Actors and Institutions: Assessing the Policy Capabilities of States

ARTICLE CRITIQUE
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(February 07, 2013)
Governments use policies to satisfy certain needs and wants of it citizens. The se needs can not be satisfied individually and this calls for a collective action to serve. The policy process has key aspects that underlie the making of public policy in general. The public policy is made by actors and institutions which play a role in policy making. The policy actors are individual and groups which influence the creation and implementation of public issues by exerting pressure on the process. The main actors reside within the state from the major characteristics of the state organization. The potential of reforming various systems lies on the context of the institution where the system thrives. Policy subsystems where policies are made are forums where discussions regarding issues affecting the state are debated. The forum persuades, and negotiates in pursuit of their interest as they try to modify objective in return for a concession. The interactions are institutional arrangements surrounding policy process affects how actors pursue their interest and the extent to which their effort succeeds.
Policy actors are classified into elected officials, interest groups, research organizations and the mass media. These actors together form the principle elements of policy subsystem in which members are drawn. Institutions on the other hand are organizations of the state, society and the international system, which shape actors behavior through the actors’ perception of their interest. This affects the probability of their realization as they constraints some choices and facilitate others (Theodoulou & Cahn, 1995). Some institutional arrangements have been perceived to be conducive in affecting policy making and implementation than others. There is no way that particular institutions can be avoided, modified or replaced without considerable effort. Therefore the actors and institutions contribute largely in policy process as their institutional factors shape the uncouth policy process participated by groups, individuals, and the state for their own interests. There is no particular technique that it can be predicted in advance, which actor or institution is more important at a particular moment, since they have comparative significance in specific state of affairs.
The most dominant approach in the analysis of public policy is the neo-institutionalism that acknowledges the critical role of institution in political life. The institutions have been designed by humans as a result of their purposive actions by instrumentally oriented individuals. The neo-institutionalism in the political sphere has made institutions to be significant as they constitute and legitimize the political actors through providing consistent behavioral rules, reality concepts, assessment standards, and endowments to capacity of purposeful actions (Howlett & Ramesh, 1995). The institutions ...