Deciding is maybe the strangest step of Eugene Bardach’s Eightfold Path of policy analysis. This is because the job of the analyst is generally not to say how the world should be, but to describe how it is and could be. One way to think of the Eightfold Path is to split the parts of the path into these three categories.
You could describe selecting criteria as an exercise in describing the world “should be.” After all, selecting criteria is about making value judgments about what a policymaker should care about. But we often lean on values universal enough (effectiveness, efficiency, equity) that any policymaker should be interested in them and we tailor our selection of criteria based on the desires put forth by the client, so that step is still more descriptive than prescriptive.
Deciding is a different story.
In A Practical Guide to Policy Analysis, Bardach says that
[T]he object of all your analytic effort should not be merely to present the client with a list of well-worked-out options. It should be to ensure that at least one of them—and more than one, if possible—would be an excellent choice to take aim at solving, or mitigating the problem.
The reason this step is a leap from the previous six steps lies in its interaction with step four. Surely any policy analysis could include dozens of different criteria by which to evaluate a policy. But policy analysis is also by its nature time-limited, so selection of criteria cannot be exhaustive. Policy analysts are thus working with imperfect information.
In the classic understanding of the relationship between the policy analyst and the policymaker, the policymaker makes the decision of which policy to choose and the analyst provides information to make the decision with. Under this framework, the policy analyst deciding for the policymaker can be seen as inappropriate. It also can be seen as unhelpful: for some criteria—I’m thinking of “political feasibility” in particular—surely the policymaker has better information than the analyst does.
So why does Bardach include it? I would hazard to guess that it has to do with the actual desires of policymakers.
When I was a budget analyst at the Ohio Legislative Service Commission, one tension we dealt with when working with legislators was between analysis and recommendation. While our charge was to provide the policymakers with analysis, legislators would often ask analysts for their opinions on the policy. They weren’t looking just for advice, but for collaborators. And sure, maybe they wouldn’t make the exact same decision the analyst tells them to, but having that guidance was helpful to them.
Some analysts felt uncomfortable being asked a question like this because they felt that it undermined their credibility as analysts. They felt that the jump from “could be” to “should be” was one that an analyst shouldn’t make. But by putting yourself in the shoes of the decisionmaker, the analyst can bring clarity to their findings are guide a policymaker in a way that is helpful to them: by telling them what you would do if you were making the decision.
Ultimately, the policymaker will make the final decision. But if the policymaker is looking for a recommendation, give it to her. It will only make her job in deciding easier.