A postcode lottery in education? Explaining regional inequality in multilevel systems

Existing research focuses predominantly on inequality among individuals. But inequality also has a territorial dimension. This article seeks to better understand the drivers of regional inequality in education, a key area in modern knowledge-based societies. The article specifically explores the conditions that shape regional differences in student enrolment and educational attainment across 14 OECD countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It uses Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) to identify necessary and sufficient conditions of regional inequality.

The article is guided by the strong assumption in the literature on federalism, decentralization, and multilevel governance that regional authority (or, decentralization) is a key driver of regional inequality. Considering that regional authority might not be a direct cause of regional inequality, the article also explores the impact of several other factors; government spending, population size, and socioeconomic status.

More specifically, it examines the following four hypotheses:

  1. Level of Regional Authority: A high level of regional authority over educational policy is a necessary condition for a high level of regional inequality in education.
  2. Expenditures: The combination of a high level of regional authority over education policy and strong regional differences in education spending is a sufficient condition for a high level of regional inequality in education.
  3. Regional Size: The combination of a high level of regional authority over education policy and strong regional differences in population size is a sufficient condition for regional inequality in education.
  4. Socioeconomic Status: Strong regional differences in socioeconomic status are a sufficient condition for a high level of regional inequality in education.

The analysis relies on the OECD Regional Statistics database, which contains internationally comparable regional data on student enrolment and educational attainment. To measure regional authority over education, the article uses the Regional Education Authority Index developed by Garritzmann et al. (2021).

This study offers insights into how educational outcomes, and in turn opportunity and quality of life, can vary greatly across regions in any given nation (see Figures 1 and 2).

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Figure 1. Regional differences in enrolment in upper secondary education; data: OECD Regional Statistics, Statistics Norway, Statistics Sweden, Swedish National Agency for Education, Federal Statistical Office (Switzerland).

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Figure 2. Regional differences in attainment of upper secondary education; data: OECD Regional Statistics, Statistics Norway, Statistics Sweden.

Regarding the drivers of these inequalities, the analyses in the article show that regional authority over education is not a necessary condition for high regional inequality, as enrolment rates vary across regions in Austria and educational attainment varies in France despite low regional authority over education in both countries. Regional authority is also not an individually sufficient condition. However, it seems to be an important factor, as it is part of all configurations associated with high levels of regional inequality in educational attainment and student enrolment:

  • Educational Attainment: (1) A high degree of regional authority over education and strong regional spending differences. (2) A high degree of regional authority over education and strong differences in regional population size.
  • Student Enrolment: (1) A high level of regional authority over education, strong regional spending differences, and strong regional differences in population size.

Because the inclusion of Belgium might undermine the robustness of these findings due to data issues and the low number of regions, analyses were also run without Belgium. These confirmed that regional authority over education is an important factor, in combination with others.

In conclusion, the article demonstrates that regional authority over education plays an essential role in shaping educational inequality–but is not the only factor.

Read the original article in Policy Studies Journal:

Schnabel, Johanna. 2025. “A Postcode Lottery in Education? Explaining Regional Inequality in Multilevel Systems.” Policy Studies Journal 53(2): 263–284. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12565.

About the Article’s Author

Johanna Schnabel is a Lecturer and Researcher at the Chair of German Politics, Otto Suhr Institute of Political Science, Freie Universität Berlin. Her research largely focuses on intergovernmental relations and public policy in federal and decentralized countries. She received her Ph.D. in Political Science at the Institute of Political Studies at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland.

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Policy design and policy feedback in welfare retrenchment: A survey experiment in China

Beyond conveying information about policy instruments, established government programs shape beliefs and expectations about policy benefits and burdens, as well as how individuals will be affected by existing policies. Social groups can then react to the information embedded in the design of policies, which, in turn, may strengthen or weaken them. The case study reported in this article explores how policy designs condition citizens’ behavioral and attitudinal responses to welfare retrenchment reforms in China. This article expands on recent policy feedback and comparative public policy literature by exploring how various policy designs, combined with individual proximity to reform, produce mixed responses. The article is guided by three hypotheses:

  1. Policy design that preserves individuals’ material self-interest will reduce opposition to welfare retrenchment reform.
  2. Policy design that improves the well-being of all in society will reduce opposition to welfare retrenchment reform.
  3. Individuals proximate to welfare retrenchment reform will exhibit stronger opposition than those with less policy proximity.

In 2020, the Chinese government engaged in a public consultation program regarding a proposed reform of the social health insurance system, which sought to reduce resources in individuals’ medical savings accounts. The authors conducted a survey experiment to gauge citizens’ responses to the proposed reforms and their hypothetical behavioral responses should the reforms go into effect. The survey participants were working and retired adults with social health insurance coverage and permanent residential status in Guangdong Province. Respondents were identified through a mature pre-existing sample and contacted via an online survey. The experiment measured socioeconomic characteristics and opposition to the healthcare reform before and after randomly receiving one of two policy design scenarios:

  1. Treatment Group 1 – Benefit-All Design: Reform will increase benefit generosity for both outpatient and inpatient care for social health insurance enrollees.
  2. Treatment Group 2 – Benefit-Family Design: Reform will allow individuals to use medical savings accounts to cover the healthcare expenses of their immediate family members.

The authors used a 1-4 Likert scale to measure opposition to the retrenchment reform. They measured demographic characteristics using a set of ordinal variables. They developed logistic regression models comparing group means with their corresponding 95% confidence intervals.

Figure 1 compares the mean opposition scores between groups before and after receiving the treatment message. Before treatment, the baseline preferences of the two groups were statistically similar. While both treatment messages reduced opposition, Treatment Group 2 (Benefit-Family Design) became more supportive of the reform compared to Treatment Group 1 (Benefit-All Design). At the same time, participants with higher educational attainment, poor health status, and large families were statistically more inclined to oppose the reform across both groups. These findings suggest that citizens prioritized preserving their material self-interest over supporting societal well-being. The authors therefore argue that sharing information on how a policy design allocates or reallocates resources garners meaningful attitudinal shifts. Therefore, this analysis supports hypotheses 1 and 2.

Figure 1. Comparing mean opposition scores before and after treatment. Vertical bars in the figure are the 95% confidence intervals.

Figure 2 compared whether the reduction of opposition to the reform varied by individuals’ proximity, specifically the frequency of medical savings account utilization. Based on the results, participants in Treatment Group 2 (Benefit-Family Design) who used their accounts at least once in the last 12 months showed significantly higher support for the reform compared to those in Treatment Group 1 (Benefit-All Design). Furthermore, individuals in Treatment Group 2 (Benefit-Family Design) who used their accounts more frequently (8-10 times) reported significantly higher opposition. These findings suggest that opposition to the reform increases as the frequency of utilization increases, which supports hypothesis 3.

Figure 2. Comparing mean opposition scores before and after treatment. Vertical bars in the figure are the 95% confidence intervals.

This article explores the significance of bridging policy design and feedback theories to better understand public response to the allocation and redistribution of material resources. While existing literature focuses on mass public opinion and participation behavior after policy adoption, this case study challenges scholars to examine citizens’ prospective assessments before policy changes as well. The authors suggest that future research should assess short-term feedback effects and long-term changes in those initial responses throughout the policy process. Unlike previous research, the findings reveal different sources of heterogeneous feedback effects other than partisanship, which vary by specific policy designs and individual experiences.

Read the original article in Policy Studies Journal:

He, Alex Jingwei, Ling Zhu and Jiwei Qian. 2025. “Policy Design and Policy Feedback in Welfare Retrenchment: A Survey Experiment in China.” Policy Studies Journal 53(2): 307–327. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12569.

About the Article’s Authors

Alex Jingwei is Associate Professor in the Division of Public Policy at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and Acting Director of the Institute for Public Policy at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), where he also serves as the Co-Director of the Master of Public Policy (MPP) Program. He specializes in policy process theories, health policy and governance, and social welfare reforms. He received his PhD degree in Public Policy from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore.

Ling Zhu is Professor of Political Science at the University of Houston. Her research interests include public management, health disparities, social equity in health care access, as well as the management of local health care networks. She received her Ph.D in Political Science at Texas A&M University and joined the faculty at University of Houston.

Jiwei Qian is Senior Research Fellow at the East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore. He currently serves as the secretary of the East Asian Social Policy Research Network (EASP). His research interests lie in health economics, political economy, and development economics. He obtained his B.Sc. in computer science from Fudan University, China and Ph.D. degree in Economics from the National University of Singapore.

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The Dark Side of Policy Learning: When Learning Leads to Value Destruction

Understanding why policy actors do what they do and how their actions influence the public have always been fundamental questions in not only public policy but also public administration and governance scholarship. To address these questions, scholars rely on various approaches. Those approaches for example include viewing policymaking and governance to be outcomes of belief updates, power struggles, crisis induced shocks, political opportunity structures, and/or the rules and traditions by which public institutions operate, among others. These different approaches provide important insights into the world of policymaking and governance, albeit of course, within certain contexts and under particular conditions.

Among these different approaches, policy learning stands out as one of the most omnipresent and fundamental. Simply put, in this approach, we analyze, dissect, and even predict why policy actors do what they do by tracing how, when, and why they learn about policy and governance problems. The potency of the policy learning lens owes to several reasons, chief of which is that it allows us to peek into the kernel of policy actors’ behavior. This is rooted in the “Homo discentis” view of the individual, which sees people as “learning beings” who are constantly collecting information and knowledge within the context of rapidly changing environments. So, in a policy learning process, individual and collective policy actors pursue and process information and knowledge about emerging problems, in an attempt to develop understandings of potential viable solutions. This is while reconciling this information and knowledge with existing cognitive and institutional structures, and biases within various contexts. This renders policy learning – at heart – a problem solving activity. Hence,  the idea of learning is normatively appealing, where all policy actors like to proclaim that their decisions are based on learning the ‘right lessons.’

Accordingly, policy learning is often hailed as a tool for helping policymakers make better policy decisions, ultimately creating value for the general public. But is this always the case? For years, existing research has done an outstanding job using a policy learning lens to analyze why and how policies change or do not change, and how it contributes to improvements in policy making and governance. However, scholarship only occasionally alludes to the unintended negative consequences of learning gone wrong. I therefore ask, is the story of learning always one of success, improvement, and glory?

My recent article explores the often-overlooked dark side of policy learning, demonstrating how learning failures can systematically lead to value destruction rather than value creation. Despite its normative appeal and origins, this article highlights that learning is not inherently positive. In fact, when misdirected, learning can also contribute to the erosion democratic values, weaken trust in institutions, and distort policy outcomes. To illustrate this, I conceptualized two main categories of learning failures that contribute to value destruction:

  1. Misdirected Learning Design Failures (non-intentional and cybernetic): These occur when policymakers genuinely attempt to solve problems but make errors in designing and undertaking the learning process. This is often facilitated by factors such as ambiguity and uncertainty underlying policy problems, or the influence of crisis shocks. 
  2. Normative Failures (intentional and deontological): These happen when policymakers intentionally manipulate learning processes for political or self-serving goals, such as justifying unpopular policies, limiting public participation, or consolidating power.

In building a conceptual framework that links policy learning to value destruction, I demonstrate how these failures negatively impact both public values (i.e., norms and principles guiding policymaking and governance) (e.g., democratic participation, accountability, transparency) and public value (i.e., added value that citizens experience and receive through public products and services) (e.g., the effectiveness, and efficiency of public offerings).

Figure 1. From policy learning governance to value destruction.

First, let’s begin by looking at Misdirected Learning Design Failures. When policymakers must address complex and/or rapidly changing issues, they may rely on poorly designed learning processes–which could eventually cause the misidentification of solutions or the development of ineffective, or even harmful, policies. For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the constraints of uncertainty and urgency often caused governments to undertake non-optimal learning, for example by mis-defining the policy problem at hand, excluding key stakeholders to be involved in the learning process, or misidentifying the optimal experts to learn from. These poor learning choices ultimately contributed to the loss of lives and livelihoods around the world. 

Second, in Normative failures, we see for example when policy actors attempt to deliberately limit learning to a particular group of actors that are known to legitimize predetermined political agendas, or engage in political learning to sidestep democratic decision-making norms, or exclude certain demographics from government services. These failures tend to take place when malintended policy actors strategically leverage ambiguity, complexity, and urgency to steer learning towards self-serving outcomes. 

My article ultimately challenges the assumption that learning always leads to better policies. By exposing the risks of learning failures, and theorizing failure types, it highlights the potential pitfalls of learning within the policymaking process and calls for stronger safeguards to prevent them. This is rooted in the idea that policy learning itself is a deliberately designed and governed process, where policy actors engineer how learning occurs, thus influencing its outcomes.

This serves as a crucial reminder that learning is inherently positive, and that without careful deliberate design and accountability, policy learning can just as easily contribute to value destruction as it can to value creation. To build on these theoretical developments, future research is encouraged to explore how different forms of governance (e.g., democratic vs. authoritarian) shape policy learning failures. It can also consider the increasing role of polycentricity and decentralization, and how learning therein contributes to value destruction at the subnational, national, and transnational levels.

Read the original article in Policy Studies Journal:

Zaki, Bishoy L. 2024. “ Hello Darkness My Old Friend: How Policy Learning Can Contribute to Value Destruction.” Policy Studies Journal 52(4): 907–924. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12566.

About the Article’s Author

Bishoy Louis Zaki is a professor of public policy and Administration at the department of Public Governance and Management at Ghent University, Belgium. His research and teaching focus on policy process theory with a focus on policy learning, and public management. He has several publications in leading international public administration and public policy journals including Public Administration Review, Policy & Society, Public Policy and Administration, the Journal of European Public Policy, Policy & Politics, Policy Design and Practice among others. He is also an editor at International Review of Public Policy journal, and a co-chair of the permanent study group on policy design and evaluation at the European Group for Public Administration (EGPA). Bishoy has over 14 years of experience in consulting, strategy, and policy where he served in different roles with several governments and international organizations worldwide. As a practitioner, Bishoy has overseen the design, implementation, and monitoring of large-scale international strategic capacity development, planning, and knowledge transfer initiatives.

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How does a focusing event shape public opinion? Natural experimental evidence from the Orlando mass shooting

Scholars of the policy process posit that focusing events often shift public attention, policy preferences, and reshape the policy agenda. The scholarship, however, has failed to fully explain how focusing events influence public opinion. Our paper aims to remedy this by analyzing the impact of one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history—the 2016 Orlando nightclub attack—on public attention and attitudes toward terrorism, national security, and specific policies.

Policy process theories often assume that “focusing events” (i.e., sudden, dramatic, widely publicized incidents) can jolt public attention and lead to changes in policy preferences. Yet, empirical studies have produced mixed results. We argue that the literature falls short for two major reasons: (1) prior research neglects to properly consider the different components of the public’s reaction to focusing events and uses inconsistent dependent variables; (2) the research often relies on data collected over time without carefully considering confounders.

Figure 1. An analytic framework for public responses to a focusing event.

To address this, we propose a new framework that aims to distinguish between changes in attention to the generic policy issue (e.g., terrorism broadly), attention to sub-issues (e.g., airplane safety), support for a general policy action (e.g., antiterrorism investment), and support for specific policy actions (e.g., gun control). Using this framework, we assert the following hypotheses:

  • H1: The Orlando mass shooting increases overall attention to the generic terrorism and security issue (i.e., “splash effect).
  • H2: The less relevant a specific terrorism issue is, the smaller the positive impact of the Orlando mass shooting on public attention to it (i.e., “limited ripple effect”).
  • H3: The less relevant a specific terrorism issue is, the smaller the positive impact of the Orlando mass shooting on public support for increased government investment in preventing terrorism decreases (i.e., “limited ripple effect”).
  • H4: The Orlando mass shooting has a negligible impact on public support for specific preventive government actions (e.g., gun control or immigration restrictions) (i.e., “deep water null effect”).

To test these predictions, we used a natural experimental design. A public opinion survey funded by Texas A&M University was fortuitously being conducted when the Orlando attack occurred on June 12, 2016. This allowed us to compare responses from 416 participants surveyed before the attack with 284 surveyed after. Our analysis provided support for all four of our hypotheses, providing empirical evidence of the “splash effect,” “limited ripple effect,” and “deep-water null effect.” Put plainly, this focusing event increased attention to the general issue of terrorism and heightened support for a general policy action (i.e., increased government counterterrorism spending), but it did not alter concerns for other terror-related acts that were less relevant to the Orlando shooting.

 Figure 2. The effect of the Orlando mass shooting on respondents’ concerns about specific terrorism issues.

Our study reveals that while focusing events can heighten public concern and support for broad policy responses, they rarely shift entrenched views on controversial solutions. This “deep water null effect” has major implications: even horrific events may not translate into support for specific reforms, especially in a polarized political climate.

Read the original article in Policy Studies Journal:

Zhang, Youlang and Xinsheng Liu. 2025. “ How Does a Focusing Event Shape Public Opinion? Natural Experimental Evidence From the Orlando Mass Shooting.” Policy Studies Journal 53(2): 463-479. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12543.

About the Article’s Authors

Youlang Zhang is a Professor in the School of Public Administration and Policy and a Research Scientist at the Capital Development and Governance Institute, Renmin University of China. He is also a Research Fellow with the Institute for Science, Technology and Public Policy, the Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M University. His research interests include policy process, citizen-state interaction, and government management. 

Xinsheng Liu is a Senior Research Scholar and Research Scientist of the Institute for Science, Technology and Public Policy, Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M University. His research interests include public policy process, policy agenda, public opinion and participation, and comparative public management and governance.

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The interactive effects of policies: Insights for policy feedback theory from a qualitative study on homelessness

Existing policy feedback literature on participation examines how policy designs shape political behavior and argues that policies can encourage some people to participate whilst discouraging others. This prompts the inquiry: how do the effects of policy design characteristics interact? How might the positive effects of one element of a policy, for example, interact with the negative effects of another to influence participation of a marginalized group? How might multiple negative or positive effects influence participation? To explore these complex effects, this study compares how homelessness policies affect political engagement in Melbourne, Australia, and Toronto, Canada.

Drawing on 118 qualitative interviews with individuals experiencing homelessness, service providers, and policymakers, this comparative study explores how the effects of policy design characteristics (i.e., distribution of benefit, generosity, eligibility, visibility, delivery design, and integration) work together to either mobilize or discourage political engagement. Table 1 defines these terms below:

Table 1. Policy design characteristic operationalization.

Figure 1 demonstrates how the interaction of multiple policies, through their design characteristics, influences political participation. These effects are shaped by the resources allocated, the signals policies send about individuals’ roles in society, and their broader impact on institutional capacity to facilitate engagement.

Figure 1. Interactive effects of policy characteristics on participation.

The qualitative interview data reveals diverse service access among participants, highlighting key variations in characteristics, particularly visibility, delivery, and integration. Table 2 outlines the policy areas by city and sector, detailing policy characteristics and their effects on engagement as reported by participants. While both cities have many negative policy effects, Melbourne’s housing and health policies showed more positive impacts, particularly in integration, visibility, and delivery.

Table 2. Policy design characteristics of policies utilized by the sample of participants and effects on participation.

Notably, Table 3 illustrates that individuals experiencing homelessness actively engage in various efforts to drive change. While 56-64% of participants reported voting in their last federal election, over 90% engaged in actions such as peer work, providing organizational feedback, and joining advisory groups.

Table 3. Participation according to venues in Melbourne and Toronto.

The way in which different policy design characteristics interact can either amplify exclusion or help counteract it, depending on how services are structured and delivered. For example, integrated service delivery can moderate the negative effects of means-tested programs with strict eligibility rules. In Melbourne, social workers traveling to service centers helped reduce barriers related to eligibility and stigma. In contrast, Toronto’s lack of visibility and integration often left participants feeling isolated.

Policy feedback scholars must pay closer attention to the lived experiences of marginalized populations. These perspectives reveal how policy design and the interplay of its characteristics directly shape political participation. Without this understanding, we risk overlooking the conditions under which participation influences policy or the ways we might create spaces that meaningfully support civic engagement.

This research highlights how policies are structured and delivered, not just how their content affects democratic engagement. Integrated, visible services can empower marginalized individuals to engage politically, even amid social and economic instability.

For marginalized and targeted populations, policy design can dictate their civic participation and relationship with the state. Too often, policies reinforce exclusion, further distancing individuals from decisions that directly impact their lives. By examining where and how these populations participate, we gain critical insight into whether their voices are meaningfully reflected in future policymaking.

Read the original article in Policy Studies Journal:

Kopec, Anna. 2025. “The Interactive Effects of Policies: Insights For Policy Feedback Theory From a Qualitative Study on Homelessness.” Policy Studies Journal 53(2): 243–262. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12532.

About the Article’s Author

Anna Kopec is an Associate Professor at the School of Public Policy at Carleton University. Her research agenda examines the relationship between political participation and public policy among marginalized populations in Western welfare states. How do policy designs influence the political agency of vulnerable groups, and how in turn do such groups participate to bring about changes to the policies and systems they interact with? This comparative work focuses on populations experiencing homelessness. A secondary research agenda examines intersectionality and homelessness, with a consideration of how policies and services individuals access influence how certain communities participate.

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Information Is Cheap, But Filtering Is Costly: Congressional Investment In Reference Resources

Lawmakers swim in a constant flood of information—reports from think tanks, pitches from lobbyists, pleas from constituents, memos from agencies—you name it. It’s a tidal wave of policy talk, and it hits every single day. To keep from going under and still stay focused on what matters most to them, members of Congress have to become expert navigators, developing savvy strategies to cut through the noise and zero in on their priorities.

One key strategy is investing in information filtering through media sources. Instead of drowning in data, members often pay news outlets and media companies to help them filter, summarize, and contextualize the complex policy and political environment. These media expenditures are not insignificant; our research found that members of the U.S. House of Representatives spend tens of thousands of dollars annually on media subscriptions and reference materials.

But who spends the most? In our article, we explored how a member’s experience in Congress shapes their spending on information resources. Based on the data (see Figure 1), we assume a negative correlation between the institutional experience of members and their spending on information filtering through the media. Specifically, we hypothesized that freshman members of the House are more likely to rely on and invest more money in media resources. Lacking the deep institutional knowledge, established networks, and experienced staff of their senior colleagues, freshman members typically face a steeper learning curve in navigating the complex information environment.

Figure 1. Distribution of member spending on publications and reference material by seniority.

To test our hypothesis, we looked at the official record of expenditures (the Statement of Disbursements) for U.S. House members in 2019 and 2021. We identified members’ expenditures on publications and reference material which included subscriptions to national news outlets (like the New York Times), local papers, and pricey policy monitoring services (like Politico Pro or Bloomberg’s BGov) that track legislation and political developments in real-time (see breakdown of publications expenditures in Figure 2). We built regression models that examined the relationship between a member’s total expenditures on publications/reference material and whether or not they were in their first term, while controlling for other personal and institutional factors that may influence members’ spending patterns.

Figure 2. Publications expenditures by category and vendor.

Our analysis confirmed our hypothesis: being a freshman was the strongest predictor of higher spending on media resources. We found that first-term members of the House spent about 94% more on publications and reference material than their experienced colleagues in 2019, and 169% more in 2021. This translates to an average increase of $7,000 to $10,000 per year invested in information filtering (see Figure 3).

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Figure 3. Predicted money spent on publications and reference materials.

When we tracked members who were freshmen in 2019 into their second term in 2021, we observed that, once reelected and having gained more experience and institutional knowledge, their spending on media resources dropped significantly (by an average of $10,513), as they seem less reliant on external tools and resources to filter information.

Our work highlights how crucial (and costly) information processing is to lawmaking in Congress, especially for freshman members. In a world where information is cheap but filtering is expensive, new members appear willing to pay a premium to make sense of it all.

Read the original article in Policy Studies Journal:

Craig, Alison and Annelise Russell. 2025. “Information is Cheap, but Filtering is Costly: Congressional Investment in Reference Resources.” Policy Studies Journal 53(1): 159–170. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12561.

About the Article’s Authors

Alison Craig is an assistant professor in the Department of Government at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research focuses on improving our understanding of the day-to-day functioning of the United States Congress, with an emphasis on the relationships between members and the challenges of policymaking in the modern legislature. Alison earned her Ph.D. from The Ohio State University and has a B.S. in political science from the University of Oregon. Prior to graduate school, she spent eleven years working for members of Congress on Capitol Hill and in her home state of Oregon. In that time she filled various roles, from communications to casework, with most of her work as a legislative assistant handling domestic policy issues and as a field representative working with local governments and opinion leaders.

Annelise Russell is an Associate Professor of Public Policy at the University of Kentucky. She is also a faculty associate of the U.S. Policy Agendas Project and a member of the Comparative Agendas Project. Her research focuses on questions about how policymakers communicate their agendas and the role of the media, particularly social media, in the political process. Her work centers around congressional decision-making and communication, including an active research agenda in the intersection of social media and political institutions. She received a Ph.D. in Government from the University of Texas at Austin, and she also holds bachelor’s degrees in political science and journalism from the University of Oklahoma.

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The Triangle of Bureaucratic Policy Analysis and the Professional Types of High-Level Civil Servants: Empirical Evidence from Southern Europe

Public policy and public administration research has focused on conceptualizing bureaucrats as pivotal actors in the policymaking process. This has allowed scholars to investigate the capacities and skills of bureaucrats as policymakers and how advice and knowledge inform their behavior. Nevertheless, the literature has proceeded in a fragmented way and without a sophisticated analytical framework that would allow for comparative research. Our recent study aims to address this by proposing a new framework for understanding how high-level civil servants—those at the top of national public administrations—engage in policymaking through the lens of policy analysis.

This study asks a central question: How can we better conceptualize the professional role of senior civil servants in the policy process? To answer this, we developed the “triangle of bureaucratic policy analysis,” which connects three core dimensions of bureaucratic work:

  • Policy Work: What bureaucrats do on a daily basis (e.g., advising, managing, steering).
  • Policy Analytical Capacity: What analytical skills and techniques they use (e.g., economic, legal, statistical).
  • Sources of Information: Where they get their information (e.g., laws, government reports, statistical data).

Figure 1. Triangle of bureaucratic policy analysis.

We applied this framework to a unique dataset: a large survey of 1,014 senior civil servants in the central governments of Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain. These countries share a “Napoleonic” administrative tradition and do not typically employ specialized policy analysts, making them ideal cases for examining how policy analysis functions without formal structures.

We used factor analysis to identify patterns in how civil servants combine work, skills, and information. Then, we used principal component analysis (PCA) to cluster these patterns into three main professional “types” of high-level bureaucrats:

  1. Political Generalist: A flexible coordinator and boundary-spanner. These bureaucrats steer ministry activities, interact with politicians and stakeholders, and rely on a broad mix of information sources. They possess “eclectic” analytical capacities—skills gained through both training and professional experience—and play a central role in aligning government priorities across sectors.
  2. Legal Advisor: True to Southern Europe’s legalistic traditions, these civil servants focus on advising political leaders using legal and regulatory tools. Their policy work revolves around assessing legal feasibility, and they rely heavily on juridical sources of information. Their analytical expertise is narrowly focused on legal techniques.
  3. Manager: A newer type, these officials emphasize implementation and results. They are more empirically oriented, favoring evidence-based data and economic analysis. Their policy work includes program management and performance monitoring, reflecting the influence of New Public Management reforms.

Each of these types reflects a different way that bureaucrats contribute to policymaking—one political and strategic, one legalistic, and one managerial.

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Figure 2. (a) Empirical types of high-level civil servants in Southern Europe: Type 1 (political generalist). (b) Empirical types of high-level civil servants in Southern Europe: Type 2 (legal advisor). (c) Empirical types of high-level civil servants in Southern Europe: Type 3 (manager).

This study contributes to a growing recognition that senior civil servants are more than passive implementers—they are policy actors with distinct analytical profiles. Our “triangle” approach offers a new way to classify and understand how bureaucracies influence policymaking, moving beyond simplistic divides like “generalist vs. specialist” or “bureaucrat vs. politician.” Moreover, these insights are relevant for reform efforts, helping policymakers assess whether administrative roles and skills are well-matched—and whether bureaucrats are being utilized effectively across different policy challenges.

You can read the original article in Policy Studies Journal at

Capano, Giliberto, Alice Cavalieri and Andrea Pritoni. 2025. “The Triangle of Bureaucratic Policy Analysis and the Professional Types of High-level Civil Servants: Empirical Evidence From Southern Europe.” Policy Studies Journal 53(1): 69–90. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12577.

About the Article’s Authors

Giliberto Capano is a professor of Public Policy at the University of Bologna, Italy. He specializes in public administration, public policy analysis, and comparative higher education. His research focuses on governance dynamics and performance in higher education and education, policy design and policy change, policy instruments’ impact, the social role of political science, the policy impact of COVID-19, and leadership as an embedded function of policy making. His recent books are A modern Guide to Public Policy (coedited with M. Howlett, Edward Elgar, 2020); Convergence and Diversity in the Governance of Higher Education (coedited with D. Jarvis, Cambridge University Press, 2020); Trajectories of Governance How States Shaped Policy Sectors in the Neoliberal Age (coauthored with A. Zito, J. Rayner, and F. Toth, Palgrave, 2022); The Fate of Political Scientists in Europe (with Luca Verzichellli, Palgrave, 2023). 

Alice Cavalieri is a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Trieste (Italy), where she works on a project about the response of parliaments and governments to different crises. Her main research interests are public budgeting and women’s representation. Her first book, Italian Budgeting Policy (Palgrave Macmillan; 2023), has been awarded the “Pietro Grilli di Cortona” Biannual Prize for the best book published by a member of the Italian Political Science Association. She is a member of the Italian team of the Comparative Agendas Project and former country lead for Italy of the OxCGRT led by the Blavatnik School of Government (University of Oxford).

Andrea Pritoni is an associate professor of Political Science in the Department of Arts at the University of Bologna, where he teaches Electoral Campaigns in Italy and Institutional Relations and Advocacy. His main research interests relate to Italian politics, lobbying and interest group politics, as well as comparative public policy. He has recently published articles on South European Society & Politics (2024), International Review of Administrative Sciences (2024) and European Political Science (2024).

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Why Did a Progressive Tax Reform Succeed in Mexico Under a Pro-Business Party?

by Oswaldo Mena Aguilar

In 2013, Mexico passed a sweeping tax reform that, surprisingly, included measures to increase taxes on the wealthiest individuals and corporations—despite being led by a party often aligned with elite economic interests. A decade earlier, under similar institutional conditions and with widespread support from the business sector, a far more modest reform effort had collapsed. What explains this contrast?

My article tackles this puzzle by comparing two major reform efforts: President Vicente Fox’s failed 2001 attempt and President Enrique Peña Nieto’s successful 2013 overhaul. Despite similar levels of party fragmentation and legislative constraints, the outcomes were drastically different—not only in terms of success, but also in ideological orientation.

To make sense of these differences, I assess two major policy process theories: the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) and Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Framework (MSF). The ACF suggests that lasting policy change results from coalitions of actors united by deep normative commitments. Yet in Mexico, such ideological coherence was absent in 2013. Instead, I argue that policy entrepreneurs took advantage of fleeting political windows—exemplifying the kind of opportunistic “coupling of streams” Kingdon describes.

In 2001, Fox’s proposal to extend the Value Added Tax (VAT) to basic goods failed because the PRI—then the main opposition party—refused to pay the political cost, despite sharing the PAN’s economic preferences. And yet, the Income Tax portion of that bill passed unanimously, after PRD legislators accepted corporate-friendly provisions in exchange for key progressive concessions. This trade-off exemplified a strategic, if ideologically messy, compromise enabled by a temporary alignment of interests.

Fast forward to 2013, when PRI, back in power, launched a tax reform that defied expectations: it dropped controversial VAT expansions and instead raised income and capital taxes on top earners. The reform succeeded not due to ideological conviction, but because it was part of a broader legislative package negotiated under the “Pacto por México.” PRI’s flexibility—along with the PRD’s willingness to strike a deal—made it possible to capitalize on a narrow legislative opportunity.

This case shows that policy change—even in rigid institutional environments—does not always reflect stable coalitions or shared beliefs. Sometimes, it’s about seizing the moment.

You can read the original article in Policy Studies Journal at

Mena Aguilar, Oswaldo A. 2024. “ Advocacy Coalitions or Pragmatic Coupling of Streams? Explaining Policy Change in Mexico: The Tax Reforms of Vicente Fox and Enrique Peña (2001 and 2013).” Policy Studies Journal 00 (0): 1–27. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12537.

About the Author

Oswaldo A. Mena is a Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. His research focuses on comparative politics, political economy, and the political determinants of inequality, poverty, and redistributive politics and policies in Latin America. He is a Data Research Fellow at the Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies and was a 2024 Junior Scholar of the Stone Center on Socio-Economic Inequality. He previously worked in Mexico’s public sector for nearly a decade.

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Immigration, Government Type, and Social Welfare Spending

by Hang Qi

Immigration and the welfare state are often cast as adversaries in political debates. When immigration increases, concerns about overburdened social services frequently rise to the surface—especially during times of fiscal constraint. But is the relationship really that simple?

In my recent article, I argue that this question cannot be adequately answered without considering the role of the institutional framework and arrangements—specifically, the type of government in power.

Drawing on panel data from 28 advanced democracies between 1980 and 2019, I examine how immigration inflows interact with government types—single-party majority, coalition, and minority governments—to influence welfare spending. My findings show that the relationship between immigration and social expenditure is not uniform. While immigration alone does not have a consistent effect on welfare spending, its impact is significantly shaped by the type of government.

Coalition and minority governments – where power is more dispersed – are more likely to respond to immigration with increased welfare spending. This contrasts with single-party majority governments, which tend to be more cautious or even restrictive. The reasons are both institutional and political. In more fragmented governments, there are numerous veto players, and accountability is shared. This can shield pro-welfare and pro-immigration parties from electoral risks and dilute the policy influence of anti-immigrant sentiment.

By contrast, single-party majority governments, especially under growing public concern about immigration, may face stronger incentives to hold down spending. Parties in such governments are more directly accountable for all policy outcomes and may be wary of appearing “soft” on immigration in the eyes of median voters.

Real-world cases underscore these dynamics. In France, left parties in coalition governments have actively defended immigrants’ access to healthcare, despite political resistance. Meanwhile, in Denmark and the U.S., left-leaning single-party governments have in some instances moderated or even reversed their immigration-friendly positions in response to electoral pressure.

These findings illustrate a broader lesson: institutions matter. Political institutions determine how the government responds to social pressures and also condition whether immigration leads to policy expansion or retrenchment. Understanding these institutional filters is crucial for designing sustainable and inclusive social welfare policies in an era of increasing migration and political polarization.

You can read the original article in Policy Studies Journal at

Qi, Hang. 2025. “ Immigration, Government Type, and Social Welfare Spending.” Policy Studies Journal 00(0): 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.70015.

About the Author

Hang Qi is an Assistant Professor of Political Science in the Department of Government and Public Administration at the University of Macau. His research focuses on the policy and politics of redistribution, immigration policy, fiscal policy, and political economy. His work has been published or is forthcoming in Policy Studies Journal, Public Opinion Quarterly, American Politics Research, and other journals.

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Can Reducing Learning Costs Improve Public Support for Means-Tested Benefit Programs?

by Gregory Porumbescu, Stephanie Walsh, & Andrea Hetling 

This study examines how lowering learning costs in means-tested benefit programs, such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), influences public support and perceptions of beneficiary deservingness. Drawing on educational psychology research (cognitive load theory) and policy feedback theory, we investigate how the structure and clarity of information about SNAP’s eligibility and application process influence learning costs, public support, and attitudes. Through a pre-registered dose-response survey experiment, our findings show that improving the clarity of SNAP information reduces learning barriers, increasing support and positive perceptions of beneficiaries. This study is guided by two testable hypotheses:  

  1. Reducing learning costs improves comprehension drawing on educational psychology cognitive load theory. 
  2. Improved comprehension increases public support based on policy feedback theory. 

To test these hypotheses, we performed a dose-response survey experiment involving 1,677 New Jersey residents. Participants were assigned randomly to one of four groups: a control group that was given no information, and three treatment groups that were given increasingly clearer and more structured information on SNAP. The treatments were: 

Flyer: A low-structuring treatment with minimal structuring of content.
Screener: A tool that breaks the content into bite-sized, manageable chunks, mimicking state-level eligibility screens.
Video: A how-to tutorial walking participants through the eligibility process. 

After being exposed to the treatment, each participant answered a series of questions related to SNAP, with the number of questions they answered correctly comprising the dependent variable, their SNAP comprehension score. To analyze the data, we employed a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) to evaluate whether differences exist across the control and three treatment groups. We utilized planned contrasts to determine if the means differed significantly across each treatment group. To analyze the relationship between comprehension and program support measures, we used ordinary least squares regressions. The mediation framework improves upon traditional methods by leveraging the potential outcomes framework. By modeling intermediate pathways explicitly, this method offers improved estimates of indirect effects compared to the associations produced by standard mediation techniques.

Image Description

Figure 2. Distribution of SNAP comprehension score by treatment group. 

As shown in figure 2, providing structured, digestible information significantly enhances study participants’ knowledge. The video treatment group, which received the clearest presentation, had the highest comprehension levels, followed by the screener group. The flyer treatment group, with the least structured data, had the lowest comprehension. In addition, differences by participant racial identity emerged, as Black non-Hispanic participants show a stronger inverse relationship between SNAP understanding and perceived deservingness compared to other groups. These findings underscore the importance of comprehension in shaping attitudes toward SNAP policies. 

Findings also revealed significant indirect effects on SNAP approval, perceived deservingness, and support for increased funding. Higher comprehension connects reduced learning costs to greater support. This indicates that simplifying information delivery about complex benefit programs can enhance public approval and engagement. These results align with policy feedback theory, highlighting the importance of accessible information in shaping support for means-tested policies such as SNAP. 

Image Description

Figure 3. Indirect effects of content structure on different aspects of SNAP support. 

Empirically, the findings show that reducing learning costs not only improves knowledge but also increases support for programs like SNAP, improves positive perceptions of program beneficiaries, and draws support for program funding. These effects could carry over to other complex safety net programs like Temporary Assistance Needy Families (TANF) and Medicaid, with policy communication implications extending beyond the reduction of learning cost. 

You can read the original article in Policy Studies Journal at

Porumbescu, Gregory, Stephanie Walsh and Andrea Hetling. 2025. “ Can Reducing Learning Costs Improve Public Support For Means-tested Benefit Programs?.” Policy Studies Journal 53(1): 135–157. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12578.

About the Authors

Gregory Porumbescu (PhD, Seoul National University) is an associate professor in the Department of Public Administration and Policy at the University of Georgia‘s School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA). His research centers on understanding the implications of technology for government transparency and accountability. Dr. Porumbescu‘s work has been published in journals such as the Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Public Administration Review, Governance, and Social Science & Medicine. Prior to joining SPIA, Dr. Porumbescu served as an associate professor at Rutgers University–Newark. There, he was a co-founding principal investigator for the New Jersey State Policy Lab, an initiative dedicated to enhancing evidence based policy making in state governments. During his time at Rutgers, he was also appointed to serve on the AI, Equity, and Literacy Working Group, contributing to Governor Phil Murphy‘s New Jersey AI task force. Dr. Porumbescu‘s research has been supported by organizations such as the National Science Foundation, Korean Research Foundation, and the New Jersey Office of the Secretary of Higher Education.

Stephanie Walsh is Assistant Director of the Heldrich Center. She earned her doctorate in planning and public policy at Rutgers University. She also holds a Master‘s degree in public policy. Stephanie also serves as the Director of the New Jersey Statewide Data System, overseeing the governance, research agenda, and publications that use the linked longitudinal data. Her research interests focus on how data can inform public programs and policies to better support service delivery and improve individual outcomes.

Andrea Hetling is a Professor at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University. Dr. Hetling‘s research interests focus on how public programs and policies can support economic well-being and financial stability among vulnerable populations, including families living in poverty and survivors of intimate partner violence. In 2019, Andrea was selected as one of only five Family Self-Sufficiency and Stability Research Network (FSSRN) Scholars and awarded a five-year grant by the US Department of Health & Human Services, Administration for Children and Families. Before getting her Ph.D., Andrea worked as a program administrator at a domestic violence agency, focusing on advocacy and development issues. As a strong believer in the public impact of applied policy research, Andrea regularly connects her research projects with her teaching and mentoring and to her service to the greater community.

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