Vanderbilt University
Human and Organizational Development
Class Number 2700
Spring 2016
Public Policy
William R. Doyle
Office: 207D Payne
Office Hours: Mondays and Wednesdays, 2-4 or by appointment
w.doyle@vanderbilt.edu
Phone (615) 322-2904
This class is about big problems. There are problems that we all face that are too big to be
solved by individuals working alone or even small groups of people working together. Failure to
deal with these problems will make life worse for everyone.
Our solutions to these problems—like people hurting or killing one another, or making sure
that everyone has enough money to live, or ensuring that people have good health or good
education—constitute public policy. The nature of public policy is that it must be carried out
by government. This makes public policy an inherently political process. Public policy is also
a technical process in that some solutions to problems work better than others. The goal for
this class is to understand both the political side of public policy—how governments come up
with solutions to problems— and the technical side of public policy—which solutions seem to
work best for which problems. All policy solutions involve both political and technical tradeoffs.
This means that not everyone will like every policy solution. It also means that a given policy
solution won’t solve every aspect of a given problem.
The course is organized as follows. In the first half the class we’ll study how societies choose
which problems to deal with and the way that solutions are identified. This half of the course
defines the context for policymaking, lays out what policies are, how they are created, and how
they are implemented and evaluated. The other half of the course requires students to apply
what was learned to three contemporary issues in public policymaking: murders in the city of
Chicago, the lack of water in California, and the 11 million people living in the United States
without legal status. For each issue, we will discuss some specific policies in specific contexts
and seek to better understand the process of policy creation, implementation and evaluation
for that area.
Evaluation
Students’ performance will be evaluated according to the following criteria:
Participation: 100 points (10 percent of final grade)
Quizzes: 100 points (15 percent of final grade)
Policy Memos (3 total): 100 points (25 percent)
Midterm: 100 points (25 percent)
Final Exam: 100 points (25 percent)
Honor Code
All assignments for this class, including quizzes, policy memos, midterm, and final are to be
conducted under the obligations set out in Vanderbilt’s Honor Code. Please click to review the
honor code.
Participation
Each students’ active participation in reading and classroom discussions is vital. The grade in
participation will be determined by the student’s active participation in the class. There are
many ways to participate, including active listening. Participation will be graded on a 100 point
scale.
Quizzes
To ensure students remain current with the readings, online quizzes will be assigned. These
quizzes are open book, open notes and are to be completed by individual students working
alone prior to the class for that day. The quiz will cover all of the readings assigned for the week.
Performance on these quizzes will count for one half of the quiz grade. These quizzes can only
be taken once.
In addition to the online quizzes, four in-class quizzes will be distributed to students during
selected class meetings during the semester. The dates of these quizzes will not be announced
in advance. The quizzes will be closed-book, closed notes and will consist of several short answer questions that can be finished in a few minutes by students who have completed the readings for the week. In-class quizzes will count for the remaining half of the quiz grade.
Policy Memos
During the course of the class, we will extensively examine three different policy areas. For each
policy area, students will be asked to complete an assignment that I describe as a policy memo.
This assignment will vary depending on the policy area. Each one of these assignments will be
graded on a 100 pt scale, with evaluation based both on the written assignment and in-class
presentations. Students will be randomly assigned to present one of their policy memos to the
class.
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Midterm
A midterm based on the readings will be given in class on February 25. The exam will be closed
book, closed notes and will consist of several essay questions. The midterm will be graded on a
100 pt scale.
Final
The final exam will cover all of the materials from the course. It will consist of several essay
questions. The final will be graded on a 100 point scale.
Grading Scale
The following scale will be used for grading:
• A: 93-100
• A-:90-92
• B+: 87-89
• B: 83-86
• B-: 80-82
• C+: 77-79
• C: 73-76
• C-: 70-72
• D+: 67-69
• D: 63-66
• D-: 60-62
• F: 59 and below
Communication
My office is in 207D Payne, and my phone number is (615) 322-2904. Please always feel free to
stop by during office hours (Mondays and Wednesdays 2-4) or to call. If my office hours don’t
work for you, please make an appointment. Student communications, including emails are my
priority. However, due to the volume of email I receive, I may miss your message. To help with
this problem, please place the phrase “HOD 2700” in your subject line. I will search for these
messages every time I log on. You can also use OAK’s email function, which will automatically
do this for you.
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Schedule
Note: Items with an “Online” tag can be linked to directly from this syllabus by clicking on the
Online link. Items with a * are available in the “Readings” section of our OAK webpage
January 11
Introduction
January 13
Contexts of Policymaking: Foundational Readings
Declaration of Independence Online
Constitution of the United States Online
Bill of Rights Online
Amendments to the Constitution Online
Read the Fourteenth Amendment closely
Federalist Papers # 10 Online
Federalist Papers # 51 Online
Complete online quiz before class
January 18
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day: no class.
January 20
Defining Public Policy
Lowi, T. J. (1964). American business, public policy, case studies and political theory. World
Politics, (16):677–715 Online
Complete online quiz before class
January 25
Group Theories: Pluralism
*Dahl “With the Consent of All”
*Samuel Bowles and H. Gintis, “Democracy and Capitalism”
*Milton Friedman, “Capitalism and Freedom”
Complete online quiz before class
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January 27
Rational Choice Thoery
*Downs: Introduction and Chapter 1, An Economic Theory of Democracy
*Mayhew Congress: The Electoral Connection pp. 11-33, 49-73
Complete online quiz before class
February 1
The Collective Action Problem
Ostrom, E. (2009) Beyond Markets and States: Polycentric Governance of Complex Economic Systems. Nobel Prize Lecture, available: Online.
Complete online quiz before class
February 3
Agenda Setting
*Kingdon “Agenda Setting”
*R. Cobb and C. Elder, “Issues and Agendas”
Complete online quiz before class
February 8
Policy Diffusion
Mintrom, M. and Vergari, S. (1998). Policy Networks and Innovation Diffusion: The Case of
State Education Reforms. The Journal of Politics, 60(01):126–148 Online
Complete online quiz before class
February 10
Social Construction
Schneider, A. and Ingram, H. (1993). Social construction of target populations- implications
for politics and policy. American Political Science Review, 87(2):334–347 Online
*Stone “Introduction” and “Market and Polis”
Complete online quiz before class
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February 15
Policy Adoption
Schneider, J. (2008)“House and Senate Rules of Procedures: A Comparison” Online
Mann, T. E. and Ornstein, N. J. (2012). It’s Even Worse Than It Looks: How the American
Constitutional System Collided With the New Politics of Extremism. Basic Books
Introduction, Chapters 1 and 7
Complete online quiz before class
February 17
Budgeting
Levitt, M. R. (2014). The federal budget: Issues for FY 2016 and beyond. Technical report,
Congressional Research Service, Washington, DC Online
Congressional Budget Office “An Update to the Budget and Economic Outlook: 2015-2025”
Online
Focus on Chapter 1
Complete online quiz before class
February 22
Policy Implementation
Kerr, S. (1995). On the folly of rewarding a while hoping for b. The Academy of Management
Executive, 9(1):7–14 Online
Brodkin, E. Z. (2011). Policy work: Street-level organizations under new managerialism.
Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 21:i253–i277 Online
Complete online quiz before class
February 24
Policy Evaluation
Ludwig, J., Kling, J. R., and Mullainathan, S. (2011). Mechanism Experiments and Policy
Evaluations. The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 25(3):17–38 Online
Kowalski, A. E. (2014). The early impact of the affordable care act state-by-state. Technical
Report 20597, National Bureau of Economic Research Online
February 29
Review
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March 2
Midterm Exam, in Class
March 7 and March 9
Spring Break
March 14
Policy Topic 1: Murders in Chicago
General Resource:
University of Chicago Crime Lab Online.
Read all subsections under key crime policy findings.
Also worth seeing is Jens Ludwig’s lecture: Online
Complete online quiz before class
March 16
Policy Research Session
March 21
Presentations: Murders in Chicago
March 23
Presentations: Murders in Chicago
March 28
Policy Topic 2: Water in California
Key Resource: Public Policy Institute of California, Climate Change/Energy Area
Online
Hanak, E., Frank, R., Howitt, R., Lund, J., and Szeptycki, L. (2015a). Allocating California’s
Water Online
Hanak, E., Mount, J., Chappelle, C., Lund, J., Medellín-Azuara, J., Moyle, P., and Seavy, N.
(2015b). What If California’s Drought Continues? RENEWABLE RESOURCES, 29(4):16 Online
Complete online quiz before class
March 30
Policy Research Session
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April 4
Presentations: Water in California
April 6
Presentations: Water in California
April 11
Policy Topic 3: Federal Immigration Policy
Complete online quiz before class
April 13
Policy Research Session
April 18
Presentations: Federal Immigration Policy
April 20
Presentations: Federal Immigration Policy
April 25
Review
Final Exam April 27
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