Australian Politics and Policy - Senior, 2019a

Australian Politics and Policy
Implementation failure
Implementation failure can occur anywhere along the policy value chain and can
be caused by any combination of:
• inadequate research, design and planning
• poor co-ordination and inadequate consultation with stakeholders
• insufficient resourcing and capacity constraints
• legislative and regulatory gaps
• proceeding too quickly and/or failure to ‘pilot’
• failure to anticipate and/or effectively manage risks
• ineffective governance and/or administrative architecture
• multiple and/or incompatible policy goals.
Implementation failure entails significant costs in terms of finite resources (such
as money, labour and time), reputation and trust. These include a failure to realise
intended policy aims; loss of public confidence; costs of restoration, rectification
or redress; costs arising from bringing failed programs to a premature end; lost
opportunities (opportunity costs); and, for governments, loss of political capital
(with potential electoral consequences). It is important to recall that policy making
is, and remains, inherently ‘political’ and that ‘policy success’ will always be a
contested assessment. Indeed, it might be said that ‘failure’ has been ‘weaponised’
in Australia’s contemporary political culture.
Conclusions
In this chapter we have attempted to introduce readers to a spectrum of ideas about
the nature, formulation and ‘craft’ of policy making. In so doing, we have tried to:
• acquaint readers with the major theoretical approaches to understanding the
policy process
• equip readers to more effectively understand past and present policy debates
• enable readers to interrogate the processes of policy development, implementation
and evaluation.
Policy design and implementation is a complex and imperfect process that is
often seen as more of a ‘craft’ than a formal discipline. Policy professionals tend to
‘learn on the job’, and even those who have formal qualifications in public policy
or exposure to the academic study of policy often find that the pragmatic reality of
policy making aligns poorly with policy theory.
The Australian policy cycle and the policy value chain offer sound practical
templates for policy design and evaluation. Unfortunately, as will be attested by
many policy professionals working within government, ‘policy craft’ is seldom
conducted in full accordance with such orderly, rational models.
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