An Analysis Of The Advocacy Coalition Framework Of Policy Change And Its Applicability

Public policy is one of the most important means and tools that is used by human in the social collective life to solve public problems. Over time, the occurrence of policy change is inevitable. In order to respond to the complex world better and to solve varieties of policy problems effectively, we must carry out the theory research of policy change, especially the causal mechanisms for these changes. At present, China is in the time of transition. All kinds of social change present themselves in the forms of institutional change, and these institutional changes take policy change as their carrier. Therefore, the study of policy change is particularly important in the current China. But in the meantime, the research theories of policy process and policy change which have native consciousness are rare in China. In view of this problem, this paper try to introduce and analyze one of the most popular theories of policy process in current western countries——the advocacy coalition framework, and to discuss the applicability of this framework when applying it to analyze China's policy change. In China, some scholars support this framework while some others question even deny it, and now most of the existing empirical researches applying this framework are no more than simple application or remain in the original level of certifying this framework. In a different direction, this paper try to take the"relatively stable parameters"and its derivative——"long term coalition opportunity structures"as the medium, and use comparative analysis to analyze the main differences when applying this framework in political and social systems of different countries or regions. In the meantime, this paper will analyze the features of China's political-social systems and then analyze the favorable or unfavorable factors from a macro point of view when applying it in China, and then make a prospect of its application in China.The logical structure of this paper is as follows: Firstly, the advocacy coalition framework will be incorporated into the theoretical development of policy change, and the theoretical background, logical process, theoretical hypothesis and some core issues will be analyzed. Then this paper will make a summary of the framework's advantages and disadvantages as a theory of policy change. Secondly, this paper will summary the extension of the advocacy coalition framework's application scope, especially its geographical scope of application, and this framework's revise accordingly. Then, this paper will take the two elements of the"coalition opportunity structures"as the medium to compare the differences of this framework when used in different countries or regions which have different kinds of political-social systems. Lastly, this paper will try to grasp China's current policy process environment through the analysis of China's political-social systems'features in the time of transition. Then, this paper will analyze the favorable and unfavorable factors when applying this framework to interpret China's policy change problems.The main content of this paper includes the following five parts:1,The introduction part of this paper will introduce the significance of this topic and summary the research development of the advocacy coalition framework. For the former, this paper will take the theoretical and practical significance of policy change research as the starting point, and introduce important theoretical framework of policy change in current western countries to add it to our country's policy change research"theory library". For the latter, this paper will summary the ACF's development from the two aspects of the framework's development and its revises. Especially, for the rare study and application of this framework in current China, this part will respond to the significance of the topic of this paper.2,The advocacy coalition framework: the compound theory of policy change research. At first, this part will define the meaning of"policy change", then analyze this"compound theory"of the ACF from four aspects separately. First, the ACF's theoretical background. This framework: (1) origins from the criticism and replacement of traditional policy process theory——"the stages heuristic";(2) is one of the most important reflections of political science research from behaviorism to post-behaviorism; (3) reflects the combination of system-analysis and group model; (4) fits the trend of network paradigm; (5) achieves the integration of"down-top"and"top-down"models of policy implementation research; (6) emphasizes the important role of policy analysis and technical information in the policy process. Second, the ACF's logical flow and theoretical hypothesis. Combined with the ACF's original diagram, this part will analyze its basic structural elements and logical flow, and then points out the significance of its theoretical hypothesis. Third, the ACF's core issues that can maintain this theory's internal consistency. These core issues are the key to keep this framework's long-term"energy". These core issues are as follows: (1) individual model and belief systems; (2) information,analysis and policy-oriented learning; (3) advocacy coalition and collective action; (4) policy subsystem and its development; (5) the causal mechanism of policy change. Fourth, the basic evaluation of the ACF's advantages and disadvantages.3,The analysis of the advocacy coalition framework's practical application: the amendments in the process of universalization. This part will introduce the ACF's existing regional application. That is to analyze the application issue of this framework in different countries or regions which have different kinds of political-social systems, and to analyze the important revise——the incorporation of"coalition opportunity structures". Specifically speaking, this part will compare the main differences of the ACF's application in different countries or regions through the two important elements of"coalition opportunity structures"——"degree of consensus needed for major policy change"and"openness of political system".4,The analysis of the advocacy coalition framework's application in China's policy areas. This part will analyze the basic features of China's political-social system in the time of transition through the following six aspects: (1) the core leadership of the ruling party and the trend of the standardization of party-government relationship; (2) the trend of decentralization on the basis of unitary; (3) the trend of grouping of interests-expression on the basis of interests-differentiation; (4) the trend of weakening of state-control and enhancement of social autonomy; (5) the trend of heterogeneity of values on the basis of social identity; (6) the trend of scientific and democratization of public policy process. The features above constitute the basic environment of current China's policy process. For these environmental features, this paper discuss the favorable and unfavorable factors when applying the ACF to interpret China's policy change problems through the following six factors: the constitution of advocacy coalitions in policy subsystems, the definition of belief system, the role of technical information and policy analysts, policy venues, the role of policy broker, and the internal/external events.5,The concluding part of this paper points out some preliminary conclusions as follows: (1) as one of the most important theoretical framework of policy process and policy change, domestic scholars should pay more attention to the ACF; (2) when referring to western theory, we must pay attention to our nations'political system, cultural traditions and socio-economic environment to complete its process of"localization", and we can take the"relatively stable parameters"and"coalition opportunity structures"as the medium to achieve this aim; (3) when referring to the ACF's application in China, the"framework"and"theory"of the ACF have different meanings; (4) for the ACF's application in China, there are many favorable and unfavorable factors in the same time, but overall, in some policy areas where the political influence is not very strong the ACF can be basically applied.Finally,this paper points out that the localization of western theories should service the empirical research and can only be completed through the empirical research. Therefore, the analysis of this paper is just the beginning, it still needs more case studies to test this framework and its hypothesis.