Spring 2023 - 60120 - PA 383G - Policy Making in a Global Age

This course seeks to answer the question “How does policy-making happen and how is it changing?” The contemporary moment brings access to more information and more channels for communicating, cooperating, and coercing across borders. At the same time, more actors of more types also contribute to policy-making. These features and actors also make decision-making more complex. We will consider policy-making processes, including rational actor models, cognitive biases, groupthink, culture, analogy and history, and consensus based models, among others. We will study the roles of bureaucratic organizations, lobbying and advocacy, media and public opinion, experts, and social movements on the policy process. We cannot cover all salient global issues and policymaking mechanisms in one semester. Rather, this course aims to equip students with intellectual frameworks to help them think about the world and the role of policymaking in it. Reading will be either one book per week or four to six articles. This is a seminar, and active engagement is expected. Grading is based on (1) class participation (2) presentations (3) policy assignments and (4) a final paper.