A Practical Guide for Policy Analysis: The Eightfold Path to More Effective Problem Solving

Just when you thought a great book couldn’t get any better, Eugene Bardach improves his "gem" of a handbook. Presenting dozens of concrete tips, interesting case studies, and step-by-step strategies for the budding analyst as well as the seasoned professional, Bardach’s eightfold approach encapsulates more than 20 years of teaching and guiding students towards effective, accurate, and persuasive policy analysis.

Some of the enhancements to this edition?

• A separate appendix that provides sample questions for policy analysts to ask about public and nonprofit institutions in order to aid their analysis and implementation.
• New attention to troubleshooting problems―how to avoid linguistic pitfalls, confusing "alternatives" and "criteria," and projecting outcomes that lead to design problems.
• Expanded coverage of cost-effectiveness analysis (including a new excerpt from a RAND Corporation report).
• Explanation of evidence and justification, as well as additional semantic tips in the appendices

Readers will also find a sample document of real world policy analysis, a primer in how to "talk the talk" of policy analysis, and a cheat sheet of strategies for solving a host of policy problems.

Eugene Bardach has been teaching graduate-level policy analysis workshop classes since 1973 at the Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley, in which time he has coached some five hundred projects. He is a broadly based political scientist with wide-ranging teaching and research interests. His focus is primarily on policy implementation and public management, and most recently on problems of facilitating better interorganizational collaboration in service delivery (e.g., in human services, environmental enforcement, fire prevention, and habitat preservation). He also maintains an interest in problems of homeland defense, as well as regulatory program design and execution, particularly in areas of health, safety, consumer protection, and equal opportunity. Bardach has developed novel teaching methods and materials at Berkeley, has directed and taught in residentially based training programs for higher-level public managers, and has worked for the Office of Policy Analysis at the US Department of the Interior. He is the recipient of the 1998 Donald T. Campbell Award of the Policy Studies Organization for creative contribution to the methodology of policy analysis, and is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. This book is based on his experience teaching students the principles of policy analysis and then helping them to execute their project work.