Friedman - Does policy analysis matter?: exploring its effectiveness in theory and practice

This book had its origins at the 20th annual Aaron Wildavsky Forum for Public Policy, held at the University of California, Berkeley, on April 10, 2014. Aaron Wildavsky was the founding dean of UC Berkeleys Goldman School of Public Policy, one of the visionaries who saw the potential of creating the new profession of public policy analysis. Aaron loved intellectual engagement, and the Forum was created in his honor to foster engagement on important issues of public policy. It seemed fitting to mark this special anniversary of the Forum by taking stock of our knowledge about the effects of the profession that he helped to create. The volume contributors began their work by agreeing to participate in the 20th anniversary Forum.

The question that lies at the center of this volumes inquiry is just how well democratic decision making can incorporate knowledge and expertise into its institutional framework through the work of public policy analysts. There is the further question of how the answer might vary with the specific decision-making institution considered, as well as with the specific policy area under consideration. While there may be few people who would aspire to uninformed decision making in any public area, there are also few people who would aspire to undemocratic decision making in that same public area. The key is the extent to which policy-analytic expertise can complement democratic decision making rather than substitute for it.

The questions that motivate this volume are of interest to all citizens. Thus the essays herein are useful not just to those interested in the work of the graduate public policy schools, but to anyone studying public policy making. Colleges and universities offer many courses to both undergraduate and graduate students that introduce them to how public policy is made, perhaps called Making Public Policy or Introduction to Public Policy. The short table at the end of this preface suggests good choices for assigning specific chapters in this volume to accompany particular lecture topics in those courses.

We are grateful to all of the Forum participants, and particularly the discussants Sarah Anzia, John Ellwood, David Kirp, Amy Lerman, Jane Mauldon, and Jesse Rothstein, whose comments have helped to improve this book. We are also grateful to David Weimer, Joseph Cordes, and the anonymous reviewers of this manuscript for their careful reading and constructive suggestions that have led to substantial improvements in the final product. Finally, we are grateful to Cambridge University Press for its permission to include the work of Eric Patashnik and Justin Peck, which appears in a slightly earlier version in the volume, Governing in a Polarized Age: Elections, Parties and Political Representation in America, edited by Alan S. Gerber and Eric Schickler (Cambridge University Press, 2016).

All of the contributors to this volume value highly the intellectual excitement and engagement that Aaron Wildavsky brought to those around him and that the Forum in his honor continues to do through its Berkeley lectures and through the books in this series. Therefore, we have assigned any royalties that may accrue to this volume to the University of Californias Aaron Wildavsky Forum for Public Policy, in full support of its worthy mission.