Break with convention - An original look at policymaking

Policymaking is a messy business. It entails more than the traditional policy cycle discussed in most textbooks. And it involves more than presidents and members of Congress.

Judges, bureaucrats, corporate leaders, journalists, and voters all influence and participate in the process, and at all levels of government. Each group practices a different kind of politics, which very often results in different policies and outcomes. By looking at six distinct, yet connected, policy domains, your students will see a more comprehensive and realistic view of policymaking:
Boardroom Politics - decisions by professional and business leaders
Bureaucratic Politics - rule-making and adjudication by administrators
Cloakroom Politics - lawmaking by legislators
Chief Executive Politics - decision making by presidents, governors, mayors, and their advisers
Courtroom Politics - rulings by judges
Living Room Politics - opinions expressed by and through the mass media, grassroots movements, political activists, and voters

Policymakers are faced with tough choices. With this text, students are better prepared to evaluate their leaders' performance given the book'ss unique framework linking how policies are chosen with what policy is chosen.

Thoroughly updated to reflect the issues of the early 21st century, this new edition also incorporates new and important scholarship.

Recommended for classes in: Public Policy and American Government

Break with convention - An original look at policymaking

Policymaking is a messy business. It entails more than the traditional policy cycle discussed in most textbooks. And it involves more than presidents and members of Congress.

Judges, bureaucrats, corporate leaders, journalists, and voters all influence and participate in the process, and at all levels of government. Each group practices a different kind of politics, which very often results in different policies and outcomes. By looking at six distinct, yet connected, policy domains, your students will see a more comprehensive and realistic view of policymaking:

Boardroom Politics - decisions by professional and business leaders
Bureaucratic Politics - rule-making and adjudication by administrators
Cloakroom Politics - lawmaking by legislators
Chief Executive Politics - decision making by presidents, governors, mayors, and their advisers
Courtroom Politics - rulings by judges
Living Room Politics - opinions expressed by and through the mass media, grassroots movements, political activists, and voters

Policymakers are faced with tough choices. With this text, students are better prepared to evaluate their leaders' performance given the book's unique framework linking how policies are chosen with what policy is chosen.

Thoroughly updated to reflect the issues of the early 21st century, this new edition also incorporates new and important scholarship.

Recommended for classes in: Public Policy and American Government

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Politics and Public Policy is a wonderful tool for teaching students about the public policy process from a real-life perspective. The authors don'st attempt to separate policy from politics, but rather embrace the complex and sometimes chaotic political process that creates public policy. Instead of taking a linear, step-by-step approach to policymaking, they examine six different political domains where policies are debated and decided. The book covers not only the bureaucracies and legislatures, but also chief executives, public opinion, business and the courts. Up-to-date examples and an interesting, conversational style make the book easily accessible to students. Most importantly, the authors' enthusiasm for their subject shines through. I highly recommend it.

Books on public policy often miss the mark by focusing on institutional processes at the expense of other important factors. Not this one. The authors place policymaking in the broader framework of political culture, corporate and economic influences, and politics. No other text comes close to this one in explaining how the policy process really works. This edition is also wonderfully modified with many recent examples, making it not only the most realistic book on public policy, but also the most timely one.
Ken Dautrich, University of Connecticut

The new edition of Politics and Public Policy is comprehensive, timely, and unfailingly interesting. It offers its readers a judicious blend of information on the way things are, analysis of why they are that way, and balanced comment on how well the political system is working in producing good public policy.

Carl E. Van Horn is professor of public policy and the director of the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University's Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy. He is the author of No One Left Behind: Economic Change and the American Worker (Twentieth Century Fund, 1996) and the editor of The State of the States (CQ Press, 1989).

William T. Gormley Jr. is University Professor and professor of government and public policy at Georgetown University. He is the author of several books, including Organizational Report Cards, with David Weimer and Everybody’s Children: Child Care as a Public Problem.

Donald C. Baumer is professor of Government at Smith College. He is coauthor of The Politics of Unemployment (CQ Press, 1985) with Carl Van Horn, and has published several articles on employment policy and Democratic leadership in the Senate. He recently completed a three-year term as Dean for Academic Development at Smith College.