Policy Instruments and Policy Capacity

Governing involves making a number of strategic choices that will have consequences for the government’s capacity to achieve its stated policy goals. One of the more important decisions for the government is the choice of instruments to use to implement its programmes. Part of the design of any policy, then, is choosing how to achieve its goals. For example if the government wants to encourage young people from low-income families to engage in higher education it could (among other things) provide such students with grants or loans, allow their parents to deduct the costs of tuition from their taxable income, or provide direct support to universities. As a more extreme intervention, it might mandate universities to admit a number of such students free of charge. Unfortunately policy makers often assume that almost any form of intervention will be adequate, make their choice of instruments on the basis of familiarity, and inadequately assess the effects of using certain mechanisms for intervention on complex social and economic processes (see Linder and Peters, 1998). These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.