Positivist Design: Policy Failure in the United Kingdom - Research Proposal Example

Positivist Research Design: Policy Failure in the United Kingdom Positivist Research Design Failure in the United Kingdom: the Case of Child Support Policy The Research Question and Its Importance While policy makers are quick to claim that government policy is successful, critics are more likely to term the same as failures (McConnell , 2010). The reality of the matter is that policy outcomes are often mixed and rarely at either of the two extremes. Adding to the difficulty gauging policy failure is the fact that a policy has many dimensions to it and so it may succeed in some of those dimensions and fail in others. There are many actors involved in the analysis of policy and the analysis takes place various forms. Its outcomes find their way into the public domain via government briefings, academic articles, non-governmental briefings and newspaper editorials among other channels. However, despite the apparently never-ending scrutiny of public policy and the resultant claims and counter-claims of policy success, establishing the truth is often difficult. The above statements notwithstanding, there are a few policies where empirical data exist for one to decisively conclude that the policy has failed to achieve its goals and objectives. The child support policy is an example. When she came to power as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Margaret Thatcher opted to reform the then court-based system of child support by bringing it under the social security system (Bradshaw, 2006). Then, when the New Labour Government came to power in 1997, it sought to simplify the old system of child support base it on a simpler formula: each child being raised by a lone parent enjoying Income Support would be entitled to a £10 child maintenance premium. Meanwhile all payments remitted by working non-resident parents were deducted for purposes of taxation. The new system was seen to be better as it had the potential to reduce child poverty. Unfortunately, the new system did not take off until March 2003, two years later than it had been planned. Because of IT and management challenges, none of the new system’s targets were being met as of 2006, three years after it had been rolled out. An investigation by the Parliamentary Select Committee on Work and Pensions found that only half of all applications had been cleared, case and cash compliance stood at 50% and 43%, respectively. Only 22% of parents on IS were benefiting from child support against a target of 65%. More than 700,000 cases remained stuck in the old system and were, therefore, not benefitting from the premium. The Committee concluded that the Child Support Agency (CSA), the body managing the new system was in a crisis and recommended that it be wound up and replaced by a different body. In November 2008, CSA was disbanded and succeeded by the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission (CMEC). This research project seeks to answer the question: What caused the New Labour Government’s child support policy to fail? The above research question, hence the research, is important for two reasons. First, it will fill the knowledge gap that exists on the question of the causes of policy failure. Whereas many studies have been conducted to evaluate the causes of the failure of policies, such studies have not been comprehensive. This research seeks to contribute to knowledge by intensively examining the above policy. That way, the conclusions arrived at will be more comprehensive and accurate. Secondly, besides adding to scholarly knowledge, the findings of and conclusions from this research will have practical value in the sense that policy-makers in across all sectors can use the knowledge to formulate better policies that will have greater chances of succeeding in meeting their goals and objectives. More importantly, this research will go a long way into ensuring that the goals that future policies will pursue will be more responsive to the needs of the people. Hypothesis and Hypothesis Testing Public policies fail because policymakers, in formulating policies, do not ensure the active and effective participation of all stakeholders. By “active and effective participation” is meant the genuine participation of all the groups that have a stake in or are likely to be affected by a proposed policy (Sidek, 2009). A detailed discussion of what constitutes “genuine stakeholder participation” is beyond the scope of this paper. However, genuine stakeholder participation is not the same thing as holding consultative meetings. The latter can be used by policymakers to manipulate the policy formulation process and claim that all stakeholders “participated” in formulating a given policy. The phrase “all stakeholders” is important because several groups in the society will either have an interest in or be affected by any one policy. In the case of the policy on child support, some of the stakeholders include parents, the Department of Work and Pension, the Parliamentary Select Committee on work and Pension and children themselves. The above hypothesis will be tested by studying the above policy. The study will begin with an extensive review of existing empirical literature on the policy – academic articles, newspaper editorials, Parliamentary Committee reports and governmental and non-governmental briefings. Admittedly, a more accurate approach would have been for the researcher to sample a number of policies and evaluate their impact with the view of determining whether those policies have succeeded or failed. However, given the limitations of time and funds, such an undertaking is not feasible. Having reviewed empirical articles on the policy, the researcher will proceed to collect data on the events and processes leading to the formulation of the policy. In particular, the researcher will be interested in any evidence of stakeholder participation and the level of such participation. In assessing the level of stakeholder participation, the researcher will refer to Arnstein’s “Ladder of Citizen Participation” (Sidek, 2009). The ladder has eight rungs that represent levels of participation. The eight rungs are grouped into three broader levels of participation: non-participation, tokenism and citizen power. Justification of the Positivist Approach It is acknowledged that the notion of positivism is a difficult one to explain. In fact, there may be as many definitions of “positivism” as there are authors on the subject. Nonetheless, positivism is premised on the idea that science is the sole means of establishing truth because scientific knowledge is verifiable (Crowther & Lancaster, 2008). A major feature of positivism the explanation of phenomena through causality. The concept of “causality” simply means that for every phenomenon, there is a cause; nothing happens without a cause (Mair, 2008). In other words, the positivist approach is deterministic. Thus, the positivist approach is suited to this research as the researcher believes that there exists a causal relation between stakeholder participation and the success or failure of a public policy. The task of the researcher is to establish the exact nature of that relationship (Heritier, 2008). Assumptions The basic assumption of the research is captured in the hypothesis above. The hypothesis assumes that there exists a cause-effect relation between stakeholder participation and public policy (Schalk , 2011). Effective stakeholder participation during the process of formulating a policy is likely to lead to the success of the policy in terms of meeting its goals and objectives. By contrast, the lack of or poor stakeholder participation is likely to lead to the failure of a policy. The research also assumes that the various government departments maintain clear records of the processes involved from the time a resolution to enact a policy is taken to the adoption of the policy. The research further assumes that third party institutions such as public universities and independent government offices are more likely to give an objective valuation of a policy than is the evaluation were undertaken by the department that initiated and implemented the policy. Choice of Data to Collect As pointed out already, the researcher will review several empirical articles on the policy. As a rule, the research will limit itself to empirical studies and reviews. The choice of the policy is justified on three grounds. First, having been adopted in the 1990s, enough time has elapsed to for its impact to be felt, if any. Secondly, the policy is largely considered to have failed. Finally, for policies enacted between 2001 and today, the duration may be too short for a fair assessment of its impact. Besides empirical articles and their reviews, data relating to the processes leading to the enactment and adoption of the policies will also be collected. In particular, the researcher will look out for evidence of stakeholder participation. Where available, such evidence will be assessed against the aforementioned levels of citizen participation. Wherever possible, the researcher will collect the views of public officers that were behind the policy. Specifically, the research will look out for the officers’ perceptions of the extent to which stakeholders took part in formulating policies. Finally, also wherever possible, the researcher will, through focus group discussions, collect the sentiments of representatives of the various groups that are directly affected by specific policies. This combination of data will make it possible for evidence to be triangulated. Sampling The sampling frame adopted for the research will integrate aspects of various sampling methods. The sampling frame will be purposeful in that the policy being investigated has certain qualities. First, it has been long enough since the adoption of the policy, hence the ability to question its success or failure. Secondly, its impact must has been studied empirically and reviewed by credible authorities such as public universities. The research will also make use of maximum variation sampling. The rationale behind maximum variation is to capture a wider picture of the extent of public participation during the formulation of the policy. As many policies as will qualify will be investigated. The researcher will also sample for various focus group discussions (FGDs). The essence of FGDs is to obtain contrasting views on a given subject (Delbert & Salkind, 2002). For instance, the researcher may want to compare and contrast the views of IS parents and Department of Work and Pension staff. Gaining Entry into Research Settings While conducting the research, the researcher will need to gain entry into various institutions of learning and public offices. The targeted groups and settings will be pre-visited prior to data collection. The purpose of the pre-visits will be for the researcher to establish rapport with their key informant and secure an appointment with them. In attempting to secure appointments, the researcher will make efforts to put the convenience of the key informant first (Crowther & Lancaster, 2008). The researcher will also need to be tactical to ensure that key informants schedule interviews in a manner that will derail the research make it impossible for the researcher to complete the research within the stipulated time of one year. The researcher will also take caution not to access members of staff without the permission of office administrators. Ethical Considerations A major assumption of positivist research is that the researcher is independent of the research, as a result of which the outcomes of the research are objective (Crowther & Lancaster, 2008). The researcher will implement a number of measures to ensure the objectivity of the research. First, the researcher will see to it that their personal biases do not influence the outcomes of the research. One of the ways to accomplish will be to hire research assistants throughout the research. Secondly, the research will refrain from interfering with the work of their research assistants. Finally, the researcher will give fair consideration to all the parties involved – policymakers, reviewers and those affected by the policies. The research, particularly interviews with key informants and focus group discussions, will be conducted under conditions of anonymity (Babbie, 2004). In reporting the results of the research, informants will not be referred to by name or title. However, in event that it becomes necessary to disclose the identity of the informant, the researcher will seek the informant’s permission beforehand. The researcher will also refrain from exploiting vulnerable and readily accessible groups such as children at a kindergarten. The researcher will endeavour to accurately present information as given or observed and not falsify it. Data Collection and Organisation Policy reviews will be researched on the Internet, but where data gaps exist, the researcher will look for that data from the authority that undertook the review. Evidence of stakeholder participation will be deduced from the records of the events and processes leading to the enactment of the policies. Where possible, that evidence will be cross-checked with the views of the concerned policymakers. The opinions of the people affected by the various policies will be obtained through focus group discussions. Where possible, copies of the minutes of meeting leading to the policy will be obtained. The opinions obtained through the FGDs will be recorded in the FGD guide for analysis. Key informant discussions and interviews will either be noted or recorded on phone for transcription (Delbert & Salkind, 2002). Data Analysis The data collected will be qualitative as opposed to quantitative: it will comprise observations and descriptions of opinions as opposed to numbers. As with all types of data, analysis will be necessary to give the data order and meaning. The data collected by the various methods will be analysed in a three-step process. The first stage will be data reduction where the mass of data will be organ sad and irrelevant data removed such the data that will remain will be more manageable (Miles & Huberman, 1994). The second stage will be data analysis and display. The basic method of qualitative analysis known as “content analysis” will be used. Content analysis is an array of various manual or computer-aided techniques for the contextualized interpretation of textual data (Miles & Huberman, 1994). The techniques allow the researcher to include substantial amounts of textual data and systematically deduce its properties such as the frequency of certain keywords. At this stage, the data will be processed into more useful information and presented either in prose or diagrams such as tables, charts and graphs. Besides giving better visual impressions, data displayed in diagrams make it easier to compare variable and deduce relationships. The third stage will be drawing conclusions and verifying the conclusions. Drawing conclusions entails stepping back and considering what the information means in light of the research question. Verification entails cross-checking the data to ensure consistency in the conclusions. Possible Problems and Solutions The researcher anticipates a number of challenges in the course of undertaking the research. The phenomenon of research fatigue is perhaps the biggest challenge. Research fatigue is the result of communities being researched over and over by the same or different researchers on the same, similar or different topics (Way, 2013). Research fatigue manifest itself in participant apathy – the general state of disinterest in research. Besides being over-researched, research fatigue may also develop in communities, and possibly among public officers, for a myriad of reasons. The members of a community may simply not be interested in a part or the whole of the research project, especially if they consider the project irrelevant. The community may also be of the opinion that that past research projects have had no impact on individuals and the community. Following several years of misrepresentation and extraction of information, communities may view researchers with suspicion and distrust and even behave with hostility towards them. Whatever the cause, research fatigue is a real challenge that any qualitative researcher must confront. In order to circumvent the challenge of research fatigue, the researcher will make use of gatekeepers – influential members of communities through whom entry into a community may be granted or denied. Research has shown that even in research-fatigued communities that have developed apathy, gatekeepers continue to be enthusiastic about research (Way, 2013). The main reason cited for their enthusiasm is the perceived economic benefits they derive from their interactions with researchers. Apart from working with gatekeepers, the research will attempt to give the research a fresh perspective by explaining to communities how they stand to gain from the research, albeit in the longer term. The other challenge the researcher expects is the practical difficulty in constituting effective focus groups that will yield the relevant data (Way, 2013). Again, the researcher will make use of the gatekeepers of the various communities and enlist their help in constituting focus groups. The researcher also expects some challenges in accessing some key informants, particularly public officials for the purpose of interviewing them. This challenge will be tackled by issuing online questionnaires for officials who may be too busy for a face-to-face interview. The officials will be encouraged to complete the online questionnaires in their free time and submit them online. In order to motivate the online respondents, the questionnaire will be kept brief, colourful and captivating. Finally, the researcher expects that time and funds will be limited. This challenge will be addressed by hiring research and ensure that the assistant strictly complete their assignments with stipulated times to avoid cost overruns. Criteria for the Evaluation of the Research The essence of evaluating a research project is to ensure that the information presented is accurate, credible and reliable. The researcher presents an eight-point framework for evaluating this research project. The framework is unique as it distinguishes between the means (or methods and practices) and ends of qualitative research (Tracey, 2010). The eight points are (a) a worthy topic – the topic selected for this project, policy failure, is one of the five topics that were proposed by the course instructor, (b) rich rigor – this refers to the thoroughness with which the project will articulate the topic, (c) sincerity – this is the degree to which the instructor will deem the project the researchers original work, bearing in mind the instructors knowledge of their students ability, (d) credibility of information presented – this will be largely influenced by the credibility of its sources, (e) resonance –this refers to how well the researcher can depict a vivid picture of the issue being addressed in the mind of the reader, (f) significant contribution to knowledge, (g) the extent to which the researcher has upheld research ethics and (h) coherence between the means and the ends of the project – how well the report answers the research question that the researcher set out to answer. References Babbie , E., 2004. The Practice of Social Research. 1st ed. California: Thomson/Wadsworth . Bradshaw , J., 2006. Child support, York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Crowther , D. & Lancaster , G., 2008. Research Methods: A Concise Introduction to Research in Management and Business Consultancy. 1st ed. Oxford : Butterworth-Heinemann. Delbert , M. & Salkind , N., 2002. Handbook of Research Design and Measurement. 1st ed. London : Sage. Heritier , A., 2008. Causal Explanation . In: M. Keating & P. Della, eds. Approaches and Methodologies in the Social Sciences: A Pluralist Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mair , P., 2008. Concepts and Concept formation. In: P. Della & M. Keating , eds. Approaches and Methodologies in the Social Sciences: A Pluralist Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. McConnell , A., 2010. Policy Success, Policy Failure and Grey Areas In-Between. Journal of Public Policy, 30(3), pp. 345-362. Miles , M. & Huberman , A., 1994. Qualitative Data Analysis. 2nd ed. Newbury Park : Sage . Schalk , J., 2011. Linking stakeholder involvement to policy performance: Nonlinear and stakeholder-specific effects in Dutch local government policy making. New York , Public Management Research Conference. Sidek , N., 2009. A Ladder of Citizen Particiaption: Journal Review, Selangor: Mara Univesity of Technology . Tracey , S., 2010. Qualitative Quality: Eight “Big-Tent” Criteria for Excellent Qualitative Research. Qualitative Inquiry, 16(10), pp. 837-851. Way , E., 2013. Understanding Research Fatigue in the Context of Community-University Relations, Worcester : Clark University . Read More