Public Policy

Public policy is created from a wide range of different people. Actors, interests of different people, institutions, and a variety of processes for policies. Our students should know that the bureaucracy and the courts are all stages in the policy process. Also, students should investigate on policy and issue networks of the domestic and foreign policy areas. 

It is when the government decides to resolve a social problem that a public policy is made. There are five steps that are taken to make a public policy: 1) defining the role of government; 2) agenda setting; 3) policy formulation; 4) policy implementation; and 5) policy evaluation. In American history, the most important area in public policy has been economic policy. Our policy makers have always been debating on which idea they should support, laissez-faire free market principles or redistributionist interventionist policies. Laissez-faire free market principles are believing that the government should intervene as little as possible in the direction of economic affairs. Also, the United States has joined international trading organisations like the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). We had done that in order to raise our business with the rest of the world. It was before FDR that our federal government did not want to be a part of domestic policy making. But since we have gotten involved in domestic policies we have seen a rise in programs like Social Security and Welfare.