Week 2- Working in the Policy World Flashcards

1
Q

Define policy analysis

A
  • Client centred advice relevant to public decisions and informed by social values
  • Dissecting an issues systematically with a view to understanding its component parts and designing an appropriate, effective response to the underlying problem
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2
Q

What is the importance of client centricity in policy analysis?

A
  • Client centricity highlights the need for policy work to account for and respond to the priorities of the employer
  • Inclusion of social values balances client centricity with awareness of broader public values
  • Highlights that making policy almost always entails taking positions on value-laden issues and designing actions to address them
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3
Q

How is the quality of policy advice determined?

A

Determined somewhat by soundness of analysis on which it is based and accuracy with which its elements are distinguished and described

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4
Q

What is the core of policy analysis?

A

Evaluation- a set of techniques and criteria with which to evaluate public policy options and select among them. Involves judgement and considerations including subjective, elusive values and objective criteria

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5
Q

Define policy advising

A

Stitching the parts back together again to create a coherent picture of the situation so that sound policy options can be designed and recommendations developed

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6
Q

What role do both policy analysts and policy advisers play?

A

In the public sector, both help governments develop, evaluate and implement policy options

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7
Q

Define discipline

A

Depends on the capacity to create distinctive new concepts, frameworks, theories and models that advance our understanding of policy related matters

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8
Q

How does policy analysis use disciplines?

A
  • Rather than starting from a particular disciplinary framework, policy analysis moves from a presenting problem to select frameworks, and disciplines likely to devise a solution
  • Multi disciplinary, interdisciplinary and pragmatic
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9
Q

Outline the tools and methods used in policy analysis

A
  • Modelling and econometric approaches- precise measurement and objectivity, struggle to prove policy causation
  • Models- abstract and theoretical but may be useful in improving understanding of real world phenomena and predicting consequences of policy change
  • Stakeholder analysis, interviewing and qualitative methods- substantial primary data (costly) and provides deeper insights into people’s perceptions of issues than theoretical models
  • Methods chosen pragmatically
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10
Q

Define normative in relation to public policy

A
  • Contextualises analysis with a view to delivering and evaluating options for decision makers and citizens
  • Concerned with values as well as information and evidence
  • Confronts competing views about nature of problems and weigh consequences of different courses of action and value attached to outcomes
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11
Q

What do policy analysts do?

A
  • Project the consequences of policy options and make explicit links with alternative values
  • Draws on data, information, evidence and applies scientific methods
  • Combines common sense knowledge with frameworks and skills associated with the professions
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12
Q

What have critical theorists and constructivists challenged?

A

The knowledge and evidence base used in policy analysis, the standing of participants in policy discussion and the authority behind decision making

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13
Q

What does Colebatch promote and why?

A
  • Promotes social construction approach, where ‘policy’ and ‘problems’ are not naturally occurring, with an existence independent of participants in process
  • Objective: to forge agreement among stakeholders
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14
Q

Outline the problem with the Australian education policy

A
  • How could Australia provide affordable and equitable access to higher education?
  • 1974-1988: Labour (Whitlam) govt abolished tertiary education fees
  • Unsustainable (costs) as there was an increase in year 12 completion rates, but no increase in tertiary education places
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15
Q

What must the new education system do?

A
  • Provide sufficient funding to expand higher education places
  • Shift financial burden from all taxpayers more to the beneficiary

*System that does not unfairly favour the wealthy

  • Encourage easier access for students to higher education
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16
Q

What was the government’s solution to the education policy problem?

A
  • Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS)- 1989
  • Sought to rebalance burden for taxpayers to higher education students, but only when their income reached a fair threshold for loan repayment
  • Utilised theory proposed by Milton Friedman, where students are allowed to find work first and begin repaying education costs once they have a secure income, with repayments commensurate with that income
  • Student pays if future income meets or exceeds average Australian wage (max 8% gross income) and do not pay if do not meet that threshold
17
Q

Outline the benefits of the HECS policy

A
  • Tertiary education enrolments increased by 70% including increase from lower socio-economic backgrounds
  • Low cost to run and revenue ($1.8 billion- 2013)
  • High return on investment
  • Increase in university trained Australians = increase in skilled and specialised workforce
18
Q

Outline the problem with Australia’s environmental policy

A
  • Increases in CO2 levels = rise in sea level, more frequent and severe bushfires and storm events
  • Those profiting from current practices continue to support the campaign for the status quo, prompting high level lobbying on behalf of emitters to limit cuts by emissions
19
Q

Outline the two basic approaches to achieving emissions reductions

A
  • Market based- price on carbon emissions
  • Regulatory- govt buys carbon reductions
    -Fixed price schemes/carbon taxes set price and market decides how much it will reduce emissions quantity
    -Floating price schemes set quantity of emissions and permits to emit (tradeable permits)
20
Q

Outline how Australia met its commitment to the Toronto Target

A
  • Mandated 20% reduction in CO2 levels in each industry and in each region of Australia
  • 20% reduction but with tradeable emission quotas so costs of reducing CO2 output are equalised over all industries producing CO2
  • Tax- e.g. each ton of CO2 emitted penalised at same rate
21
Q

Outline what Australia’s universal health system should achieve

A
  • Be available without regard to the income, age, type of illness, general health status or personal circumstances of patients
  • Costs equally distributed
  • Financing should be comprehensive and promote high quality care, facility integration and efficient resource allocation
  • Efficient and economical in own operation
  • Offer satisfactory rewards, incentives and conditions for health professionals to practice
22
Q

Outline Medicare

A
  • Increased tax levy
  • Subsidies for private insurance
  • Medicare levy to fund other programs e.g. NDIS
  • Part funded by 2% levy on income tax