- Department: Social Policy and Social Work
- Module co-ordinator: Dr. Daniel Horsfall
- Credit value: 30 credits
- Credit level: I
- Academic year of delivery: 2022-23
- See module specification for other years: 2021-22
Occurrence | Teaching period |
---|---|
A | Autumn Term 2022-23 to Summer Term 2022-23 |
Task | Length | % of module mark |
---|---|---|
Essay/coursework Essay |
N/A | 33 |
Essay/coursework Policy Report |
N/A | 33 |
Essay/coursework Workshop Report |
N/A | 34 |
None
Task | Length | % of module mark |
---|---|---|
Essay/coursework Reassessment Essay |
N/A | 100 |
Information currently unavailable
The key text for this course is Hudson, J and Lowe, S (2009) Understanding the Policy Process: Analysing Welfare Policy & Practice. It contains a chapter relating to each of the weekly lectures and we recommend that you read the whole of this book during the course of the module.
In addition to this, Bochel, C and Bochel, H (2003) The UK Social Policy Process offers a useful overview of the British case and Parsons, W (1996) Public Policy: An Introduction to the Theory and Practice of Policy Analysis offers a comprehensive overview of key theoretical perspectives in the field. Spicker, P (2006) Policy Analysis for Practice: Applying Social Policy provides a more applied perspective that looks at how governments analyse policies.
There are several other very good books which you should read or dip into ad lib. Brian Hogwood and Lewis Gunns Policy Analysis for the Real World is a well-established text, rather dated but an example of a scholarly text which has stood the test of time. They argue inter alia that it is difficult to establish new policy because of the clutter that already exists. Michael Hills The Public Policy Process is accompanied by a Reader which contains some very useful articles and extracts from seminal papers, some of which are required reading; The Policy Process: A Reader (2nd edition). Three texts that explore some of the core conceptual and theoretical dimensions of the literature are Considines Making Public Policy, Colebatchs Policy and Johns Analysing Public Policy. Doreys Policy Making in Britain: an Introduction provides a basic overview of the core actors and institutions involved in making policy in the UK.
There are several specialist journals in the library. The most useful for our purpose are Policy and Politics; Political Quarterly; Journal of Public Policy; Journal of Social Policy; Public Administration; Public Policy and Administration; Governance; Social Policy & Administration; Social Policy & Society; and Policy Studies. The Social Policy sub-fields all have their journals and these should be familiar to you (e.g. in Housing Policy the best academic journal is Housing Studies and the Shelter magazine Roof contains useful and up-to-date information and comment on latest developments). They are referenced as appropriate under each lecture or in the workshop information.