MGT270. Principles of Public Sector Management

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2015 University of Management and Technology

MGT 270. Principles of Public Sector Management

Assignment 4

One of the best known statements of public policy is contained in the 1968 article written by Garrett Hardin, titled The Tragedy of the Commons. Hardin – who was a genetic biologist – was gravely concerned that unchecked population growth would follow Malthus’s predictions and lead to a host of problems, including reduced well-being of people on a per capita basis, unacceptable levels of pollution, general food shortages, over-fishing of the world’s fish stocks, and other problems of this nature. From the perspective of the 21st century, most of Hardin’s concerns have become real. We are now plagued with global warming, large-scale epidemics (e.g., SARS, bird flu), mass starvation, depletion of fish stocks, tainted food, deforestation, growing extinctions of species, etc. With the increasing affluence of China and India, with a combined population of more than 2.3 billion people, increased environmental degradation and shortages of materials, fuel, and food will be exacerbated.

Answer the following questions after reading Hardin’s article (http://www.garretthardinsociety.org/articles/art_tragedy_of_the_commons.html” http://www.garretthardinsociety.org/articles/art_tragedy_of_the_commons.html ):

Exactly what is the tragedy of the commons? What are its consequences? (One half page to one full page response, single spaced.)
This article is recognized to be a high-impact public policy statement. But it was written by a biologist and not a government panel or politician. So in what sense is this a public policy statement? (One half page to one full page response, single spaced.)
In Thomas A. Birkland’s book, An Introduction to the Policy Process, the author identifies five elements of a policy design:
Element

Questions to Ask

The goals of the policy

What are the goals of the policy? To eliminate a problem? To alleviate a problem but not entirely eliminate it? To keep a problem from getting worse?

The causal model

What is the causal model? Do we know that, if we do X, Y will result? How do we know this? If we don’t know, how can we find out?

The tools of the policy

What tools or instruments will be used to put the policy into effect? Will they be more or less coercive? Will they rely more on incentives, persuasion, or information? Capacity building?

The targets of the policy

Whose behavior is supposed to change? Are their direct and indirect targets? Are design choices predicated on our social construction of the target population?

The implementation of the policy

How will the program be implemented? Who will lay out the implementation system? Will a top-down or bottom-up design be selected? Why?

Thomas A. Birkland, An Introduction to the Policy Process (2nd ed.), Armonk, NY: 2005. Page 160.

Develop a five element policy design based on Hardin’s arguments, as presented in ”The Tragedy of the Commons.” (No limitation on length. Response should be typed single spaced.)