Randomised controlled trials

The author reflects on the growing use of and acclaim for RCTs as a method for policy discovery. The chapter outlines the social science thinking behind the tool, provide some examples of its use and then discuss its strengths and weaknesses.

Co-design with citizens and stakeholders

This chapter examines how design thinking, with its commitment to seeing challenges from the user perspective, prototyping and rapid learning, has begun to make head way in the policy world as a technique to review service delivery practices. This chapter will review the thinking behind it, connecting design to various social sciences theories and showing applications of the technique.

Deliberative policy analysis

This chapter shows how open deliberation can enhance the legitimacy of policy making, and how it can also, as a science, overcome the bounded rationality of individuals. This chapter explores the value of deliberation in evaluation especially in an environment policy context, not as a tool for democracy per se but as toll for better policy. The social science background to these claims will be explored and examples given of the application of deliberation to better policy making. Finally, the strengths and weaknesses of the approach will be explored.

Microsimulation modelling and the use of evidence

This chapter provides an overview of microsimulation modelling and how it is used to evaluate policy with an emphasis on tax and government cash benefits. The chapter will provide a brief history and introduction to microsimulation modelling.

Crafting public policy: choosing the right social science method

This chapter aims to give a realistic account of how to select a method and so provide the reader with a guiding introduction to the methods that follow. It argues that the choice of method to aid policymaking will reflect a range of factors. For example, the breadth and range of evidence that is already available, or the need to gain insights from hard to reach citizens.

Conclusion: Connecting social science and policy

The conclusion makes an argument for how the relationship between policy and social science could be improved.

Cluster analysis in policy studies

The author explores how cluster analysis could be used to a greater degree by policy makers. The origins of these techniques will be explored plus some examples of their practice, along with a discussion of the scope and limitations of their use.

Visuals in policy making: ‘See what I’m saying’

The authors look at the technique of visualisation. Humans see the world and experience it through images, and so policymaking can engage citizens through those processes and support a way of learning that does not rely solely on written reports and arguments.

Narrative and storytelling

This chapter discusses how policymakers tell stories. Each piece of legislation and policy advice is a narrative in its own right, proposing specific links between ideas, actions, and institutions. However, what stories do they listen to in formulating policy, and can social scientists influence this process? This chapter argues that by constructing stories that ‘resonate’ with policymakers’ everyday experience (based on case studies, action research, appreciative enquiry or ethnography), social scientists are able to facilitate processes of critical reflection and creative thinking.

Qualitative comparative analysis for reviewing evidence and making decisions

This chapter looks at another technique that has grown in popularity – qualitative comparative analysis – in the social sciences to analyse situations with comparative rigour through access to medium-N. In this, the author explores the logic of Boolean and fuzzy set analysis and then explores any applications to policy learning identified. This chapter will offer an assessment of the limitations to the technique but also the enormous potential it holds.