UNDERSTANDING THE POLICY PROCESS: Analysing Welfare Policy and Practice

This book draws on the latest and best social science to explain how and why policy change occurs.

Focusing on the policy-making process as the key to change, it uses core concepts of policy analysis, one in each chapter, to build up a fully worked explanation of policy change, and to equip readers with knowledge that can be applied to any aspect of welfare policy and public and social policy more generally.

“Understanding the Policy Process: ”

* introduces the main themes of the policy analysis literature;

* demonstrates the centrality of the policy-making process to an understanding of the operational possibilities and limits of social policy;

* takes account of macro-, meso- and micro-level approaches to social policy analysis;

* uses clear explanations of key concepts, up-to-date illustrative case studies and examples to increase students’ understanding of the theory and practice of policy analysis;

* is comparative in approach.

This highly informative text is aimed at students of applied social science courses, their teachers, and those in social policy and politics departments in particular. Students who read it will understand the policy process more clearly, not just in theory but also in practice.

John Hudson, Lecturer in Social Policy and Stuart Lowe, Senior Lecturer in Social Policy, are both political scientists who teach and research in the Department of Social Policy and Social Work at the University of York, UK.