In a democratic society, among all the available options, public policy is the most suitable tool to facilitate tangible and lasting social change. A public policy refers to laws or rules enforced by certain governmental bodies to facilitate programs or regulations affecting a specific population or social area. It is also concerned with the allocation of actual resources to respond to perceive public issues and challenges that require government action to be solved (Anyebe, 2018). However, many issues that come with infective public policies center around the fact that some group or individual behaviors are understudied by social scientists to give reliable advice on how issues should be solved (Dye, 2012). Thus, to facilitate effective public policies, it is necessary to study the variables involved in specific instances and understand how governments can positively influence them.
Public policy is the best way to facilitate social change because the existing policies can be contributing to social issues, and merely changing them can resolve issues. For instance, in India, there is a persistent problem of lacking good schools, which creates issues with admissions. Upon further exploration, it becomes clear that the policy environment is unfavorable, with the government mandating fifteen different licenses to open new schools and colleges (Shah, 2011). This limitation prevents schools from opening, lowering the quality of education. By changing the public policies, the issue can be solved as it will become less costly and problematic to open educational institutions in the country. While public policies do not provide answers to all social problems, they allow to make steps in the direction of finding solutions that will improve people’s lives in the long run.
References
Anyebe, A. (2018). An overview of approaches to the study of public policy. International Journal of Political Science, 4(1), 8-17.
Dye, T. (2012). Policy analysis: What governments do, why they do it and what difference it makes. University of Alabama Press.
Shah, P. (2011). Social change & public policy. Center for Civil Society.