May and Jochim (2013)

Policy Regime Perspectives: Policies, Politics, and Governing

Regime perspectives help understand how and with what effect policies lead to feedback processes that shape policy legitimacy,
coherence, and durability.
Public policies create winners and losers, as some people profit while others don’t. Also they create feedback processes that affect
political participation and future policy demands.

Policymaking is a political enterprise. Herein policies are the “currency for governing” in democratic systems. This
shows that governing is more than just enacting policies and “watching the chips fall as they may”. Therefore we need
to understand policies better. The regime perspectives lens provides a basis for understanding and helps improve
theories about policy processes.

Policy Regimes as Governing Arrangements

Policy regimes are the governing arrangements for addressing policy problems. Governing arrangements can be broadly
constructed to include institutional arrangements, interest alignments, and shared ideas. The policy regime lens starts
with a particular set or problems (not a policy) e.g. crime, environmental harms, illegal immigration, terrorism… and
tries to show the ideas, institutional arrangements ant interest behind the government arrangements for handling the
problem. This means that the breadth of the regime depends on the boundaries when conceptualizing the problem, thus
how the problem is framed. Starting with problems, (not the policies,) allows to consider how laws, rules, and
administrative actions that make up relevant governing arrangements are combined.

Policy regimes and feedback

Feedback effects are mediated by how core ideas behind policies are perceived (thus their framing), experiences with
the institutions that deliver the policies, and the images presented by the interests against or for the policies.
Policy feedback can enhance policymaking and implementation by reducing conflict over policy ideas. This happens by
mobilizing key supporters and undermining potential opponents. Feedback effects have the potential to deeply influence
politics.

1. Policy Legitimacy
This means that the governed accept the goals and approach for resolving problems. It means that the commitments
made by political actors are appropriate and just. Thus when the governed (the people) see the commitments as right,
they accept them, creating legitimacy.
P1: Stronger policy regimes foster greater levels of policy legitimacy.

2. Policy Coherence
Policy coherence can be seen as the consistency of actions in addressing a given set of policy problems or target groups.
It gets stronger via a common sense of purpose. This is enhanced by a powerful rationale (a convincing story behind the
policy), institutional structures that work together, and interest support that provides a constituency for consistent
actions in addressing problems. Thus the connectedness of actions is very important.
P2: Stronger policy regimes foster greater policy coherence.

3. Policy Durability
Durability of policy can be thought of as the sustainability of political commitments over time.
P3: Stronger policy regimes are more durable, but few are invariant to disruptive forces.

Depicting and Analysing Policy Regimes

There are three forces that make up a regime: ideas, institutional arrangements, and interests.
See table p. 434!

1. Ideas: The Glue of a Policy Regime

Ideas serve as ‘the currency for debate’ about political commitments as policymakers embrace particular ideas as
foundations for policy. Ideas are important because they provide direction for governing and serve as organizing
principles and governing principles.

2. Institutional Arrangements: Structure-Induced Cohesion

Institutional arrangements structure authority, attention, information flows, and relationships in addressing policy
problems. The institutional design may establish related mechanisms for collaborative governance e.g. oversight
entities, designated categories of representation of interests for oversight, specified public engagement mechanisms, and
shared management structures. A key challenge for depicting policy regimes is capturing both the formal and informal
aspects. I did not fully understand this part myself, so please feel free to add and adapt anything

3. Interests: Governing Capacity

Interest support helps to establish the governing capacity of a regime. New regimes are sustained by the embracement
of organizing ideas by new coalitions of political actors. Experience with policies can lead to interest-based backlash.
This can dissipate or destroy the energy behind a regime.
Sometimes policy options are fashioned in what appears to be apolitical environments for which publics surrounding
issues are neither extensive nor a source of major conflict

Identifying and Studying Regimes

The regime lens has a different vision on policy: it focuses on the governing arrangements for dealing with the problem,
not the policies. Therefore the strength of each element is important. The lens helps to unpack the role of policy
feedback effects that are put in place by different governing arrangements and how those in turn affect policy
legitimacy, coherence, and durability.

Conclusion
Policy regimes are constructs that depict the constellation of ideas, institutional arrangements, and interests that make
up the governing arrangements for addressing particular problems. The regime lens can be used to construct a
conceptual map that considers the relevant political forces involved in addressing a given problem—the contours of a
policy regime. In doing so, one starts with a particular set of problems and works to identify the components of the
policy regime.
The regime lens incorporates the interplay of policy and politics in shaping the realities of responses to problems and in
propelling responses to those realities. The use of regime perspectives helps to understand the interplay of policy and
politics in governing.

Please feel free to adapt and add anything, good luck studying!