Crosby B.C., Bryson J.M. - Leadership for the Common Good (2005)(en)

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practices. The council is also engaged in an effort to redesign markets generally, as through accounting and reporting methods that would assign costs to waste and pollution.

To take another example, the African American Men Project is itself a new institution with elaborate mechanisms for governance and oversight of initiatives. The project also aims to change major institutions, such as the public schools, city and county government, the court system, public libraries, radio and television programming, and the job market.

Exploring the Phases of the Change Cycle

Although ideas, stakeholders, and institutions are important throughout the policy change process, each phase offers particular challenges or opportunities for developing and refining policy ideas, analyzing and involving stakeholders, and altering institutions. Before describing each phase, we want to highlight the way the first three phases interact to produce public issues. The three phases together constitute issue creation, in which a public problem and at least one solution (with pros and cons from the standpoint of various stakeholders) gain a place on the public agenda. An issue is on the public agenda once it has become a subject of discussion among a broad cross-section of a community (of place or of interest). Typically, to gain a place on the agenda, policy entrepreneurs must help diverse stakeholder groups develop a new appreciation of the nature and importance of a problem and its potential solutions. Usually the three phases are highly interactive. Various agreements are struck, as problem formulations and solutions are tried out and assessed in an effort to push or block change. If policy entrepreneurs are unsuccessful in placing the issue on the public agenda, it remains a “nonissue” as far as the general community is concerned (Gaventa, 1980; Cobb and Ross, 1997).

Issues—linked problems and solutions—drive the political de- cision-making, or policy-making, process. Unfortunately, all too often in this process the real problems and the best solutions get lost (if ever they were “found”). Instead, a vaguely specified problem searches for possible policy options; policy advocates try to find a problem their solution might solve; and politicians seek both problems and solutions that might advance a career, further some

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group’s goals, or be in the public interest. Hence visionary leadership becomes particularly important during the process of issue creation. A good idea can give the issue momentum; it is a compelling way of defining or framing the problem and attendant solutions so that key stakeholders are convinced the issue can and must be addressed by policy makers.

Initial Agreement

The purpose of the first phase of the policy change cycle is to develop an understanding among an initial group of key decision makers or opinion leaders about the need to respond to an undesirable condition and develop a basic response strategy. Policy entrepreneurs may initiate this phase with a simple conversation or small meeting with people they think may share their concern or have helpful insights. An example is the conversation between Mark Stenglein and Gary Cunningham that would ultimately lead to the AAMP. Before long, though, policy entrepreneurs must expand the circle to include at least some key stakeholders—those most affected by the problem and those with crucial resources for resolving the problem. (Guidelines for deciding whom to involve and how are offered in Chapter Six.) Policy entrepreneurs need visionary leadership skills as they organize forums (face-to-face and virtual) in which key stakeholders (many of whom represent a group of stakeholders) can develop at least a preliminary shared understanding of the problem and why doing something about it is important, and possibly urgent. The policy entrepreneurs must also convince stakeholders that their participation is vital and is likely to lead to personal and societal benefits.

Policy entrepreneurs have to practice leadership in context; that is, they must examine the policy environment in order to decide whether the time is right to try to launch a change effort. Timing may not be everything, but if it is off then a change effort may have difficulty gaining momentum beyond a small group of people. Thus policy entrepreneurs stay alert for subtle signals of change and any more visible “focusing event” (such as a disaster, official report of a new threat, a scientific breakthrough, a journalistic exposé)—evidence that existing policy regimes are being questioned. Focusing events are also likely to attract media attention to the problem and thus may help policy entrepreneurs in-

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volve additional stakeholders in the initial agreement. A focusing event can contribute to a window of policy-making opportunity, in which public concern about a problem comes together with promising solutions and political shifts to make policy change possible (Kingdon, 1995). (For further discussion of focusing events and related phenomena, see Baumgartner and Jones, 1993.) In the AIDS case, for example, as physicians and public health workers fought to get the epidemic that was affecting gay men on the public agenda in the early 1980s, they were attuned to scattered reports of a similar disease among drug addicts, Haitian immigrants, and hemophiliacs. These reports activated some additional stakeholders but did not attract the media attention that such subsequent focusing events as candlelight marches and the death of Rock Hudson would receive.

The desired outcome of this phase is one or more initial agreements that can guide a developing group of change advocates as they proceed through the policy change process. At the very least, the group should agree on the purpose and worth of the effort and outline a plan for planning. The agreement should be recorded in some way so that it can be a reference for future work. Subsequent agreements are likely to be struck later in the change process as more stakeholders become involved, and as an array of possible problem definitions and solutions becomes clear.

Problem Formulation

In this phase, policy entrepreneurs organize additional forums to deepen shared understanding of the problem that concerns them and to set direction for the next phases. They take a diagnostic stance, gathering information about how the problem manifests itself and about likely causes of or contributors to the problem. Information gathering can happen through stakeholder consultation (such as the stakeholder dialogues sponsored by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development), action research (such as that conducted for the African American Men Project and the Vital Aging Network), or professional conferences (such as gatherings of AIDS researchers).

Attention to framing is especially important in this phase. Policy entrepreneurs ensure there are opportunities for stakeholders to consider how they and others are framing the problem. They

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also help potential supporters of change understand the power of framing (the ability of a problem frame to exclude some solutions and privilege others). Thus Hively and her colleagues in the Vital Aging Initiative explicitly attacked the framing of older adults as frail dependents, which can only lead to a solution search that focuses on services and social welfare policy. Instead, they insisted on framing older adults as diverse, productive citizens. This view directed the search for a solution toward programs of empowerment and elimination of barriers to employment. Additionally, policy entrepreneurs emphasize the power of broader, more complex frames to “open up the search for solutions” (Nutt, 2002, p. 112) and attract a wider array of stakeholders. For example, the AAMP began with a narrow employment frame: the problem was that young African American men did not have jobs. Soon, however, county commissioners and staff began to focus more broadly. Once the project steering committee was established, the members understood that the “current social and economic situation of many young African American men does not stem from a single cause, but from a multitude of interrelated ones” (Hennepin County, 2002, p. 2). The committee then decided to focus on housing, family structure, health, education, economic status, community and civic involvement, and criminal justice.

Attention to frames can also constrain a group’s habitual rush to a solution and help it think about the outcomes or objectives desired (Nutt, 2002; Nadler and Hibino, 1998). Chapter Seven includes exercises that can help a group identify its problem frames. Included is one adapted from Paul Nutt’s work that helps individuals move from solution preferences to objectives.

Problem framing also relates to what Frank Baumgartner and Bryan Jones call policy image, which combines empirical information and emotional appeal (Baumgartner and Jones, 1993). For example, framing older adults as frail dependents is likely to prompt attention to statistics about disease and longevity or health care costs; it rouses emotions of compassion and responsibility on the positive side, but quite likely pity and resentment on the negative side. Thus policy entrepreneurs should think about not just the solutions themselves that flow from a problem frame but also the nonrational responses that may suffuse the ensuing debate about the solutions.

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Policy entrepreneurs should also consider whether particular problem frames activate partisan agendas. In the United States, for example, using a government-failure frame (to explain something like the spread of the AIDS epidemic) activates long-standing disagreement between the Republican and Democratic parties about the amount and purpose of government expenditures.

Framing a problem as a crisis may also have unanticipated side effects. Stakeholders are certainly motivated to do something about the problem; reporters may begin covering it. At the same time, a crisis atmosphere can drive out thorough consideration of solutions. Journalists may even exacerbate the crisis as they seek out opposing views of what is causing the problem and thus promote controversy that sells newspapers or attracts viewers.

Search for Solutions

In this phase, policy entrepreneurs organize forums to consider solutions that might achieve the desired outcomes identified in the previous phase. In searching for solutions, forum participants can use three basic approaches: adapting solutions they know about, searching for solutions that exist but are not known to the group, and developing innovative solutions (Nutt, 2002). Organizers of the AAMP, for example, have developed a mentoring project called Brother Achievement (adapted from a program called Public Achievement) that coaches young people in citizenship.

Beyond identifying or developing solutions, the policy entrepreneurs also consider which solutions are likely to elicit interest and support from key stakeholders and the broader public. This analysis is helpful in placing the problem, and one or more promising solutions, on the public’s agenda, thus creating a public issue that can attract the attention of policy makers and other affected parties who will then influence the formulation, adoption, and implementation of specific policies. It may also be possible to place an issue on the policy makers’ agenda without gaining widespread public attention (Baumgartner and Jones, 1993). In the case of the AAMP, county commissioners were involved from the outset; thus the recommendations of the project steering committee were virtually ensured a place on the county board’s agenda. Of course, many of the recommendations would require action by other policy makers, so supporters of the project planned a variety of forums

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that would attract additional stakeholders as well as media coverage that would influence decision making by state legislators, school board members, corporate boards, nonprofit leaders, and foundation grant makers.

At the conclusion of this phase, a strong advocacy coalition should be developing. Members of the group accept a shared problem frame and support a set of related solutions that require action by a range of policy makers. The coalition is likely to include a formal advocacy group and outside supporters—journalists, elected officials, public administrators, party officials—who are not members of the formal group. Our definition of an advocacy coalition is more inclusive than the one offered by Paul Sabatier and Hank Jenkins-Smith, theirs being “an advocacy coalition consists of actors from a variety of public and private institutions at all levels of government who share a set of basic beliefs (policy goals plus causal and other perceptions) and who seek to manipulate the rules, budgets, and personnel of governmental institutions in order to achieve these goals over time” (1993, p. 5). We would include nonprofit and business organizations as well as governmental institutions as objects of the coalition’s effort.

Even though the emphasis in this phase is on solutions, the forums that explore solutions are also likely to spend time reconsidering problem definitions. More specific guidance about solution search strategies and coalition development is offered in Chapter Eight.

Policy or Plan Formulation

In this phase, policy entrepreneurs shift their focus from forums to arenas. Working with their advocacy coalition, they develop plans, programs, budgets, projects, decisions, and rules for review and adoption by policy-making arenas in the next phase. They attempt to design and redesign institutions (and, if the desired change is sweeping enough, entire policy regimes). Policy design must address real problems in a way that is technically and administratively feasible, politically and economically acceptable, and legally and ethically responsible (Benveniste, 1989; Kingdon, 1995). Further guidance about designing policies or plans is offered in Chapter Nine.

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When more than one arena might include the problem in its domain, policy entrepreneurs consider which arena is likely to look most favorably on their proposal—a process that Frank Baumgartner and Bryan Jones (1993) call “venue shopping.” Policy entrepreneurs often focus on arenas that are at multiple levels and in different realms. For example, the physicians fighting to stem the U.S. AIDS epidemic took their recommendations to local, state, and federal governments as well as to nonprofit and business arenas. Schmidheiny and his colleagues at WBCSD have focused on global and regional arenas as well. Attention to arenas may be phased, as when the initial focus in the AAMP was on the county board, which then funded further work that would include placing issues affecting African American men on other policy-making agendas. The Vital Aging Network focused initially on policy makers at the University of Minnesota and in state agencies or boards dealing with aging, but it soon sought grants from foundations and launched an educational program to help older adults press the state legislature for policy changes.

Bargaining and negotiation are common in this phase, but so is a collegial informality in which members of the advocacy coalition— elected officials, policy analysts, planners, and interest group advo- cates—try out alternative policies on one another, speak persuasively of the relative merits of their option, and engage in the give-and-take of a successful design session (Innes, 1996; N. C. Roberts, 1997). Policy entrepreneurs require political leadership skills, especially the skill of attending to the goals and concerns of all affected parties so as to build a coalition large and strong enough to secure adoption and implementation of a desired plan or proposal in subsequent phases.

The bargaining and negotiation, as well as the collegial give- and-take, of this phase are typically a somewhat behind-the-scenes preparation for the public battle to come in an arena. Policy entrepreneurs attempt to ensure that any proposal developed in this phase is of the kind that will survive the intense scrutiny and power plays expected in official policy-making meetings—espe- cially those that attract television and other press coverage. If a proposal has not reached the point at which official decision makers can comfortably say yes to it under the glare of klieg lights and

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the scrutiny of journalists, it will be tabled for further work or buried indefinitely.

As an advocacy group converges around specific structural changes (ideas, rules, modes, media, and methods), policy entrepreneurs help the group think about how these new structures enable some behaviors and restrain others. They also help the group anticipate various stratagems that opponents may employ in the next phase, such as attacking or undermining the group; defusing, downgrading, blurring, or redefining the issue; controlling the policy makers’ agenda; and strategic voting (Cobb and Elder, 1983; Riker, 1986).

Proposal Review and Adoption

In this phase, policy entrepreneurs call on their political leadership skills to persuade policy makers to adopt the policy or plan supported by their group. The first task is to place a proposed policy on the formal, or decision, agenda of the policy makers. The second is to engage in the bargaining, negotiation, and often compromise that characterize a policy-making arena without losing sight of policy objectives and alienating members of the advocacy coalition.

Crucial to policy adoption is what Guy Benveniste calls the “multiplier effect” (Benveniste, 1989, p. 27), which kicks in when stakeholders begin to perceive that a policy has a high probability of adoption. As this perception spreads, many stakeholders who were on the fence, or even against the proposed policy, join the supporting coalition. On the other hand, the same perception can cause opposition to harden if the opponents feel their fundamental beliefs or identity is threatened. A crisis may turn on the multiplier effect, changing perceptions about the costs and benefits of a proposed course of action. In the midst of crisis, advocates of change might be seen as system saviors, promising benefits to many, rather than as self-interested partisans whose proposed changes will benefit only themselves and place an undue burden on others (Wilson, 1967; Bryson, 1981).

Although implementation and evaluation are emphasized in the next phase, policy entrepreneurs should make sure that adopted policies are clear, workable, and politically acceptable to likely implementers. The new laws, regulations, or directives also should include an evaluation mechanism to help implementers en-

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sure that problems are actually being remedied by the new policy, program, or project, and to help the implementers make needed adjustments in the initial implementation plan.

In the case of the AAMP, for example, the county commissioners were persuaded to approve the steering committee’s recommendation for a permanent African American Men Commission that would include diverse stakeholders. The commission was to hammer out an action plan based on all the recommendations contained in the committee’s report. It was also charged with coordinating, facilitating, and monitoring the implementation process and with publishing periodic reports on “outcomes for young African American Men in Hennepin County” (Hennepin County, 2002, p. 75). The county board also approved $500,000 in seed money to provide staffing and other support for the commission.

If change advocates fail to have their proposal adopted in this phase, they have the option of cycling back through previous phases to improve the proposal, find a more politically acceptable solution, reframe the problem, and build a stronger coalition of support. Additional guidance about proposal adoption and review is in Chapter Ten.

Implementation and Evaluation

In this phase, policy entrepreneurs attempt to ensure that adopted solutions are incorporated throughout a system, and their effects assessed. Successful implementation doesn’t just happen. It requires careful planning and management; ongoing problem solving; and sufficient incentives and resources, including competent, committed people. The original leaders of the change effort may have to play new roles and allow new leaders to emerge.

The creation of the African American Men Commission attracted many additional supporters to the AAMP; in all, 130 people were appointed to the new group. The project staff organized twenty-six Saturday training sessions for all commissioners. Nine functional, or “domain,” committees plus an executive committee generate many leadership opportunities for the members. Additionally, county commissioners and Minneapolis city council members are ex-officio members of the executive committee.

The initial action plans developed by the commission established objectives for projects connected to each committee domain:

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fundraising, housing, family structure, health, education, economic status, community and civic involvement, criminal justice, and communications. The plans included numerous initiatives aimed at expanding the network of organizations working to improve the lives of African American men. Many were implemented almost immediately. For example, a major AAMP public conference, held just months after the county board approved the project’s continuation, attracted 650 participants. Several organizations also agreed to join the project’s Quality Partnerships Initiative, which brings together the AAMP, community nonprofits, faith-based organizations, and businesses to share information about their efforts to support African American men. By the time a year had elapsed from the appointment of the African American Men Commission, the AAMP was sponsoring a highly successful Day of Restoration, in which people who had piled up traffic violations could clear their records by paying fines or performing community service. The project also was preparing to launch Right Turn, which helps young men who have committed minor crimes create and implement an individual development plan.

Successful evaluation also does not just happen. Like implementation, it must be planned and supported if it is to inform judgment about program performance. Policy entrepreneurs need to keep in mind two contrasting purposes of evaluation. One is accountability to policy makers and other stakeholders, ensuring that a program or project is fulfilling policy makers’ intentions and benefiting stakeholders. The second is improvement of a program or project as it is developing. Thus the Vital Aging Network’s Advocacy Leadership Certificate Program includes assessment of participant learning and civic impact. Results are used to improve future renditions of the program and inform supporting organizations about the impact of their investment. Assessment of participant learning, with its focus on program improvement, is mainly what evaluation experts call “formative evaluation,” and assessment of civic impact, with its focus on program results, is mainly “summative evaluation” (Patton, 1997, p. 76).

Policy entrepreneurs should beware of making evaluation so cumbersome that it hinders program development. They also need to strike a balance in deciding on the timing of evaluations. On the