Het beleid inzake unieke regionale talen

Gearfetting
- What conclusions can be drawn with regard to the use of the research instrument
to be developed, as well with regard to the problem of making
comparisons?
Chapter 2 begins by defining the terms policy and policy-making. In this
study they involve, directly or indirectly, government policy regarding
language use, as well as the way in which the policy was created.
To be able to explain the policy-making process requires a reconstruction
of the interaction between the participating actors, in this case the central
government and the representatives of the related language group. To this
end there are three different approaches compared, which can be used to
analyse policy-making: the barrier model, the stream model and the rounds
models. On the basis of different arguments, it was decided to adapt and use
the rounds model.This model views policy-making as a series of decisions
taken by various actors in different rounds. In this process, a distinction is
made into different categories of actors. The adaption refers to explicit
attention to the historic dimension of the policy to be investigated, the
interactions between the actors involved and the further framework for
policy-making. The model developed can be characterised by the letters
BIC, which stand for Beleidsgeschiedenis (Policy history), Interaction and
Context. Along with the B and C, the content of I, the interaction process, is
further explicated with the advocacy coalition approach developed by
Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith. Utilised in this way is the concept of the
advocate coalition as the framework that the actors structure further. And
that applies likewise to the concept of policy-oriented learning, which puts
the focus on ‘relatively enduring alterations of thought or behavioural
intentions that result from experience and are concerned with the attainment
(or revision) of policy objectives’. Policy-oriented learning requires
attention to the changes in the policy of the other, of oneself and the tactical
and strategic considerations. Such changes are necessary to obtain policy
results. When anyone sticks to a standpoint, once taken, little progress will
be made in policy-making.
In the Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith approach, the chance of policy-oriented
learning, and the successful policy-making that goes with it, are made dependent
on three variables:
- The level of the oppositions among actors;
- The analytical tractability of the policy subject;
- The presence of a professional forum. To this, a fourth variable is added in
this study, namely:
- The continuity of the interaction.
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