thereby producing information of little or no use to policy mak-
ing.
A principal theme of this volume is that implementation problems in
the social policy areas are the major substantive (as opposed to monetary
or political) hurdle to better programs in the future. Our position is
summarized by these three statements:
1. The greatest difficulty in devising better social programs is not
determining what are reasonable policies on paper but finding the means
for converting these policies into viable field operations that correspond
reasonably well to original intentions.
2. The major problem of social policy analysis has been its failure to
attend to the implementation feasibility of its recommendations.
3. The prime difficulties with social experimentation have been
organizational: foreseeing the need for an experiment in sufficient time to
meet decisionmaking demands, designing the experiment, getting it into
the field, and determining if it is working well enough to provide a valid
basis for testing policy questions.
In studying implementation, it seems certain that the real benefits
will come, if at all, from thorough, painstaking studies of a process and its
many actors—a process that may stretch from the upper reaches of
Washington bureaucracy to a local project, with a number of intermediate
stops. More specifically, people must investigate who has what respon-
sibilities and how these responsibilities are carried out by key actors
including several agency headquarters' offices, federal regional offices,
subnational governments, and program and project sponsors and
operators. Only when we look in detail at the interrelationship of de-
cisionmaking and implementation will we be able to unravel some of the
mysteries of putting programs in place. Researchers must understand that
Preface Xlll
the study of implementation is likely to require time-consuming and
tedious activities that are not likely to bring striking breakthroughs in
terms of understanding or techniques. However, it is an area in which
unstinting hard work should over time bring large payoffs—if only we
have the patience.
The purpose of this book is to stimulate concern for and inquiry into
the area of implementation. We see it as part of a growing effort to (1)
increase awareness of implementation in large-scale public bureaucracies
and demonstrate the need to build implementation into the structure and
process that make up the organization's policymaking apparatus; (2)
stimulate research on implementation by people in a variety of academic
disciplines; and (3) encourage the development of techniques to carry out
implementation analysis and assessment in organizations.
Some comments are needed on the chapters in this volume and the
intended audience. The typical chapter is a detailed analysis of a specific
case of social program implementation. In some instances the cases begin
with a presidential initiative and demonstrate either how the politics of
compromise produces a vague, almost unworkable program that becomes
even more confused as it moves into the field (Model Cities) or how even
the strongest of presidential desires can be undone completely by com-
munity groups (new towns in-town). In other instances the focus will be
upon social field experiments where one might anticipate, because of the
research character of the activities, that there would be a much stronger
concern for the issues of specification and implementation. Here, too, we
will see that politics and bureaucracy impinge. Wherever the case study
starts, there is complexity, and it is through the careful and detailed
analysis of process that we come to see many of the subtle elements of
implementation.
Fortunately, many of these cases make interesting reading. There is
a goodly dose of political and bureaucratic intrigue and a fair amount of
humor. In fact, some of the most absurd things imaginable happen as
decisions move toward operations. The chapters, however, are not pre-
sented mainly for their entertainment value or as illustrations of the
foibles of government. In total, the chapters provide a number of insights
that should prove useful in devising more sensible implementation
strategies and in determining research and analytic needs.
This book is intended for overlapping groups in government and the
social science research community, including policy planners (analysts),
administrators who carry out programs, researchers engaged in social
policy studies such as field experiments, and those concerned directly
with the study of implementation issues. An earlier volume in the "Quan-
titative Studies in Social Relations" series, Evaluating Social Programs,
XIV Preface
edited by Peter Rossi and Walter Williams, also was intended to reach a
broad group of government people and academicians. The editors ob-
served in the preface to that book that "if one is to understand the
complexity of evaluation research, he must confront both methodology
and politics." The same may be said about implementation. However,
and this is a point worth emphasizing, the present volume does not
contain the kind of methodological chapters that in the earlier volume
made life difficult for those whose methodological skills were low. The
complexity of implementation arises more from the force of politics
and bureaucracy than from any of the more traditional statistical issues
treated in the earlier book.
Yet, and this too is a critical point, the present book clearly is
intended for social science researchers. As an example, take the case of a
social field experiment. In such research it is necessary to develop a
design to test the hypotheses at issue, to put into the field a project that in
its operational dimensions reflects the underlying hypotheses, and to hold
the design so as to provide a valid test of hypotheses. In the animal
laboratory or in a highly controlled human setting such as a mental
institution, meeting these requirements may not be hard at all. In the
relatively uncontrolled world of social programs and policies, politics and
bureaucracy intrude. Time demands, pressures from outside groups, bu-
reaucratic recalcitrance, and the like are the big issues, not the sample
design or the statistical test.
Researchers will have to learn about an entirely different set of
threats to the validity of an experiment or an evaluation. They also will
need to devise new techniques or learn to use present ones differently in
implementation analysis and assessment. Techniques are important. Re-
search on implementation can be quite rigorous. The problem is to get the
techniques to work in the complex world of bureaucracy and politics.
One final warning: Implementation can be a terribly unsettling area.
At times there are strong reasons for optimism. For example, both editors
think that there can be a very high payoff to implementation research, but
there is certain to be much frustration. Even if our research tells us what
to do about implementation, we still may not know how to implement our
findings.
Perhaps most frustrating of all, there will seldom be clean and neat
answers to implementation issues. Take the question of specification, the
spelling out in some detail of how the program should operate. As Milbrey
McLaughlin observes in her paper in this volume: "There is general
agreement that a major component of the 'implementation problem' has
to do with inadequate operational specificity. There is debate concerning
who should make project operations more specific, how it can be done,
Preface XV
and when specificity should be introduced." One thing can be said with
near certainty about the "who," "how," and "when" questions: The
answer will vary from case to case; and in specific cases, there seldom
will be a simple, sharply delineated answer. When a project involves
multiple layers in an organization, responsibilities almost certainly will be
shared. The correct answer usually will be of the "Goldilocks" variety:
One party should do just the right amount and then stop, and the next
party should do just the right amount, and so on.
This is not to argue that we cannot devise helpful approaches to
implementation. We are convinced that we can. The point, however,
is that we will be limited by the realities of the field; there almost never
will be any sure technological fix. Problems of implementation are
ultimately problems of politics and bureaucracy. As long as this sobering
fact is kept in mind, we believe that useful research can be done and that
implementation in social programs can be improved significantly. We are
not defeatists, just realists.
1
INTRODUCTION*
Walter Williams
The verb "implement" has two principal meanings: "to provide or
equip with the means of carrying into effect," and "to carry into effect."
Implementation in an organization can involve both a continuing effort
over time to raise the capability ofthat organization or associated organiza-
tions to carry out programs or projects, and a one-time effort to put an
organizational decision into place. Increasing an organization's implemen-
tation capacity will be treated briefly in this volume, but it is the latter
process, trying to move from a decision to operations, that will be the main
concern. At issue is the universal problem of putting a decision into effect.
All of us know that deciding to quit smoking or to lose weight, sad to say, is
only the first small step toward a solution. In a complex organization such
as a government agency, the same mundane distinction between a decision
and its implementation pertains, although many parties may be involved in
the decision, and the process of implementation may move through several
hierarchical layers. It is amid this complexity that the fundamental need to
implement the decision can get misdirected so easily.
*Some parts of this chapter were contained in my editor's introduction to the "Special
Issue on Implementation," Policy Analysis, Vol. 1, No. 3, pp. 451-458 and are used with
permission of The Board of Regents of the University of California.
3
4 Walter Williams
The most pressing implementation problem is that of moving from a
decision to operations in such a way that what is done bears a reasonable
resemblance to the decision and functions adequately in its institutional
environment. The past contains few clearer messages than that of the
difficulty of bridging the gap between policy decisions and workable field
operations. It is a general problem spanning most policy areas. Indeed, in
the area of social policy from which the essays in this book are drawn,
implementation looms as the major substantive—as opposed to monetary
or political—hurdle to better programs. We simply do not know how to
implement complex new social programs or major program modifications.
This is not surprising, because implementation is an exceedingly difficult
task. What is hard to fathom is why so little has been done to investigate the
process of implementation,1 since that activity is of crucial importance in
program operations, policy analysis, and evaluative research, particularly
social experiments.
More and more, the evidence drawn from direct observation of
efforts to develop and operate social policies and programs in the field
points to the saliency of implementation concerns. The Great Society
*It is not the purpose of this volume to present a critique or a detailed bibliography of
the major pieces on implementation, but I am certain that no bibliographic effort, at least in the
social policy areas, would refute the point that little research has been carried out either on the
implementation of social policies, programs, or projects or on the implementation process in a
social policy organization such as a federal agency. Actually, it is hard to find material with the
term implementation in the title. Only a few recent books come to mind—for example, N.
Gross, J. Giacquinta, and M. Bernstein, Implementing Organizational Innovations: A
Sociological Analysis of Planned Educational Change (New York: Basic Books, 1971); and
Geoffrey Pressman and Aaron Wildavsky, Implementation (Berkeley and Los Angeles:
University of California Press, 1973). In Social Policy Research and Analysis (New York:
American Elsevier, 1971), I have a chapter entitled "The Agency Implementation Process."
Jerome Murphy's two studies of federal education legislation has produced a number of pieces
on implementation, a good example of which is "Title I of ESEA: The Politics of Implement-
ing Federal Education Reform," Harvard Educational Review, February 1971, pp. 35-63. As
far as I can tell, there has been only one major empirical study of social implementation efforts
that covers a large sample of projects—the Rand Corporation's "Change Agent Study" now
reported on in several volumes. The study is summarized in Paul Berman and Milbrey
McLaughlin, Federal Programs Supporting Educational Change: The Findings in Review,
Vol. IV, R-1589/4-HEW, The Rand Corporation, April 1975, and discussed in this volume in
the paper by McLaughlin. A few other works contain lengthy discussions of issues pertinent
to the problem of social policy implementation. Examples that immediately occur to me are
Robert A. Levine, Public Planning: Failure and Redirection, Basic Books, 1972; Martha
Derthick, New Towns In-Town, The Urban Institute, 1972; parts of which are included in this
volume; and Miriam Johnson, Counterpoint: The Changing Employment Service, Olympus,
1973, which does not discuss implementation/?^ se but presents an extended case study of
implementation difficulties in a social program. Others no doubt would cite different mate-
rials. However, the critical point is that only a small number of works discuss social program
implementation in detail. Indeed, one purpose of the book is to stimulate additional work in
this important area.
