|
The policymaking process is a dynamic game among actors that interact in what can be called arenas. Some actors are formal, such as political parties, presidents, cabinets, legislatures, courts, and the bureaucracy. Their policymaking roles are formally assigned in the constitution. Other actors are informal, such as social movements, business, and the media. They do not have any formal role, but have emerged on many occasions as powerful players.
The extent and exact nature of the role that actors play—and their interactions—are shaped by a variety of underlying factors (formal and informal rules, interests, preferences, and capabilities), as well as by the expected behavior of other actors and the nature of the arenas where they meet. Some arenas are more formal (such as a legislative committee); others are less formal (“the street,” where social movements and others mobilize). Some are more transparent (courtrooms); others are less transparent (closed-door negotiations). Actors’ actual roles often deviate from the roles that one would expect based on formal rules and formally ascribed roles. Thus their real roles in the policymaking process must be analyzed carefully. Part II does precisely that.
• Chapter 3 focuses on political parties, the legislature, and the president: actors that are central to the formal political system and to the policymaking process.
• Chapter 4 examines the roles of other actors with formally ascribed roles in the policymaking process: cabinets, the bureaucracy, subnational actors such as governors, and the judiciary.
• Chapter 5 examines business, unions, the media, social movements, and sources of policy expertise (so-called “knowledge actors”). Actors such as these can be considered “informal” in the sense that they are generally not regulated by the constitution or other organic laws or assigned specific roles in the process of making public policies.
Part II looks at the actors one by one in order to consider in depth the characteristics of the actors that affect the characteristics of public policies. The interactions among actors, as they participate in policymaking processes in a variety of countries and policy sectors, are examined in the rest of the report.
|
