Stages Model

There are many different models to explain the policy process, but one of the oldest and most common approaches to the study of policy-making derives from the early work of H. Lasswell (1951). This American political scientist was the first to have taken into account and analysed policy as a process, that is, as a set of phenomena organised in time and led by a number of specific and self-induced mechanisms. The model that he helped build is usually known as the stages model of policy, since it separates policy-making into its component steps, or stages, and analyses each in turn. The original version of the model included seven stages, though more recent versions have reduced the process to fewer steps, varying between four and six.

Broadly speaking, such stages include [1]:

  • The identification of policy problems or issues, through demands for action;
  • Agenda-setting, or focusing on specific problems/issues (this stage is sometimes merged with the previous one);
  • The formulation of policy proposals, their initiation and development, by policy-planning organisations, interest groups, and/or the executive or legislative branches of government;
  • The adoption of and rendering legitimate of policies through the political actions of government, interest groups, political parties;
  • The implementation of policies through bureaucracies, public expenditures, and the activities of executive agencies; and,
  • The evaluation of a policy’s implementation and impact.
By breaking the policy process up into different stages, and thus clarifying the stages that are required for a policy to be born and exist, this model has several strengths and limitations.

Its major strength is that it reduces the complexity of policy-making to manageable, analytical units, facilitating understanding. By separating the process into a series of clear and identifiable steps, one can focus on the distinct procedures and activities necessary to develop a policy, instead of losing oneself in the intricacies of the overall policy process. This model does not primarily focus on the actors and institutions involved in policy-making but rather emphasises the fact that policy-making, as a comprehensive process, cuts across and sometimes links this variety of actors and institutions (i.e. the executive and the legislative branches of government and the courts, civil society, intergovernmental bodies, etc.). As noted by Porter and Hicks in one of their papers on the process of policy formulation, by shifting attention to the process and its component steps, this model “transcends the boundaries of specific institutions and points to the ways in which individuals and groups interact across them” [2]. Entire sections of the study of policies, particularly public policies, have developed over time, based on this model.

Although this model is extremely important in the policy-making literature and is considered a traditional approach by many authors, it has also been subject to criticism. The main criticism focuses on the so-called linearity of the model.

The stages model is usually viewed as presenting the policy process in terms of a policy cycle, where the last stage of the process, “evaluation,” overlaps with the first, “problem identification”; where each step is considered as temporally and functionally distinct; and where different sets of actors are associated with different stages and periods of time. Critics say that this is extremely misleading since, although policy-making may well proceed in stages, it is not linear; the entire process is in no way automatic and can change directions or even cease to be at any point. Reality is not a fixed sequence: the “formulation” stage may be an opportunity for a new “identification of problems,” the “implementation” phase usually requires a redefinition of the “formulation” of the policy proposal, and the “evaluation” can lead to a new “problem identification.” Far from being linear, the policy process is dynamic and, at times, even chaotic. For instance, a policy can end without having been subject to evaluation, and another can be implemented before having been formally or legally adopted.

It has been said that the stages model gives the illusion that policy-makers arrive at a decision through a rational and systematic approach to problem-solving: defining the problem, analysing alternative solutions, adopting a solution, and testing and evaluating that solution. But policy-making only rarely follows this pattern. A vast number of players is usually involved in the policy process, and this tends to result in a process in which decisions are made collectively, often after resolving conflicting interests by bargaining.

1. Porter, R.W., with Hicks, I., Knowledge Utilisation and the Process of Policy Formulation: Toward a Framework for Africa, USAID, Washington DC, 1995, p. 8.

2. Op. cit., p. 9.