Course Outline Course Objectives Governance 390: Public Policy and Administrative Governance will allow students to become

familiar with the actors, institutions, and processes of public policy-making and administrative governance in Canada. It will also help students to develop the analytical tools necessary to think critically about matters associated with the making and implementation of Canadian public policy. When you have completed the course you should be able to achieve the following objectives: 1. Discuss the character of public bureaucracy and provide a theoretically informed analysis of the contrast between a classic Weberian bureaucracy and the type of public bureaucracy advocated by the New Public Management (NPM) 2. Outline and discuss the role of bureaucratic, political, and non-state actors in the policy process 3. Contrast the various policy instruments and service delivery mechanisms used in policy implementation and comment on the factors shaping the possibility of successful policy implementation 4. Understand and discuss the nature of democratic accountability in parliamentary government and comment on approaches to ensuring ethics in administrative governance 5. Comment on the significance of social diversity to the making and implementation of public policy and discuss the relationship between social diversity and the differential impact of public policy 6. Contrast the governing paradigms associated with the administrative welfare state and those of the neo liberal state and explain the relationship of the NPM to the neo liberal mode of governance

Governance 390: Public Policy and Administrative Governance is composed of eight units. Unit 1 Introduction to Public Policy and Administrative Governance Unit 2 Public Bureaucracy in Theory and Practice Unit 3 Policy Formation: The Institutions and Processes of Political Governance Unit 4 Administrative Governance: The Challenge of Policy Implementation Unit 5 The Role and Influence of Non-state Actors in Policy-making and Administrative Governances Unit 6 Ethics in Administrative Governance: The Challenge of Ensuring Democratic Accountability in Public Administration Unit 7 Social Diversity and the Question of Difference in Policy-making and Administrative Governance Unit 8 Paradigms of Governance: Policy-making and Administrative Governance from the Administrative Welfare State to the Neo-liberal State Unit 1 Introduction to Public Policy and Administrative Governance Unit 1 introduces public policy and administrative governance. The commentary for this first unit will familiarize you with the core concepts used in the study of public policy and administration. What is public policy? What does the term administrative governance mean? What is the difference between publicadministration and private administration? What is the relationship between policy studies and the study of public administration? These are some of the core questions that this unit answers. The assigned readings go further than simply introducing political and administrative governance. They examine the organization of the executive branch of government, recent trends in the structure of the Canadian state, and, more importantly, they reveal the ways in

which the New Public Management (NPM) has changed the nature of political and administrative governance. The rise of the NPM will be one of the core themes of the course; you will benefit from taking care to learn what you can about the NPM as you complete Unit 1. Learning Objectives When you have completed Unit 1, you should be able to achieve the following learning objectives: 1. Define and contrast political governance and administrative governance 2. Define public policy and discuss the purpose and focus of policy studies 3. Distinguish between public administration and private administration as fields of practice 4. Comment on the relationship between public administration and policy studies as fields of study 5. Outline the core organizational forms of the public bureaucracy and discuss the roles of key players and institutions in the political and permanent executive 6. Offer some preliminary observations on the character of the NPM Unit 2 Public Bureaucracy in Theory and Practice Unit 2 provides the conceptual tools necessary to define public bureaucracy and to appreciate the diversity of perspectives found in the scholarly literature that examines the character of public bureaucracy. While the unit commentary and assigned readings focus on the conceptual and theoretical fundamentals that underpin scholarly studies of public bureaucracy, the chapter by Reg Whitaker offers an examination of politics and administration that gives a refreshing historical examination of the real world of politicians and bureaucrats. Learning Objectives When you have completed Unit 2, you should be able to achieve the following learning objectives:

1. Offer a definition of public bureaucracy and discuss competing perspectives on the character of public bureaucracy 2. Identify and describe the basic organizational forms of Canadas public bureaucracy 3. Contrast the essential characteristics of a Weberian ideal type bureaucracy and the type of public bureaucracy advocated by proponents of the NPM and postbureaucratic organizational models 4. Explain and comment on what is meant by the politics/administration dichotomy Unit 3 Policy Formation: The Institutions and Processes of Political Governance This unit explains the institutions and processes of political governance. You will be introduced to a model of the policy process and the core political, bureaucratic, and constitutional institutions that affect the policy process. Then, in the latter part of the commentary, you will examine the decision processes of the most powerful institutions of the Canadian government. The readings for Unit 3 focus on a range of related issues. In the first, Stephen Brooks (2004) provides a detailed overview of the machinery of government. This reading will round out what you learn from the commentary. Sharon Sutherland (1993) provides a comprehensive overview of the role of the public service in policy development. Her analysis includes some discussion of the structure of the public service, the tension between politics and administration, and other important issues. In the final reading, Donald Savoie (1999) develops his well-known argument regarding the ongoing centralization of policy-makingpower in the Prime Ministers Office (PMO) and the offices of key bureaucratic structures known as central agencies. Learning Objectives When you have completed Unit 3, you should be able to achieve the following learning objectives: 1. Outline and discuss the machinery of government and the various stages of the policy process 2. Explain the impact of Canadas core constitutional institutions on policy-making

3. Discuss the role of the various political and bureaucratic institutions in the policy process 4. Describe, in some detail, the process of policy decision-making by Cabinet 5. Comment on the power of the centre in the policy process Unit 4 Administrative Governance: The Challenge of Policy Implementation Unit 4 aims to develop your understanding of a range of issues related to policy implementation. The unit analyzes a variety of alternative policy instruments and explores the challenge of defining and achieving success in policy implementation. But, throughout the unit, an underlying theme will be the deeply political character of policy implementation. Because implementation has consequences for, among other things, the character and success of public policy, the commentary will stress the ways in which policy implementation is closely related to (and, conceptually, may overlap with) policy formation. Given the relationship between the political function of policy formation and the administrative role of policy implementation, it is not surprising that the readings selected for this unit come from textbooks designed for courses in both public administration and public policy. One of the three reading covers each of the three issues discussed in the commentary below: (1) the challenges of policy implementation, (2) the character of competing policy instruments, and (3) the nature of what has come to be known as alternative service delivery (ASD). Learning Objectives When you have completed Unit 4, you should be able to achieve the following learning objectives: 1. Contrast the various policy instruments that are available for policy implementation 2. Discuss the factors shaping the possibility of successful policy implementation 3. Explain and discuss the core ideas underpinning the current enthusiasm for ASD 4. List and comment on the service delivery mechanisms associated with ASD

Unit 5 The Role and Influence of Non-state Actors in Policy-making and Administrative Governance Unit 5 provides a conceptual and theoretical framework for understanding and studying the role and influence of non-state interests in the policy process. Non-state actors are involved in virtually every stage of the policy process, from agenda-setting to implementation. It is therefore essential that students of policy-making and administrative governance have a framework for examining the role and influence of such actors. There is an extensive literature on non-state interests in the policy process. Some studies focus on the relationship between business and government. Others focus on public interest groups, lobbying, or public consultations. Still others take the form of case studies of the development and implementation of particular public policies. The task of tackling such a vast and multifaceted field of study is beyond the scope of one course. Thus, the Unit 5 Commentary has three specific goals:

To introduce the conceptual framework of what is known as policy community and network analysis

To offer an opportunity to consider the challenges associated with inviting non-state actors into the policy process through democratic public consultations

To provide a theoretical framework for considering the role and influence of one set of particularly powerful non-state actors: that is, private-sector business interests

Learning Objectives When you have completed Unit 5, you should be able to achieve the following learning objectives: 1. Explain the concepts associated with policy community and policy network analysis 2. Distinguish between elite accommodation and democratic public consultation 3. Contrast competing theoretical perspectives on the power and influence of non-state actors in the policy process and discuss the challenges that face designers of democratic public consultations

4. Discuss Canadas approach to regulating and monitoring professional government lobbyists 5. Offer an explanation of the privileged position of private-sector business interests in the policy process 6. Discuss the historical trajectories of group and movement influence in Canadian politics Unit 6 Ethics in Administrative Governance: The Challenge of Ensuring Democratic Accountability in Public Administration Unit 6 provides an introduction to democratic accountability and ethics in government. While these issues were once of interest to few beyond scholars of political science and public administration, the scandal that erupted around Ad-scam in the final years of Jean Chrtiens tenure as prime minister riveted the Canadian public. In the elections of 2004 and 2006, the issue of ethics and accountability were central. Since then, a major piece of legislationthe Accountability Acthas been passed by Parliament. The readings assigned for Unit 6 were all written before the report of the Commission of Inquiry into Ad-scam. The authors do not address the details of that report or the subsequent Accountability Act. All the same, the issues addressed in those readings are directly relevant to these events. As such, the material covered in this unit will assist your understanding of the principle of democratic accountability and of the political controversies regarding ethics and accountability. Learning Objectives When you have completed Unit 6, you should be able to achieve the following learning objectives: 1. Analyze and discuss the nature of democratic accountability in a parliamentary democracy 2. Evaluate the potential impact of the NPM on democratic accountability 3. Outline the principles of and potential approaches to ensuring ethics in administrative governance

4. Contrast the viewpoints of competing theories of public bureaucracy on the issue of public-sector accountability Unit 7 Social Diversity and the Question of Difference in Policy-making and Administrative Governance Unit 7 provides a theoretical and practical appreciation of the consequences of social diversity for both administrative governance and policy-making. The commentary and readings will challenge you to think about the consequences of ignoring social diversity in the design and implementation of public policies. You are encouraged to think about issues like self-representation in the policy process and employment equity in staffing the public bureaucracy, and to do so from a perspective that goes beyond simply recognizing the extent of social diversity in Canadian society and that actually embraces difference. This is a perspective that is not common in policy studies, and is even less common in the field of public administration. In other fields of social and political scholarship, however, many of these ideas have gained considerable acceptance in recent years. Learning Objectives When you have completed Unit 7, you should be able to achieve the following learning objectives: 1. Comment on the significance of social diversity for how we approach public policymaking and administration 2. Explain why advocates of identity politics argue that self-representation (and authenticity of voice) is so important to democratic policy-making 3. Understand the rationale for and functioning of employment equity in the federal public service 4. Discuss the relationship between social diversity and the differential impact of public policy

Unit 8 Paradigms of Governance: Policy-making and Administrative Governance from the Administrative Welfare State to the Neo-liberal State Unit 8 presents another opportunity to explore current trends in policy-making and administrative governance. To ensure that the character of these trends is fully appreciated, the commentary and the assigned reading focus on contrasting the current neo-liberal paradigm of governance with the postwar governing paradigm of the administrative welfare state. This approach is meant to provide a more theoretically sophisticated and historically grounded appreciation of the character of public administration in the twenty-first century. While some of the analysis, and many of the specific facts in this unit will be new, the basic issues raised should be familiar from earlier units and their assigned readings. A short book has been selected to serve as the Unit 8 assigned reading. This is somewhat more demanding than the reading assignments of earlier units. But, because this unit completes our exploration of the central issues related to public policy and administrative governance, it is useful to tackle a significant reading that manages to bring together a number of important themes while also looking beyond public administration to a broad set of recent changes in ideology, theory, and governance. Learning Objectives When you have completed Unit 8, you should be able to achieve the following learning objectives: 1. Describe what is meant by the notion paradigm of governance and contrast the three governing paradigms that have had periods of hegemony over the course of Canadian history 2. Discuss the character of the administrative culture and state form associated with the postwar welfare state 3. Outline the core features of neo-liberal governance and explain the place of the NPM in this paradigm of governance 4. Comment in some detail on the recent transition from an administrative welfare state form to a neo-liberal state form

5. Provide an analysis and normative evaluation of the NPM