Theories of the Policy Process

by Christopher M. Weible

Although the design of a policy can influence both elite and mass attitudes about the relative value of a particular group of beneficiaries, the implementation of a particular policy can also affect people’s attitudes toward both government and their own personal political efficacy. For many beneficiaries of public policy, interactions with various disbursement or oversight agencies provide citizens with their primary, and sometimes their only, direct experience with government. It therefore comes as no surprise that these interactions can serve as a proxy for the whole of government, significantly affecting individual evaluations of government capacity and the efficacy of participating in political activity (Soss 1999; Mettler 2011).