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Policy science, particularly the policy network approach, is teeming with new studies and concepts. This abundance has resulted from the inescapably multidisciplinary approach of policy science and from our ambition to surpass traditional policy analysis. The field's concepts are developing so rapidly, however, that new hybrids and mutations threaten us with confusion and overcomplication rather than providing us with clarity, and cumulative improvement and theory development are thus hampered. These unintended consequences are intimately associated with errors of conceptual stretching, that is, using valuable concepts with clear meaning to refer to inapplicable phenomena, thus misusing and diminishing the value of our conceptual tools. In policy science, this is also the case with central analytic tools, frameworks, models, and theories. Therefore, although policy making can be messy, if we hope to escape the alleged impasse in policy science, we cannot afford to tolerate the current inaccuracies of conceptual stretching.Related Articles

Raile, Eric D.,
Amber N. W. Raile,
Charles T. Salmon, and
Lori Ann Post. 2014. "." Politics & Policy 42 (): 103‐130. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/polp.12063/full


Shanahan, Elizabeth A.,
Mark K. McBeth, and
Paul L. Hathaway. 2011. "." Politics & Policy 39 (): 373‐400. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1747-1346.2011.00295.x/full


Gruber, Lloyd. 2013. "." Politics & Policy 41 (): 723‐764. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/polp.12034/full

Review of Krantz Lindgren, Petra: Att färdas som man lär? : om miljömedvetenhet och bilåkande. 2001 ; Godkänd; 2002; 20080310 (ysko)

An important task for policy evaluation is to develop methods that are based on the fact that political power is fragmented and that every policy area is complex. This article demonstrates, using an empirical example, how different strands of the policymaking process are related to different logics of evaluation. Also discussed is how these differences may result in quite opposite conclusions about the possible failure or success of single programmes. However, it is concluded that policy research does not have to abandon the idea of rationality and adopt a more postmodern or hermeneutic line of analysis. Policy evaluation is still, it is argued, a matter of finding relevant units of analysis, and in contemporary society these units are networks rather than political–administrative entities. Thus, in order to be able to scrutinize and understand such processes of policy creation, policy evaluation must adopt a non-hierarchical attitude and this requires a bottom-up methodology.

This paper described the institutional functioning of commonly owned forests in Sweden. A total of 33 common forests were designated in 1861 and have been regulated by the same legislation ever since. Shares in the commons were determined by shares in local arable land and benefits to shareholders have included cash payments, private subsidies and local infrastructure. The common forests have competed successfully in timber production with large-scale timber companies, which the author ascribed to their low transaction costs. They also scored highly on three of five criteria of institutional performance. Overall, their success might be due to their efficient integration into, rather than separation from, the formal economy. ; Godkänd; 1997; 20070125 (ysko)

Contemporary western societies can be described as negotiated economies, as multi-actor societies with fuzzy borders between public and private organizations and institutions. In this article it is argued that if we aim at understanding the processes of policy-making, we have to start our investigations from a point where we do not unreflectively assume that political administrative hierarchy prevails. The relevance of formal political institutions has to be proved, not taken for granted. Adopting a naive `stage-model' of the policy-making process, however, may lead to anticipating reality, or replacing empirical findings with political administrative norms. This is due not only to the history of political science, with its focus on formal institutions, but also to the fact that hierarchy is a human way of simplifying a complex environment. The implementation structure approach is suggested as an alternative methodological device for conducting a nonhierarchical implementation analysis to circumvent this problem. The approach provides a fruitful point of departure for a broad discussion of alternative ways of achieving constitutional order in society.

The survival of the commons is closely associated with the potential to find ways to strengthen contemporary management systems, making them more responsive to a number of complexities, like the dynamics of ecosystems and related, but often fragmented, institutions. A discussion on the desirability of finding ways to establish so-called cross-scale linkages has recently been vitalised in the literature. In the same vein, concepts like adaptive management, co-management and adaptive co-management have been discussed. In essence, these ways of organizing management incorporate an implicit assumption about the establishment of social networks and is more closely related to network governance and social network theory, than to political administrative hierarchy. However, so far, attempts to incorporate social network analysis (SNA) in this literature have been rather few, and not particularly elaborate. In this paper, a framework for such an approach will be presented. The framework provides an analytical skeleton for the understanding of joint management and the establishment of cross-scale linkages. The relationships between structural network properties - like density, centrality and heterogeneity - and innovation in adaptive co-management systems are highlighted as important to consider when crafting institutions for natural resource management. The paper makes a theoretical and methodological contribution to the understanding of co-management, and thereby to the survival of the commons. ; Validerad; 2008; 20071105 (annica_s)