The importance of analysis in public policy

There was an important article by Mel Cappe, former Clerk of the Privy Council about the importance of analysis in public policy. it also goes with the article I referred to Wednesday about Cass Sunstein (Link here), which talks about how Sunstein imagines the possibility of really making a difference in people lives through the design of "choice architecture".

I thought this line from Mel Cappe's piece was good and important:


The importance of ideas and analysis has never been greater. How should we present complex issues for elected officials, mere mortals all, to come to grips with? Simplification can be trivializing, and it misses the subtlety in both challenges and solutions. The answer lies in building evidence and expertise into the process.


It's not always easy to understand what kind of expertise is needed in public policy, or within government. In most cases you don't need a PhD in an area to understand the basic mechanics and problems at hand and even come up with solutions. On the other hand, I'm not convinced that politicians should be overriding a nuclear safety commission, (at least on a regular basis) without at least some good analysis.


He also points to the big challenge underlying the current situation in the public service:

Even with robust supply, however, there is inadequate demand. Ministers should be demandeurs of public-service expertise, requesting analysis and evidence, options and alternatives. But who needs evidence and expertise when you have ideology?

There are serious questions however about the role of the public service in providing advice, given the multitude of sources available to everyone. What is the role of in-house experts when you can find a ton of information a simple google search away? This is easier in some areas to justify than in others. I believe that there needs to be some serious thinking about how the public service policy function is exercised, and a rethink of its role.

This points to two separate questions. One is how the policy function is carried out, how it is organized. You could call this the plumbing and mechanics. The second is more about the role. You could call this the what, or the substance. I think the rising nature of horizontal challenges, and also problems which ignore disciplinary boundaries point to the need for better collaboration, where teams of people with different expertise can come together and really think a problem through. This is needed to break down silos. Even if such exercises were merely to identify issues and challenges rather than implement solutions they would be welcome and useful.

It's interesting to read David Brooks, because he's obviously someone who is quite intelligent, but it is frustrating to see him denigrate people who have expertise. While he might argue that he's disparaging the "certainty" that bureaucrats or technocrats have in their analysis, it often comes across as bashing expertise. This is the external challenge, people are increasingly skeptical of expertise, and lord knows there are a litany of failures in forecasting, and in dealing with problems. The alternative can't be ignorance or ideology, which won't help explain real problems so that we can do better.

This faith that government has a role to play and also that analysis is important appears in some ways to be what differentiates those who believe the in the "liberal" or welfare state from conservatives and libertarians. I'm not sure I would frame it quit the same way, but this article points to the difference between the liberal state and the watchman state.

In my estimation even a limited state, would be better prepared in the areas it did intervene if it had good analysis and a good sense of what it is trying to achieve.