Policy Reconsidered

The idea of 'policy' is ripe for critical reappraisal. Whilst the context for policy making changes constantly, multiple questions endure: How is policy conceived and why? What is taken for granted and what gets problematised? How should policy be informed, analysed and understood? This book identifies key topics within the policy arena and subjects them to sustained theoretical and practical appraisal. It explores the development of the meaning and language of policy, and examines its practice from the micro- to the supra-national levels, using illustrative case studies to demonstrate how policy is contested, shaped and accounted for.Given the significance of policy as a means to organise and direct social, economic and political life, this book presents the case for a critical restatement of its origins, development and form - without which we risk being trapped by received wisdom, and caught up in a cycle of change without understanding the 'why' or 'how'. The book shows the gains to be made from applying a cross-disciplinary lens to the study of 'policy', with contributors presenting critical and reflective engagements with the theory and practice of policy at all levels of political organisation and within a range of contexts. Targeted at upper undergraduate and postgraduate students and their teachers, it will also be of interest to policy actors wanting insight to their project.