Concept of Public Policy

Public policy refers to the course of action (or deliberate inaction) chosen by a government or any public authority to deal with a problem or matter of public concern. It is the authoritative decision of the state that sets out what it intends to do, how, and for whom. In the words of Thomas Dye, "Public policy is whatever governments choose to do or not to do." James Anderson defines it as "a purposive course of action followed by an actor or set of actors in dealing with a problem or matter of concern."

Key Features

1. Goal-oriented: Policy is directed at achieving certain ends or solving identified problems.
2. Authoritative: It is formulated and enforced by those with legitimate public authority.
3. Public concern: It addresses issues affecting the general public, not private matters.
4. Course of action: It includes decisions, laws, programmes, rules and even deliberate inaction.
5. Dynamic: It changes with time, context, and the demands of society.
6. Multi-actor: Formed through interaction among legislature, executive, bureaucracy, judiciary, political parties, interest groups, media and citizens.

Types of Public Policy

• Substantive vs. Procedural: Substantive deals with what the government does (e.g., health policy); procedural deals with how it is done (e.g., rule-making).
• Distributive: Allocates benefits to specific groups (e.g., subsidies).
• Regulatory: Controls and restricts behaviour (e.g., traffic rules, anti-monopoly laws).
• Redistributive: Shifts resources between groups (e.g., progressive taxation, welfare).
• Constituent: Concerns the structure of government itself (e.g., electoral reform).

Policy Process (Stages)

Agenda setting → Policy formulation → Adoption/Legitimation → Implementation → Evaluation → (Feedback and modification/termination).

---

Limitations of Public Policy

Despite its importance, public policy suffers from several limitations:

1. Unclear and conflicting goals: Policies often carry vague or multiple, competing objectives, making implementation and evaluation difficult.

2. Inadequate information and uncertainty: Policymakers rarely have complete, accurate data; decisions are thus made under uncertainty and may be based on poor forecasts.

3. Resource constraints: Limited financial, human and technical resources restrict what policies can achieve, especially in developing countries like Nepal.

4. Bureaucratic inefficiency and corruption: Red tape, lack of accountability, rent-seeking and weak institutions dilute policy intent during implementation.

5. Political interference and instability: Frequent changes in government, partisan interests and populist pressures distort policy continuity and effectiveness.

6. Rigidity and time lag: Policies may become outdated because formulation and implementation lag behind rapidly changing social and economic realities.

7. Weak implementation and monitoring: Gaps between policy design and execution, poor coordination among agencies, and absence of reliable evaluation reduce outcomes.

8. Influence of powerful interest groups: Elite and vested groups may capture the policy process, so policies serve narrow interests rather than the public good.

9. Public apathy and low participation: Limited awareness, consultation and citizen involvement weaken legitimacy and feedback.

10. Unintended consequences: Policies may produce side effects (e.g., market distortion, dependency) that were not anticipated.

---

Conclusion: Public policy is the authoritative instrument through which the state translates its intentions into action for public welfare. However, its effectiveness is constrained by vague goals, scarce resources, bureaucratic and political weaknesses, and interest-group capture. Sound policy therefore requires clear objectives, evidence-based formulation, strong institutions, participation and continuous evaluation.

Elite Theory and Its Implications in Policy Making

1. Concept of Elite Theory

Elite theory is a perspective in political science and public policy that holds that every society is divided into two broad classes — the few who hold power (the elite) and the many who are ruled (the masses). Power, according to this theory, is not widely distributed but is concentrated in the hands of a small, organized minority. The masses are largely passive, apathetic, and ill-informed, while the elite are cohesive, resourceful, and well-organized. Public policy, therefore, is not the product of mass demand but the reflection of the values, interests, and preferences of the ruling elite.

The theory has its roots in the writings of Vilfredo Pareto (theory of the governing elite and the circulation of elites), Gaetano Mosca (the "ruling class" and the "political formula"), and Robert Michels (the "iron law of oligarchy"). It was later developed in the modern American context by C. Wright Mills (The Power Elite, 1956), Floyd Hunter (community power structure), and Thomas R. Dye and Harmon Zeigler, who gave it a systematic policy orientation. Dye and Zeigler argued that "public policy is the preferences and values of the governing elite," and that policy flows downward from the elite to the masses rather than upward from the masses to the government.

2. Core Assumptions of Elite Theory

1. Minority rule is inevitable — in every society, organized minorities rule over unorganized majorities.
2. Power is stratified — society is divided into a power elite, sub-elites, and the masses.
3. Elite cohesion — elites share common values, interests, and backgrounds (education, wealth, social status), which keeps them united.
4. Non-decision making — elites prevent certain issues from ever reaching the policy agenda (Bachrach and Baratz's "second face of power").
5. Mass apathy — ordinary citizens are passive and accept elite decisions as legitimate.
6. Policy reflects elite interests — public policy is shaped to preserve the elite's position, not to redistribute power or wealth.

3. Implications in the Policy Making Process

a) Policy agenda is set by the elite. Issues that threaten elite interests rarely reach the policy agenda. For example, in many developing countries, land reform or wealth taxation is kept off the agenda despite mass poverty, because it threatens landed and business elites.

b) Policy formulation is dominated by elites. Policies are drafted in closed circles — bureaucrats, business leaders, political leaders, and technocrats — with minimal public consultation. The role of ordinary citizens is limited to implementation and compliance.

c) Policy outcomes favour the powerful. Budget allocation, subsidies, tax concessions, and infrastructure investment tend to benefit elite groups. In Nepal, for instance, large infrastructure contracts and tax exemptions have often favoured politically connected business houses.

d) Bureaucracy as an elite instrument. Senior bureaucrats form a sub-elite that controls information and implementation, and often shares the same class background as political and business elites. This strengthens elite dominance in policy execution.

e) Marginalization of the poor and minorities. Since elites set the terms of policy, the interests of the poor, women, Dalits, Janajatis, and other marginalized groups are often ignored or only symbolically addressed.

f) Circulation of elites rather than change of system. Pareto argued that elites change (new elites replace old ones) but elitism itself persists. Revolutions or democratic changes often merely replace one elite with another without altering the basic structure of power.

4. Critical Examination

Strengths:

1. It realistically explains why, despite democracy and universal suffrage, policy outcomes remain skewed in favour of a few.
2. It highlights the role of informal power structures — business lobbies, bureaucratic networks, and political dynasties — that formal constitutional analysis overlooks.
3. It explains "non-decision making" and the suppression of radical demands from the policy agenda.
4. It is useful for understanding policy making in developing and transitional societies where institutional checks are weak.

Weaknesses:

1. Elitism is not always monolithic. Empirical studies (e.g., Dahl's Who Governs?) show that different elites dominate different policy areas — no single unified elite controls everything.
2. Underestimates mass influence. In democracies, elections, social movements, media, and civil society do influence policy. The civil rights movement, environmental movements, and Nepal's 2006 People's Movement show that mass mobilization can change policy.
3. Pluralist critique. Power is dispersed among competing groups; policy is the outcome of bargaining, not elite dictate.
4. Marxist critique. Elite theory focuses on elites rather than on the capitalist class structure; it is reformist and does not explain the deeper economic roots of power.
5. Methodological bias. Mills and Hunter studied only "reputational" or "positional" elites and ignored actual decision outcomes.
6. Democratic optimism ignored. It underestimates the potential of democratic institutions, education, and awareness to check elite power.

5. Implications for Policy Making in Nepal

In the Nepali context, elite theory helps explain:

• Dominance of a few political families and business houses in policy making.
• Weak implementation of pro-poor policies such as land reform and reservation.
• Bureaucratic resistance to decentralization and federalism.
• Policy continuity regardless of changes in government, because the same elites remain in power.

6. Conclusion

Elite theory offers a powerful and realistic lens for understanding how public policy is actually made — not as a neutral, rational process but as a reflection of the interests of a small, organized, and resourceful minority. However, it is not a complete explanation. In a democracy, policy making is a complex interaction of elites, counter-elites, interest groups, social movements, and the public. The theory is best used as a critical tool to expose hidden power structures, rather than as a total explanation of the policy process. For a country like Nepal, it warns that without strong democratic institutions, inclusive participation, and accountability, policy will continue to serve the few rather than the many.

Disjointed Incrementalism

Disjointed incrementalism is a model of policy decision making developed by Charles E. Lindblom (1959, 1965) as a realistic description of how public policy is actually made. It is also called "muddling through" or successive limited comparisons. It is the descriptive counterpart of Lindblom's earlier "science of muddling through" and stands in contrast to the rational-comprehensive model of Herbert Simon and others.

Meaning and Features

Disjointed incrementalism holds that policy makers do not make grand, comprehensive, means-end rational decisions. Instead, they make small, successive, marginal adjustments to existing policies. Its key features are:

1. Incremental change – New policy is a small variation of the old policy; decisions are "marginal" rather than radical.
2. Successive limited comparisons – Alternatives are compared only with the status quo and with a few nearby options, not with all possible options.
3. Disjointedness – Decisions are taken in separate, uncoordinated parts by different agencies and at different times; there is no single integrated master plan.
4. Partisan mutual adjustment – Different actors (ministries, parties, interest groups) bargain, negotiate and adjust to one another rather than follow one central planner.
5. Mixed means and ends – Ends and means are chosen together; policy makers cannot separate "what to do" from "how to do it."
6. Remedial and serial – Policy is adjusted step by step as problems appear; it is corrective rather than visionary.
7. No single decision-maker – Many participants with different values and interests shape policy.

Value in Policy Decision Making

1. Practical and realistic. It matches how governments actually work, where time, information and resources are limited. Full rational-comprehensive analysis is impossible in practice.

2. Reduces risk of large mistakes. Because changes are small and reversible, a wrong decision causes limited damage and can be corrected in the next step. Big-bang reforms carry huge, irreversible costs.

3. Builds consensus and political feasibility. Small adjustments are easier to negotiate among conflicting parties. Partisan mutual adjustment allows agreement without forcing everyone to accept one grand ideology.

4. Saves time and cost. Policy makers need not collect exhaustive data or evaluate every alternative; they compare only a few feasible options, which is faster and cheaper.

5. Allows learning by doing. Policy is treated as an experiment. Feedback from each step informs the next, so policy improves gradually (serial correction).

6. Maintains stability and continuity. Existing institutions, commitments and expectations are not suddenly disrupted, so social and economic order is preserved.

7. Useful in uncertain and complex environments. Where problems are ill-structured (poverty, health, education), incremental steps are safer than one grand plan.

Limitations

• It is conservative – it favours the status quo and may block needed radical reform.
• It may ignore long-term goals and produce only short-term patchwork.
• It can become disjointed to the point of incoherence, with no overall direction.
• It may exclude weaker groups who cannot bargain effectively.
• It is less useful in crises (war, disaster, pandemic) where quick, large decisions are needed.

Conclusion

Disjointed incrementalism is a valuable descriptive and practical model. It explains how democratic governments make policy through small, negotiated, self-correcting steps, and it protects against costly errors. However, as a normative guide it is weak in crises and in situations demanding fundamental change. Therefore, it is best used as a complement to, not a replacement for, the rational-comprehensive model — a realistic middle path between pure rationality and pure politics.

Importance of Policy Study

A policy is a broad statement of intent that guides decisions and actions in an organisation or government. Policy study (also called policy analysis) is the systematic examination of the nature, causes, and consequences of policies. Its importance can be explained as follows:

1. Understanding the policy process. Policy study helps us understand how policies are formulated, adopted, implemented, and evaluated. It explains the role of actors such as the legislature, bureaucracy, interest groups, and citizens.

2. Rational decision-making. It supplies facts, data, and evidence on which rational decisions can be based. It reduces reliance on guesswork, intuition, and political pressure.

3. Identifying and defining problems. Many social and economic problems are complex. Policy study helps to identify the real causes of a problem, separate symptoms from causes, and set the agenda for action.

4. Evaluating alternatives. It compares the costs, benefits, and likely outcomes of different policy options. This allows the best alternative to be selected in terms of efficiency, equity, and feasibility.

5. Assessing policy impact. Policy study measures whether a policy has achieved its stated objectives, what side effects it produced, and whether it should be continued, modified, or discontinued.

6. Improving implementation. By studying administrative structures, resources, and incentives, it points out the gaps between policy design and actual delivery, and suggests corrective measures.

7. Promoting accountability and transparency. Systematic study makes the basis of policy decisions open to public scrutiny, which strengthens democratic control and the accountability of policymakers.

8. Forecasting and planning. It helps anticipate future problems and trends (population, employment, environment), so that preventive and long-term policies can be designed instead of reacting to crises.

9. Supporting good governance. Evidence-based policy study promotes rational, equitable, and participatory governance, and helps avoid duplication, waste, and inconsistent decisions.

10. Capacity building and learning. Lessons drawn from past policies become knowledge for future policymakers, improving the overall capacity of the state and organisations.

Conclusion: Policy study is therefore essential for informed choice, effective implementation, proper evaluation, and accountable governance. Without it, policies tend to be ad hoc, inconsistent, and wasteful.

Public goods vs private goods (5 marks)

Goods are classified by two properties: rivalry (does one person's use reduce what is available to others?) and excludability (can non-payers be kept from consuming it?).

Private goods are both rival and excludable. If one person eats a plate of momo, no one else can eat it (rival), and the seller can refuse to serve anyone who does not pay (excludable). Because sellers can charge a price, private goods are efficiently supplied by the market. Examples: food, clothes, a seat on a bus, a mobile phone.

Public goods are non-rival and non-excludable:

• Non-rivalry (non-diminishability): one person's consumption does not reduce the quantity or quality available to others. If one citizen benefits from national defence or a street light, the benefit to others is not reduced. The marginal cost of an extra consumer is zero.
• Non-excludability (non-rejectability): once the good is provided, no one can be prevented from enjoying it, whether or not they pay. A citizen cannot be excluded from national defence, flood control, or a public park's fresh air.

Because of non-excludability, people can enjoy the good without paying — the free-rider problem. No private firm can recover its costs through prices, so the market underproduces or fails to produce public goods at all. Hence they must be provided by the government, financed through taxes. Because of non-rivalry, the efficient price is zero and the good should be provided up to the point where society's total (not individual) marginal benefit equals marginal cost.

Key difference in summary:

Note: Many goods are mixed or quasi-public — e.g., roads and education are excludable but partly non-rival (club goods), while common resources like fishing grounds are rival but non-excludable. Pure public goods are the extreme case at one end of the spectrum.

Underlying Ideas of Two Communication Theories

The question asks for the underlying ideas of two communication theories. A full 5-mark answer should name each theory, state its core idea, and explain the assumptions behind it. Two commonly examined theories are given below.

1. Two-Step Flow Theory (Lazarsfeld, Berelson and Gaudet, 1944)

Core idea: Media messages do not reach and influence people directly. They first flow to opinion leaders, who then pass them on to the less active members of the public. Hence the name "two-step" flow: media → opinion leaders → public.

Underlying ideas:

• Limited media effects: The audience is not a passive, atomised mass; media influence is filtered and moderated, not injected directly.
• Role of opinion leaders: Certain people in every group are more exposed to media and more socially connected. They interpret and relay information, adding their own meaning.
• Interpersonal communication matters more: Face-to-face discussion is often more persuasive than the mass media message itself.
• Social context shapes reception: Family, friends, workplace and community groups decide what is attended to, understood and accepted.
• Audience is active and selective: People choose what to expose themselves to and how to interpret it.

2. Uses and Gratifications Theory (Katz, Blumler and Gurevitch, 1974)

Core idea: The audience is active and uses the media purposefully to satisfy specific needs, rather than being used by the media. The question asked is not "What do media do to people?" but "What do people do with media?"

Underlying ideas:

• Audience initiative: People select channels, content and timing according to their own goals.
• Need satisfaction: Media are used to gratify needs such as information, personal identity, integration and social interaction, and entertainment (Katz, Gurevitch and Haas, 1973).
• Gratifications sought vs. obtained: What people expect from media may differ from what they actually get, which shapes future media use.
• Competition with other sources: Media compete with other activities (sleep, conversation, hobbies) for the audience's time and attention.
• Media effects are indirect: Behaviour and attitude change depend on the needs being served, so effects cannot be predicted from the message alone.
• Audience is not homogeneous: Different individuals use the same content for different purposes.

Summary

Both theories mark a shift from the powerful-effects (hypodermic needle) model to the limited-effects tradition, treating the audience as active, selective and embedded in social relationships.

In a liberal democratic system, public opinion is not simply the sum of private views; it is actively formed, aggregated and transmitted to decision-makers through a set of institutional and informal mechanisms. The main mechanisms are:

1. Elections. Elections are the primary and most authoritative mechanism. Through periodic, free and competitive elections, citizens express their judgement on parties, candidates and policies. The mandate given or withheld at the polls is treated as the clearest expression of public opinion, and it determines who governs.

2. Political parties. Parties aggregate scattered individual preferences into coherent programmes and manifestos. They structure public opinion by framing issues, mobilising supporters and providing a link between the mass public and the legislature. In a liberal democracy, parties are the main channel through which opinion becomes policy.

3. Pressure and interest groups. Trade unions, business associations, professional bodies, farmers' organisations and advocacy groups articulate the specific opinions of their members. They use lobbying, campaigns, petitions and sometimes strikes to press their demands on government, giving organised expression to sectional opinion.

4. Mass media. Newspapers, radio, television and now social media disseminate information, set the agenda and shape the terms of public debate. Editorials, talk shows, opinion polls and investigative reporting both reflect and mould public opinion. A free and plural media is therefore regarded as essential to liberal democracy.

5. Opinion polls and surveys. Scientific sampling techniques allow the opinions of a large population to be measured on particular issues. Poll results are widely reported and influence parties, candidates and policy-makers, though they are a measurement of opinion rather than a direct channel of it.

6. Petitions, demonstrations and civil society action. Citizens can directly express opinion through petitions, public meetings, processions, strikes and peaceful protest. Civil society organisations, NGOs and social movements raise issues that parties may neglect, and they often push marginal concerns onto the public agenda.

7. Direct democratic devices. Referendums, plebiscites, recall and initiative allow citizens to decide or propose policy directly, bypassing representative institutions. These are supplementary mechanisms that give expression to opinion on specific constitutional or policy questions.

8. Constitutional guarantees. Freedom of speech and expression, freedom of assembly, freedom of association and freedom of the press provide the legal environment in which all the above mechanisms operate. Without these guarantees, the other mechanisms cannot function meaningfully.

In short, liberal democracy expresses public opinion through a combination of electoral, associational, communicative and direct-participatory mechanisms. Elections and parties provide the authoritative channel; media, interest groups, polls and protests provide the continuous and informal channels; and constitutional freedoms make the whole system possible.

Bureaucratic Rationality

Bureaucratic rationality is the concept, developed most fully by Max Weber, that modern bureaucracy is the purest institutional expression of rational-legal authority — the form of domination in which obedience is owed not to a person but to an impersonal, legally established order of abstract rules. Bureaucratic rationality therefore means the organisation of administration according to calculable rules, technical knowledge and formal procedure rather than personal whim, tradition or charisma. Weber treated it as the "iron cage" of modernity: technically the most efficient form of organisation yet devised, but also a threat to individual freedom and democratic control.

Weber's ideal-typical features

• Fixed jurisdictional areas bound by rules, with clearly defined official duties.
• Hierarchy of offices with graded authority and channels of appeal.
• Written files and records (Akten), which make administration continuous and auditable, independent of the individual official.
• Office-holding as a vocation: appointment on the basis of technical qualification, not election or inheritance; a career with salary, pension and promotion by seniority or merit.
• Impersonality: the official performs duties sine ira et studio — without hatred or passion — treating all cases alike under the same rule.
• Formal, general, abstract rules that are stable, published and applied uniformly, so that outcomes become calculable and predictable.

Why it is rational

Rationality here is means–end (instrumental) rationality, not rationality in the sense of wise ends. Bureaucracy is rational because it selects the most efficient means to whatever goal the political authority sets. Its superiority over patronage, patrimonial or charismatic administration rests on:

1. Precision and predictability — like a machine, it produces uniform, calculable results.
2. Technical superiority — specialised knowledge and expertise that amateurs cannot match.
3. Continuity and speed — administration continues irrespective of who holds office.
4. Depersonalisation of power — authority resides in the office, not the officeholder, which curbs nepotism and arbitrariness.
5. Equal treatment before the rule — formal equality of citizens in their dealings with the state.

Critical examination

• Formal vs substantive rationality. Weber himself distinguished the two. An action may be formally rational (correctly following rules) yet substantively irrational in its consequences for welfare, equity or justice. A rule may be applied impartially and still produce unjust outcomes.
• Goal displacement. Merton's analysis shows that adherence to rules becomes an end in itself; the means displace the ends, producing ritualism, red tape and trained incapacity — officials unable to respond to novel situations.
• Irrationality of rationality. The very features that make bureaucracy efficient — hierarchy, specialisation, impersonality — can generate rigidity, buck-passing, resistance to change and the displacement of organisational goals by sectional interests.
• The "iron cage" and dehumanisation. Rationalisation strips work of meaning and subordinates the individual to an impersonal machine; Weber feared this would imprison modern humanity in a cage of rule-bound routine.
• Threat to democracy. Because officials possess expertise and permanence while politicians come and go, bureaucracy can acquire autonomous power. Weber's answer was legal-rational control by the political leadership, but critics argue this only substitutes one domination for another.
• Cultural limits. Weber's model is an ideal type drawn from the modern Western state. In developing societies, bureaucratic rationality coexists with patronage, kinship and particularistic loyalties, producing hybrid and often dysfunctional administration.
• Post-Weberian critiques. Later writers argue that the ideal type overstates uniformity and understates the discretion officials actually exercise; New Public Management and street-level bureaucracy theory both challenge the machine model.

Conclusion

Bureaucratic rationality is the organisation of administration through impersonal, hierarchical, rule-governed and expert authority, which Weber regarded as the most efficient and technically superior form of administration ever developed. Its strength — calculability and impartiality — is inseparable from its weakness: rigidity, goal displacement, dehumanisation and the concentration of unaccountable power. The concept therefore remains central to the study of public administration, not as a description of how bureaucracies always work, but as an ideal type against which their rationality — and its costs — can be measured.

Economic Constraints on Policy Making

Economic constraints are the limitations imposed by a country's economic conditions and resource availability that restrict the range of options open to policy makers. A government cannot formulate or implement any policy it wishes; its choices are bounded by what the economy can afford and sustain. The main economic constraints are explained below.

1. Limited financial resources. Every policy requires funds. When government revenue (taxes, royalties, foreign grants) is low and the fiscal deficit is already large, policy makers cannot finance new programmes. They must either borrow — which raises debt and interest burdens — or cut spending elsewhere. In a country like Nepal, where capital expenditure is chronically low and revenue depends heavily on imports, this constraint is severe.

2. Balance of payments position. A weak balance of payments limits policy. If foreign exchange reserves are low, the government cannot freely import capital goods or allow expansionary policies that would raise imports further. It may be forced to devalue the currency, restrict imports, or seek foreign loans — all of which constrain domestic policy choices.

3. Inflation and price stability. Expansionary fiscal or monetary policy can stimulate growth but may also ignite inflation. Policy makers therefore face a trade-off between growth and price stability. Once inflation is high, they must adopt contractionary measures that slow the economy, limiting their freedom to pursue welfare or employment goals.

4. Level of savings and investment. Domestic savings determine how much capital is available for investment. Low savings mean heavy dependence on foreign capital, which comes with conditions and repayment obligations. This restricts the government's ability to direct investment according to national priorities.

5. Unemployment and poverty. High unemployment and widespread poverty create pressure for immediate relief and employment programmes. However, such programmes are costly and may be unproductive in the long run. Policy makers are caught between short-term political demands and long-term fiscal prudence.

6. Debt burden and debt servicing. A large accumulated public debt consumes a big share of revenue in interest payments, leaving little for development. Lenders (IMF, World Bank) may also impose conditionalities such as liberalisation and privatisation, reducing national policy autonomy.

7. Resource endowment and technology. The availability of natural resources, skilled labour, and technology sets the production ceiling. A resource-poor, technologically backward economy cannot support ambitious industrial or export policies, no matter how sound the intention.

8. Trade and global economic environment. Membership in the WTO, trade agreements, and dependence on remittances or foreign aid expose the economy to external shocks. A global recession, oil price rise, or fall in remittances can force sudden changes in domestic policy.

9. Taxable capacity and tax structure. If the tax base is narrow and collection inefficient, the government cannot raise revenue without provoking resistance. This limits spending on health, education, and infrastructure.

10. Political economy of resource allocation. Scarce resources must be distributed among competing sectors — defence, agriculture, industry, social welfare. Every allocation favours one group at the expense of another, so policy makers are constrained by pressure groups and vested interests.

Conclusion. Economic constraints thus operate on both the revenue side (what the government can raise) and the expenditure side (what it can spend), and are reinforced by external dependence. Effective policy making therefore requires realistic assessment of these constraints and prudent prioritisation of objectives rather than the pursuit of unlimited goals.

The questions that follow the passage are not included in the text given, and the passage itself breaks off mid-sentence. The main points of the visible text, which any question on it will draw on, are:

1. Linkage between policy makers and receivers. This linkage is vital to understanding the meaning and power of public policy.
2. Benefit and loss. Society benefits or suffers from government activity, and sometimes both happen together.
3. Controversial policies. The more controversial a proposed policy, the more likely one part of society gains at the expense of another.
4. Unequal impact. Because public policy questions vary so widely, some decisions emerging from the political process affect society more than others, and each policy question has its own unique impact on those in its path.
5. Origin and role of public policy. Public policies result from the blend of politics and government, and public policy defines prevailing values as well as solutions to prevailing problems.