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Policy planning and central-local relations
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Long Range Planning, Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 38 to 45, 1985 Printed in Great Britain
0024-6301/85 $3.00 + .OO Pergamon Press Ltd.
Policy Planning and Central-Local Relations Bob Hinings, Professor of Organixational Analysis, Uniuersity of Alberta, Leach, Stewart Ranson and Chris Skelchev, Institute of Local Government University of Birmingham
This paper is based on research carried out at the Institute of Local Government Studies at the University of Birmingham. Policy Planning Systems are ways of dealing with the division of functions between central and local government and they provide a structure for the flow of information by means of specified procedures and processes. As this tends to create an increased flow of work, this area of planning is threatened by central and local government cut-backs in expenditure and manpower, and may wellonlysurvive by a positive demonstration of its usefulness.
Introduction Central-local relations involve a network of interorganizational relations which have to be controlled and managed. The network arises from the distribution of functions between various levels and agencies of government. In attempting to manage this distribution of functions, the agencies involved have to deal with issues of policy formulation and their operational implementation. One way of attempting to manage such an inter-agency network is to redistribute the functions on to what seems a more logical basis in relation to changing priorities. This does occur from time to time, either on a major scale, as when the whole of local government in England and Wales was organized in 1974, or on a more modest scale, as with changes in the balance of responsibilities between central government departments in London and their territorial offices in the various regions of England and Wales. Another way of managing inter-organizational relations is to recognize their permanence and set up a system for inter-agency planning. Policy Planning Systems (PPSs) are ways of dealing with the division of functions between central and local government. A policy planning system is an instrument for Bob Hinings iscurrently Professor of Organizational Analysis, Faculty of Business, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. The other authors are lecturers at the Institute of Local Government Studies, University of Birmingham.
Steve Studies,
making explicit, formalizing and regulating the relations between objectives, policies and finance in a particular policy sector.’ It is premised on a version of the rational model of policy-making with at least a medium-term planning horizon. The idea of rolling programmes and mechanisms of review are built in. Policy planning systems are programmatic and future oriented. The future orientation is the planning element in policy; the programmatic nature is the systematic, procedural, cyclical element.* A policy planning system is different from a ‘policy system’. The latter is purely ‘a set of interconnected parts, interacting so as to form a complex whole’ with respect to a particular policy area.3 A policy planning system is introduced into such an existing system of relations and procedures. A policy system is likely to be much less developed in terms of explicitness, rationality, formalization and may not involve a programmatic element. The distinction between a policy system and a policy planning system is important because the latter are normally inserted into the former. Wherever a number of agencies have to interact there will be a system to ‘produce’ policy in the conventional cybernetic sense. An existing policy system incorporates a set of organizations with associated political, managerial and professional together with formal and informal interests, procedures. The introduction of a PPS is often an attempt to specify more clearly the existing system, or to demonstrate that a necessary change is taking place. To a significant extent, the fate of a policy planning system will be dependent on the way it is ‘taken up’ by the existing policy system.
The
Nature
of Policy
Planning
Systems With the planning mood of the 1960s and early 1970s there was a rise of policy planning in both
Policy local and central government in Britain. In one piece of research, as many as 22 different planning systems were identified.4 More than half of them involved some form of relationship between local authorities and central government, attempting to regularize that relationship by means of policy and resource planning. There are many differences between these various initiatives. The common element is an attempt to formalize and plan the network of relationships between governmental agencies at the centre and those at the locality. Some are more policy oriented than others; some involve a strong element of resource allocation and the distribution of grant. Some are primarily concerned with helping the planning of central government; others emphasize ideas of partnership between agencies. Essentially there are three kinds of differences between policy planning systems, namely :
(1) Their
level of specificity: some, such as Structure Plans, deal with interrelated sets of problems and functional areas; others, such as Housing Investment Programmes, cover a relatively discrete activity.
(2) Whether
they have a substantive or resource such as Transportation orientation: some, Policies and Programmes, are primarily concerned with substantive policy issues; others such as PESC concentrate on resource allocation.
relative roles of central and local (3) The government: there are those systems where the is primarily a base for local authority information collection as against those which aim at better planning and policy coordination between the various agencies of government. The aim of this paper is to draw out some salient features of the operation of policy planning systems from research into three substantive policy areas. Two policy areas with rather different forms of policy planning were examined, system Transportation Policies and Programmes (TPPs) and Inner City Partnerships and Programmes (ICPPs). As the name implies, TPPs are concerned with the development and implementation of policies for transport, dealing with issues such as road planning, bus systems and railroad integration. ICPPs were set up to deal with issues of multiple deprivation arising in the inner areas of large cities. Both systems were designed to bring central and local government closer together and to involve non-governmental agencies in planning. Note, in terms of the differences outlined above, TPPs are specific, substantive (with a strong element of resource allocation) and ‘driven’ by central government. ICPPs are corporate, substantive (with an element of resource allocation) and emphasize the partnership of a wide range of agencies.
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Relations
Taking up the distinction between a policy system and a policy planning system, a third policy area was examined, that of the provision of education for 16-19 year olds. This is not a programmed area, and indeed did not really exist as a policy sector enabled before the mid-1970s. It’s inclusion comparisons to be made between programmed and unprogrammed policy approaches so that the relative significance of policy planning systems could be assessed. On the basis of the various comparisons that could be made between the three of policy sectors, not only could the operation policy planning systems be described, but hopefully, some of the reasons for their particular operation understood.’
How
Do Policy
Planning
Systems
Work? There is, of course, much that could be described from the work carried out.‘j Here we wish to concentrate on the matters that seem to be of most significance in the operation of policy planning systems. In doing this, we will use the 16-19 education policy sector as a counterpoint to TPPs and ICPPs. The latter were introduced into transportation and inner cities to change the process and outputs of policy-making. It becomes important to ask the questions of whether such policy planning systems produce solutions to the issues of inter-agency planning that work in the expected way; whether they reorganize the relationships between government agencies in ways that change the process of policy-making. To answer these questions, six salient operation were identified, namely :
features
(1) The
an
difficulties of organizational field.
(2) The (3) The
strategies
inter-
of those involved.
flow of information the locality.
(4) The importance of the system.
managing
of
between
of financial
the centre and
allocations
involved (5) The extent of innovation ing a policy planning system.
as part
in introduc-
(6) The extent to which the original circumstances for introducing the system remain stable.
Managing
an Inter-Organizational
Field It is a distinctive feature ofa policy planning system that it specifies the boundaries of the policy area in organizational terms. Once the agencies to be involved have been defined, it is a matter of organizing and managing that involvement. Thus, for TPPs and ICPPs the various organizations to be
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consulted, to have a role in planning and decisionmaking, and to receive allocations, were formally defined by the system. In 16-19 education, without a formal policy planning system, this was not the case and the definition of which governmental and quasi-governmental groups should be involved was difficult and relatively open-ended. It is, in fact, a feature of policy-making in most aspects of education that it is diffuse, fragmented and decentralized, with a relatively wide range of organizations involved. As such it represents a complicated inter-organizational field, steered by a series of informally understood procedures and relationships. With an area like 16-19 education, which hardly existed as a policy field 5 or 6 years ago, it is difficult to specify who should be involved and how, i.e. what the nature of the policy planning organization should be. The initial management of a set of interorganizational relationships requires the specification of who can and cannot be legitimately involved. A policy planning system doesjust that. It then acts as a legitimizing framework for those so specified. In this sense, the policy area can be managed by controlling and limiting the range of involvement. In the case of 16-19 education there are some groups who would like to see the introduction of a policy planning system for this reason, to limit involvement and exclude certain agencies from the process. A diffuse, fragmented process could be given order and clarity. In particular, central government would have a clearer view of the process and its own place in it. But the ideas of control and limitation were not really part of the initial thrust for TPPs, and especially ICPPs. While for transportation planning there was an element of ‘tidying up’ involvement, the system was mainly meant to ensure a wider degree of rational participation in planning. For Inner Cities, with its very strong emphasis on ‘partnership’ between agencies of government, the watchword was a wide ranging involvement of all bodies who had an interest in the policy area. Distinctively, ICPPs also went for a high level involvement of politicians from both the centre and the locality. For both systems, control was to be achieved by specifying involvement, by laying down procedures for completion of the planning cycle and by emplzasiziflg a poliryfocus. Limitation of participation was not an initial objective. In both transportation and inner cities it proved these inter-organizational difficult to manage relationships. This is not peculiar to policy planning systems. Wherever policy and resource allocation require organizations to work together, there arc issues of managing relationships. The difficulties that have occurred are largely to do with managing
1985 and controlling the range of involvement. With policy planning systems that emphasize a relatively wide range of organizational participation (especially so in the case of Inner Cities) there has to be an active commitment by the focal organization (e.g. the Department of the Environment or the partnership authority’) to achieving the necessary participation of all agencies and to ensuring that they have a role in the process. The emphasis on rationality and partnership tends to assume an intcrorganizational field that has an ‘automatic pilot’ built in for management purposes. The system is seen as managed by its procedures rather than by managers. In effect, the next 5 sections of the report take up this issue. They should be seen as outlining the causes of difficulties and consequent changes in relationships as policy planning systems were seen as either failing to deliver what was initially expected ot- them, or having to respond to circumstances different from those in which they were originally launched.
The Strategies
of Those Involved
Any planning system which involves a variety of agencies, whether explicitly and formally, as in the case of TPPs and ICPPs, or rather more informally and fragmented, as with 16-19 education, has to cope with the fact that the agencies have their own interests to pursue. This derives directly from the distribution of functions between tiers. Not only does any such distribution produce technical problems of co-ordinating services, e.g. social for the elderly and housing services provision provision in county areas, but it is liable to produce differences in perspectives, priorities and objectives. The inter-organizational planning process has to handle this. Because of an explicit commitment to managing a policy planning system the planning process, formally recognizes certain of these differences. But at the level of system design, and due to its underpinning by the rational model of decisionmaking, it is essentially technical differences that are recognized. The rational model, when applied to inter-organizational networks, suggests that the various agencies involved can come to a resolution of their differences, producing policies and priorities which are seen by all participants to be the differences is a matter of best. Ironing out demonstrating what is technically the best, something which will become apparent to all. A more fragmented and informal system such as occurs with 16-19 education tends to operate on rather different principles. There is more of a recognition that a variety of interests are involved and that there have to be processes of negotiation. are not self-evident, but Solutions to problems
Policy derive from political differences and differences in values and objectives. Of course, a policy planning is supposed to supplant a bargaining system approach but in fact it can only do this in a limited way. It cannot ignore the fact, in its operation, that the organizations involved are not interested in the same outcomes. Policy planning systems, like any policy system, act as a series of constraints and opportunities that are taken up and manipulated by the various organizations in the network in terms of their own interests. Those involved develop strategies about what they want to get out of the process and how they will go about getting it. Through the process of specification and clar~‘jcation, a policy planning system attempts to make certain what interests and subsequent strategies will be taken into account. What strategies and interests are actually followed in the areas examined here? Instructive is the fact that groups in central government were interested in developing a PPS for 16-19 education. This illustrates the usefulness of such a system to central government in two ways, namely, providing information and allowing intervention. Certainly, the DOE and DTp through their two planning systems are provided with a level of information that was not available to them prior to the existence of such A regular flow of information is systems. established. Also a set of processes which sequence and specify decision-making steps is provided which enable central gover.nment to make more decisive interventions. The strategy of the centre is control of policy and resource allocation and a PPS is helpful to this. As far as other agencies are concerned, some are more focal than others and this affects the nature of involvement. For TPPs it is the county which is central and the process is generally useful to the surveyor’s department. Usually (although not always), its strategy is to maximize allocations while playing down policy implications. This can mean co-operation with Regional Office and the DTp centrally, but conflict with other agencies such as the district authority and bus undertakings. These other organizations tend to have very specific interests. As a result they only take part in the process in a tangential way. The TPP system, being relatively specific in policy focus, largely serves the interests of the county and the DTp. Inner City Partnerships and Programmes are deliberately more diffuse (and more ambitious in inter-organizational terms). The whole notion of partnership is one that is nieant to embrace a wide range of interests in a new approach to policymaking. Because of this multiplicity of agencies there is considerable variation in values. strategies. interests and perceptions. In particular. the ICPP approach to policy planning points up the differences both within central government and
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within a local authority. Within the centre, the DOE had the responsibility for operating the in maintaining and process with an interest developing the system. This proved difficult both because of the lack of interest of many other government departments (and so the perceived failure of central government by some local authorities, to deliver its promise of partnership) and the difficulties of maintaining ministerial interest, another important initial promise of the system. Similarly, at the level of the local authority, it was should assume not always easy to see who responsibility for the operation of the partnership or programme. In a number of cases a unit within a local authority, such as corporate planning, has seen an advantage in taking responsibility because it gives the same kind of information and access that the overall PPS does for the DOE and its Regional Offices. But other parts of the local authority that are supposed to be involved, such as education or social services, may take a very different view of the system and their strategy may be to stop too much happening. The point is, that the inter-organizational nature of policy planning systems means that variety rather than uniformity is key. The variety inherent can be partly controlled by specification, but this cannot deal with the differences in outlook. These differences pressure the system away from a commitment to formal rationality towards negotiation and bargaining.
The Flow of Information A policy planning system (and indeed any policy system whether planned or not) involves a flow of information between the organizations in the network. A policy planning system attempts to structure the jlow of information through the specification of procedures and processes. These procedures lay down what information is to be collected, how it is to be processed, who is to deal with it and to whom it is to be transmitted. A policy planning system is supposed to change the nature and flow of information. It is meant to give a primacy to policy related topics as against those dealing with resource allocations. The setting up documents for both TPPs and ICPPs stressed the policy-led aspect of the systems. They also specified how this policy related information was to be handled and who was to be involved in the flow. Once again, the stress was on the interorganizational nature of involvements. A more fragmented system such as 16-19 education 15 less able to control the flow of information. It is unclear where responsibility lies because of the strong autonomy built into the policy system. One
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of the issues that arises for the centre, in this case, is the extent to which it is able to acquire the information that it needs for policy planning. With a policy planning system, central government departments become involved in dealing with new kinds of information. It is an important rationale of such systems that they increase the flow of information generally, and in particular, that they provide more information to central government departments. The DOE and DTp both regionally and centrally get access to the detailed policies of individual local authorities with the possibility of making interventions based on that information. But with this comes a difficulty, that of having the capacity in central government to handle this amount of information. It is often said by all governmental agencies, both central and local, that they would like more information about each other’s intentions; handling such information can be a formidable task. This is especially so when the original intentions are for logically organized general policy statements, followed by detailed policy arguments, leading to specific policy proposals, backed up by financial statements, all on a rolling programme basis. For many local authorities this may be a normal part of operation. The resources of people and expertise are already in place to handle the necessary processes. In the centre handling the amount of information generated has been a real problem. There is less likely to be either the capacity or the expertise to deal with local authority statements and proposals at the level of detail envisaged by the syrtem. As a result one can see the same process at work in both TPPs and ICPPs. Strategy considerations and the logic of the relationships between overall policy and specific projects can become a matter of lip emphasis switches to the service. The major programming of packages of projects within a mutual awareness of the ‘limits of the possible’. The information built into the original ideas underlying both TPPs and ICPPs was to allow three criteria of judgment to be used, namely, policy, progress and in processing process. Because of the difficulties information a relatively mechanical rule of progress came to be used more frequently. Once this movement had taken place it is a short step to evaluate proposals on financial rather than policy grounds. Other events pushed both TPPs and ICPPs in this direction. Evaluation through progress (time) and spending (finance) is easier than by means of policy content. The former two processes can be carried out quickly, efficiently and with accuracy. The latter is slower, subject to error and considerable debate with the agencies involved as to objectives and the relationships of programmes to objectives. To in effect downgrade the the requires of the systems policy content development of informal rules about what will be
1985 accepted and what will not. The regional offices become particularly important in this process, something which bolsters their commitment to policy planning systems.
Financial
Allocations
The ideas underlying policy planning systems emphasize equality of involvement and partnership. But any. inter-organizational network has relationships of relative dependence built in. The requirements of information produce dependencies, initially of the centre on the locality. The move to a simpler information and evaluation process pushes the balance of dependence towards the centre. If a financial allocation is part of the is planning process, then a resource dependency apparent.* In a policy system such as that for 16-19 education the balance of dependencies rests with local authorities and the other non-central agencies The DES is dependent on others for involved.’ information; ‘its’ resources are distributed through the general block grant; the legal situation and role of the centre in 16-19 education is by no means clear; there is no educational consensus on how to approach the issue; within central government there are several agencies involved in the issue, especially the Manpower Services Commission with its responsibility for job creation schemes and training. All of these factors work to distribute rather than concentrate dependencies. Not only is the DES interested in a policy planning system, but also in a block grant for education. This would potentially create major dependencies in favour of the centre with a convergence of legal, financial and decision-making resources. Both TPPs and ICPPs have grants tied to the process, tending to structure dependencies in favour of the centre. The rationale, from a local authority a programme or point of view, for becoming partnership authority is to acquire extra resources. It is ‘free’ money to be allocated outside major budget heads. To get this money a local authority is prepared to accommodate to the requirements of the centre. TPPs, of course, operate somewhat differently because they cover a complete class of authority rather than a group specially picked. But even so most local authorities want to receive grant, and as much as possible. Because of this it is to the advantage of local authorities to follow the and observe the requirements of the centre, informal rules. For most organizations involved in the process this is not necessarily seen as an issue, a dependency. It is only when something goes wrong that the dependencies become apparent; they are part of the structure of the inter-organizational relationships. But there are circumstances where the dependency
Policy created by a financial relationship does not work as predicted. The influence of a grant depends on its overall significance for the local authority concerned. For some ICPP and TPP authorities the relative amounts received are quite small in relation to their total budgets, so their room for manoeuvre is increased. Also, a resource, from the point of view of a local authority, is the political will of the members. The particular policy area may not be a high priority and the members may be resistant to central government attempts to change their priorities. Where the balance of dependence changes due to resources other than financial, then the centre has to be open to influence itself in order to influence local authorities. But in general, the existence of a grant turns the balance towards the allocator. It is this fact that underpins the debate about a block grant for education.
The Extent
of Innovation
Two further aspects are important about policy planning systems. One is that, because of their strong idealistic nature, they tend to be overambitious, promising more than they can reasonably deliver. The other aspect is that there are always prior inter-organizational relations, procedures and processes into which they are introduced. Both TPPs and ICPPs are the latest in a line of attempts to grapple with transportation and urban deprivation. TPPs were primarily seen as tidying up existing inter-organizational relationships and providing a clear policy-led focus. As such it was somewhat less ambitious than ICPPs. The latter was heralded as a new initiative which would bring together central government departments, local authorities and other agencies in a qualitatively new set of relationships. Partnerships in particular represented an attempt to innovate in a new and different way. The partnerships represent an attempt to set up organizations and processes which symbolize the working together of a variety of agencies. They also had the highly symbolic aspect of politicians at the various levels working together. A leavening of failure was inevitable because of the degree of innovation in structures and practices. But partnerships were set up, did operate to distribute urban aid and did produce programmes to combat deprivation. The TPP and the programme authorities are a much more limited innovation than the partnership. The programme authorities within the urban programme operate much more as do TPP authorities and could be judged as a limited success in terms of the original objectives of both outcomes
Planning
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and process. Even so, both TPP and programme authorities have had to wrestle with new ways of doing things, as have the DTp, DOE and regional offices. A policy planning system is innovative in the sense that it attempts to change the structure and processes in a network of relationships. With TPPs and ICPPs it has proved difficult to alter the standard, known patterns of relationship. The involvement of district councils and bus operators in the case of the former and of a wide range of departments of state, health and water authorities in the latter has been achieved only patchily. Involvement is related to interests and what one has to gain through such involvement. In interorganizational relationships, known ways of operating continue in the face of new requirements. This is not to say that policy planning systems have not altered sets of relationships; they quite clearly have. Rather, they have had to battle against established ways of operating which may be antithetical to the aims of the new organization. It is also in the nature of policy planning systems that they attempt to specify as many aspects of their operation as possible. Although on the surface a policy planning system is a quite detailed policy instrument, the amount of explicit guidance on how to operate has been small. As a result implicit, informal rules and processes, only discernible from practice, have grown up and often these are more related to known ways of operating rather than the aims of the innovation. The development of a policy field of education for 16-19 year olds is the latest in a line of reconceptualizations of crucial educational issues. This goes together with the reconstruction of organizational forms. The attempt to develop new forms and processes in this area of policy-making shows up quite starkly the attempt at innovation. An attempt in any area of education to produce a defined, systematized, formalized, programmatic system and organization is a break that is evident (and meant) from existing practices and cultures. It illustrates, as do the two actual systems of TPPs and ICPPs, the way in which a policy planning system is an innovation that is meant to mark a fresh approach to problem solving.
The Stability of Continuing Circumstances Change in central-local relations is endemic. It results from the changing issues with which government agencies have to deal. The particular ways in which those issues are dealt with is greatly determined by what those in power see as the contingent circumstances. The heyday of the rational planning approach to issue resolution came in the late 1960s and early 1970s. At that time
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resources were seen as relatively unproblematic, the role of government was thought to be essentially positive and planning was an obvious good. Hence, the rise of the policy planning system to harness these circumstances in a positive, policy oriented way. The environment in which the original innovations were planned has not remained static. Ideas change; resources change; priorities change. The efficacy of policy oriented, programmatic approaches has come under question. The availability of finance has altered, with resource constraint becoming a major issue. Priorities, explanations and definitions of needs and causes in all three policy sectors have changed. As a result of this variation since the circumstances of introduction, the network of inter-organizational relationships changes, the sets of interests involved alters and the processes are used to transmit different messages. Actually, this ability to use a policy planning system for a variety of purposes marks its utility and flexibility, especially for the centre. Both TPPs and ICPPs have been used to re-orient the spending priorities and patterns of local authorities, not as a matter ofjoint determination but through central government direction. Again, part of the desire of some for an educational policy planning system is to have more direct access and control over local authority policy and resource allocation. The operation ofpolicy-making systems, no matter what the claims made for them, cannot be divorced from the wider concerns of the government of the day. A specified, programmatic system provides a mechanism for passing whatever messages are required. The process of making decisions about public expenditure as a whole affects the operation of policy planning systems. Increasingly, from a central government perspective we have seen the decline of an interest in policy planning as a system for its own sake, to a much more instrumental view. Any policy-making system is an entity which adapts to changing sets of circumstances. There are points, though, at which the changes take the system so far away from the original aims and form that something qualitatively of organization different has occurred. At one point it seemed that this was likely to happen with partnerships with the attempt to use them to penalize overspending. With a planning system in place it may well be easier for the centre to change the directions of policy and resource allocation without having to make it a public matter.
In Conclusion Hopefully from what has been outlined it will be clear that policy planning systems do make a difference to the process of policy formulation and
1985 resource allocation although not always in the intended way. They have not necessarily radically altered policy outcomes as a result of their rational, policy oriented, programmatic base. TPPs, one might argue, were not meant to lead to radical change, but more a process of ‘tidying up’ a policy area. ICPPs have led to a concentration of effort on the problems associated with urban deprivation. Policy planning systems have made a difference in an organizational and instrumental sense. They have specified sets of inter-organizational relationships and processes which represent genuinely new and different networks. This is particularly the case for inner city partnerships, in spite of difficulties inherent in what was being attempted. These networks have been valuable, both in bringing together sets of previously unrelated interests, and forcing them to co-relate; and also from the viewpoint of central government in providing mechanisms for signalling and controlling changes in policy direction through decisions about resource allocation. This success is reflected in the attempts to bring more system and programme into the 16-19 education area because of the presumed benefits to both policy-making and control. A prime purpose of policy planrling systems has been to change and improve the process of policymaking. This is a difficult undertaking. Any attempt to improve a system usually offers more than is eventually delivered. This paper suggests that policy planning systems have delivered less than they promised due to problems inherent in managing any inter-agency system. These problems centre around gaining commitment of those involved (and recognizing that it will be differential); dealing with the flows of information generated; coping with the resource dependencies involved; handling the amount of innovation that is entailed; and reacting to changing contingent circumstances. All ofthese mean that implementing a policy planning system is about organizing for, and managing change.‘O The fact that there will be difficulties does not nullify the attempt. Decision-makers and practitioners do not start from ‘what is’ as ‘what must be’, although they may recognize the difficulty of moving from the former to the latter. Policy planning systems were meant to change things towards what was seen as a more desirable end state. In doing that, those responsible have to be aware of the magnitude of what they are attempting and face the issues that have been raised here. Practitioners have to recognize that policy planning systems are not necessarily seen as efficient, rational tools by those who have to operate them. While at a cognitive level participants may agree on the utility of policy planning and programmed implementation, it is only when such systems are made
Policy operational that those involved can start to come to terms with the emotional impact they will have. A designer of any system has to be aware that he is always asking people to change their behaviour and usually requiring them to change their attitudes. In doing this he has to demonstrate that it is worth their while to become committed to the change. One of the main lessons of the policy planning system dealt with here is that the problems tend to be magnified when the system is an interorganizational one. Three things in particular needed to be attended to much more than they were. Spending more time on them might have ensured more success:
(1) The
designers should have spent more time on checking out the variety of differences between those expected to be involved in the new systems. Because systems designers tend to be committed to their own ideas they become adept at ignoring real differences of interest. Inter-organizational planning systems try to combine quite wide differences and so have to handle consequent conflicts. There is no ‘pure’ rationality that will produce agreed solutions to problems. Conflicts that are bound to occur can only be handled within the system if there is a high level of commitment to the usefulness of that system.
Planning
planning systems operate (3) Inter-organizational within complex sets of relationships. If they manage to operate, in the sense of producing the necessary information, policies and programmes, they generate a great deal of work. In neither of the two PPSs dealt with here wag there sufficient capacity in either central or local government to deal with the processes and their output in the way envisaged by an ideal system. If there is actually going to be a process of evaluating policies, examining the rationality of programme documents and their relationship to policies, and evaluating progress, then considerable manpower is needed. Because of
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45
the symbolic significance of the planning systems, the amount of extra work involved was played down. Designers have to make better estimates of what they arc asking from those responsible for operations. With both central and local government currently to cut back under a great deal of pressure expenditures and reduce manpower, the outlook for policy planning both internally and interagency is not good. It is precisely in the area of planning that cuts have been and are taking place. Because of the perceived partial failure of policy planning their relevance is questioned. It is only by demonstrating their usefulness to the taxers that such systems will survive.
Notes
and Reference3
(1)
C. R. Hinings, S. Leach, S. Ranson and C. K. Skelcher, Planning Systems in Central-Local Relations, Report Social Science Research Council (1983).
(2)
C. R. Hinings, Policy planning systems. and central-local relations, in: G. Jones (ed.). New Approaches to the Study of Central-Local Relationships, SSRC/Gower (1980).
(3)
J. 0. McLaughlin, Urban Approach, Faber (1969).
(4)
Planning Systems Research Project, Final Report, School for Advanced Urban Studies, University of Bristol (1977). Also see M. Stewart, Some of the issues in planning systems development and J. Earwicker, Service plans as corporate hazards, both in Corporate Planning Journal, 4 (3) (1978).
(5)
The actual research, supported by the Social Science Research Council, looked at 7 TPP authorities, 6 ICPP authorities and 7 local education authorities. An interview program was carried out in those authorities, departments of state at regional and national level, and other public agencies involved in the process.
(6)
Further details of the approach adopted in the research and the various results can be found in Hinings et al. (1983) op. cit.; Hmings (1980) op. cit.; S. Ranson et al., Domination and Distribution in Policy Planning Networks, I.L.G.S. (mimeo) (1980).
(7)
The central government department responsible for the Inner Cities programme is the Department of the Environment (DOE). It has an Inner Cities Directorate to organize the planning process and to draw in other areas of the DOE as necessary. The TPP system is managed, at central government level, by the Department of Transport Both of these departments have a number of regional offices outside London which are actively involved in the policy planning systems.
(8)
For a general view of organizational theories of resource dependency see J. Pfeffer and G. Salancik, The ExternalControl of Organizations, Harper & Row (1978). For its application to the study of central-local relations, see R. Rhodes, Controoland Power in Central-Local Government Relations, Gower (1981).
(9)
Education is a local authonty function with each local authority that is responsible for education having a separate education department. At central government level there is the Department of Education and Science (DES). It does not operate through local offices.
(2) It
is important to clarify the responsibility for ensuring that the policy planning system is working. Within organizations this is usually the responsibility of a planning unit. For interorganizational planning systems the focus of responsibility is liable to be lost. This certainly tended to be the case for ICPPs with its emphasis on partnership. In these situations it is easy for MO one to feel responsible. Designers cannot assume that a system will run itself. Either it requires clear hierarchical responsibility or the provision of a special inter-agency unit.
and Central-Local
(10)
and Regional
Planning:
Policy to the
A Systems
See C. R. Hinings, Organizational change and organlzlng change, Local Government Studies. 7 (1981).
for
Long Range Planning, Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 38 to 45, 1985 Printed in Great Britain
0024-6301/85 $3.00 + .OO Pergamon Press Ltd.
Policy Planning and Central-Local Relations Bob Hinings, Professor of Organixational Analysis, Uniuersity of Alberta, Leach, Stewart Ranson and Chris Skelchev, Institute of Local Government University of Birmingham
This paper is based on research carried out at the Institute of Local Government Studies at the University of Birmingham. Policy Planning Systems are ways of dealing with the division of functions between central and local government and they provide a structure for the flow of information by means of specified procedures and processes. As this tends to create an increased flow of work, this area of planning is threatened by central and local government cut-backs in expenditure and manpower, and may wellonlysurvive by a positive demonstration of its usefulness.
Introduction Central-local relations involve a network of interorganizational relations which have to be controlled and managed. The network arises from the distribution of functions between various levels and agencies of government. In attempting to manage this distribution of functions, the agencies involved have to deal with issues of policy formulation and their operational implementation. One way of attempting to manage such an inter-agency network is to redistribute the functions on to what seems a more logical basis in relation to changing priorities. This does occur from time to time, either on a major scale, as when the whole of local government in England and Wales was organized in 1974, or on a more modest scale, as with changes in the balance of responsibilities between central government departments in London and their territorial offices in the various regions of England and Wales. Another way of managing inter-organizational relations is to recognize their permanence and set up a system for inter-agency planning. Policy Planning Systems (PPSs) are ways of dealing with the division of functions between central and local government. A policy planning system is an instrument for Bob Hinings iscurrently Professor of Organizational Analysis, Faculty of Business, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. The other authors are lecturers at the Institute of Local Government Studies, University of Birmingham.
Steve Studies,
making explicit, formalizing and regulating the relations between objectives, policies and finance in a particular policy sector.’ It is premised on a version of the rational model of policy-making with at least a medium-term planning horizon. The idea of rolling programmes and mechanisms of review are built in. Policy planning systems are programmatic and future oriented. The future orientation is the planning element in policy; the programmatic nature is the systematic, procedural, cyclical element.* A policy planning system is different from a ‘policy system’. The latter is purely ‘a set of interconnected parts, interacting so as to form a complex whole’ with respect to a particular policy area.3 A policy planning system is introduced into such an existing system of relations and procedures. A policy system is likely to be much less developed in terms of explicitness, rationality, formalization and may not involve a programmatic element. The distinction between a policy system and a policy planning system is important because the latter are normally inserted into the former. Wherever a number of agencies have to interact there will be a system to ‘produce’ policy in the conventional cybernetic sense. An existing policy system incorporates a set of organizations with associated political, managerial and professional together with formal and informal interests, procedures. The introduction of a PPS is often an attempt to specify more clearly the existing system, or to demonstrate that a necessary change is taking place. To a significant extent, the fate of a policy planning system will be dependent on the way it is ‘taken up’ by the existing policy system.
The
Nature
of Policy
Planning
Systems With the planning mood of the 1960s and early 1970s there was a rise of policy planning in both
Policy local and central government in Britain. In one piece of research, as many as 22 different planning systems were identified.4 More than half of them involved some form of relationship between local authorities and central government, attempting to regularize that relationship by means of policy and resource planning. There are many differences between these various initiatives. The common element is an attempt to formalize and plan the network of relationships between governmental agencies at the centre and those at the locality. Some are more policy oriented than others; some involve a strong element of resource allocation and the distribution of grant. Some are primarily concerned with helping the planning of central government; others emphasize ideas of partnership between agencies. Essentially there are three kinds of differences between policy planning systems, namely :
(1) Their
level of specificity: some, such as Structure Plans, deal with interrelated sets of problems and functional areas; others, such as Housing Investment Programmes, cover a relatively discrete activity.
(2) Whether
they have a substantive or resource such as Transportation orientation: some, Policies and Programmes, are primarily concerned with substantive policy issues; others such as PESC concentrate on resource allocation.
relative roles of central and local (3) The government: there are those systems where the is primarily a base for local authority information collection as against those which aim at better planning and policy coordination between the various agencies of government. The aim of this paper is to draw out some salient features of the operation of policy planning systems from research into three substantive policy areas. Two policy areas with rather different forms of policy planning were examined, system Transportation Policies and Programmes (TPPs) and Inner City Partnerships and Programmes (ICPPs). As the name implies, TPPs are concerned with the development and implementation of policies for transport, dealing with issues such as road planning, bus systems and railroad integration. ICPPs were set up to deal with issues of multiple deprivation arising in the inner areas of large cities. Both systems were designed to bring central and local government closer together and to involve non-governmental agencies in planning. Note, in terms of the differences outlined above, TPPs are specific, substantive (with a strong element of resource allocation) and ‘driven’ by central government. ICPPs are corporate, substantive (with an element of resource allocation) and emphasize the partnership of a wide range of agencies.
Planning
and Central-Local
39
Relations
Taking up the distinction between a policy system and a policy planning system, a third policy area was examined, that of the provision of education for 16-19 year olds. This is not a programmed area, and indeed did not really exist as a policy sector enabled before the mid-1970s. It’s inclusion comparisons to be made between programmed and unprogrammed policy approaches so that the relative significance of policy planning systems could be assessed. On the basis of the various comparisons that could be made between the three of policy sectors, not only could the operation policy planning systems be described, but hopefully, some of the reasons for their particular operation understood.’
How
Do Policy
Planning
Systems
Work? There is, of course, much that could be described from the work carried out.‘j Here we wish to concentrate on the matters that seem to be of most significance in the operation of policy planning systems. In doing this, we will use the 16-19 education policy sector as a counterpoint to TPPs and ICPPs. The latter were introduced into transportation and inner cities to change the process and outputs of policy-making. It becomes important to ask the questions of whether such policy planning systems produce solutions to the issues of inter-agency planning that work in the expected way; whether they reorganize the relationships between government agencies in ways that change the process of policy-making. To answer these questions, six salient operation were identified, namely :
features
(1) The
an
difficulties of organizational field.
(2) The (3) The
strategies
inter-
of those involved.
flow of information the locality.
(4) The importance of the system.
managing
of
between
of financial
the centre and
allocations
involved (5) The extent of innovation ing a policy planning system.
as part
in introduc-
(6) The extent to which the original circumstances for introducing the system remain stable.
Managing
an Inter-Organizational
Field It is a distinctive feature ofa policy planning system that it specifies the boundaries of the policy area in organizational terms. Once the agencies to be involved have been defined, it is a matter of organizing and managing that involvement. Thus, for TPPs and ICPPs the various organizations to be
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consulted, to have a role in planning and decisionmaking, and to receive allocations, were formally defined by the system. In 16-19 education, without a formal policy planning system, this was not the case and the definition of which governmental and quasi-governmental groups should be involved was difficult and relatively open-ended. It is, in fact, a feature of policy-making in most aspects of education that it is diffuse, fragmented and decentralized, with a relatively wide range of organizations involved. As such it represents a complicated inter-organizational field, steered by a series of informally understood procedures and relationships. With an area like 16-19 education, which hardly existed as a policy field 5 or 6 years ago, it is difficult to specify who should be involved and how, i.e. what the nature of the policy planning organization should be. The initial management of a set of interorganizational relationships requires the specification of who can and cannot be legitimately involved. A policy planning system doesjust that. It then acts as a legitimizing framework for those so specified. In this sense, the policy area can be managed by controlling and limiting the range of involvement. In the case of 16-19 education there are some groups who would like to see the introduction of a policy planning system for this reason, to limit involvement and exclude certain agencies from the process. A diffuse, fragmented process could be given order and clarity. In particular, central government would have a clearer view of the process and its own place in it. But the ideas of control and limitation were not really part of the initial thrust for TPPs, and especially ICPPs. While for transportation planning there was an element of ‘tidying up’ involvement, the system was mainly meant to ensure a wider degree of rational participation in planning. For Inner Cities, with its very strong emphasis on ‘partnership’ between agencies of government, the watchword was a wide ranging involvement of all bodies who had an interest in the policy area. Distinctively, ICPPs also went for a high level involvement of politicians from both the centre and the locality. For both systems, control was to be achieved by specifying involvement, by laying down procedures for completion of the planning cycle and by emplzasiziflg a poliryfocus. Limitation of participation was not an initial objective. In both transportation and inner cities it proved these inter-organizational difficult to manage relationships. This is not peculiar to policy planning systems. Wherever policy and resource allocation require organizations to work together, there arc issues of managing relationships. The difficulties that have occurred are largely to do with managing
1985 and controlling the range of involvement. With policy planning systems that emphasize a relatively wide range of organizational participation (especially so in the case of Inner Cities) there has to be an active commitment by the focal organization (e.g. the Department of the Environment or the partnership authority’) to achieving the necessary participation of all agencies and to ensuring that they have a role in the process. The emphasis on rationality and partnership tends to assume an intcrorganizational field that has an ‘automatic pilot’ built in for management purposes. The system is seen as managed by its procedures rather than by managers. In effect, the next 5 sections of the report take up this issue. They should be seen as outlining the causes of difficulties and consequent changes in relationships as policy planning systems were seen as either failing to deliver what was initially expected ot- them, or having to respond to circumstances different from those in which they were originally launched.
The Strategies
of Those Involved
Any planning system which involves a variety of agencies, whether explicitly and formally, as in the case of TPPs and ICPPs, or rather more informally and fragmented, as with 16-19 education, has to cope with the fact that the agencies have their own interests to pursue. This derives directly from the distribution of functions between tiers. Not only does any such distribution produce technical problems of co-ordinating services, e.g. social for the elderly and housing services provision provision in county areas, but it is liable to produce differences in perspectives, priorities and objectives. The inter-organizational planning process has to handle this. Because of an explicit commitment to managing a policy planning system the planning process, formally recognizes certain of these differences. But at the level of system design, and due to its underpinning by the rational model of decisionmaking, it is essentially technical differences that are recognized. The rational model, when applied to inter-organizational networks, suggests that the various agencies involved can come to a resolution of their differences, producing policies and priorities which are seen by all participants to be the differences is a matter of best. Ironing out demonstrating what is technically the best, something which will become apparent to all. A more fragmented and informal system such as occurs with 16-19 education tends to operate on rather different principles. There is more of a recognition that a variety of interests are involved and that there have to be processes of negotiation. are not self-evident, but Solutions to problems
Policy derive from political differences and differences in values and objectives. Of course, a policy planning is supposed to supplant a bargaining system approach but in fact it can only do this in a limited way. It cannot ignore the fact, in its operation, that the organizations involved are not interested in the same outcomes. Policy planning systems, like any policy system, act as a series of constraints and opportunities that are taken up and manipulated by the various organizations in the network in terms of their own interests. Those involved develop strategies about what they want to get out of the process and how they will go about getting it. Through the process of specification and clar~‘jcation, a policy planning system attempts to make certain what interests and subsequent strategies will be taken into account. What strategies and interests are actually followed in the areas examined here? Instructive is the fact that groups in central government were interested in developing a PPS for 16-19 education. This illustrates the usefulness of such a system to central government in two ways, namely, providing information and allowing intervention. Certainly, the DOE and DTp through their two planning systems are provided with a level of information that was not available to them prior to the existence of such A regular flow of information is systems. established. Also a set of processes which sequence and specify decision-making steps is provided which enable central gover.nment to make more decisive interventions. The strategy of the centre is control of policy and resource allocation and a PPS is helpful to this. As far as other agencies are concerned, some are more focal than others and this affects the nature of involvement. For TPPs it is the county which is central and the process is generally useful to the surveyor’s department. Usually (although not always), its strategy is to maximize allocations while playing down policy implications. This can mean co-operation with Regional Office and the DTp centrally, but conflict with other agencies such as the district authority and bus undertakings. These other organizations tend to have very specific interests. As a result they only take part in the process in a tangential way. The TPP system, being relatively specific in policy focus, largely serves the interests of the county and the DTp. Inner City Partnerships and Programmes are deliberately more diffuse (and more ambitious in inter-organizational terms). The whole notion of partnership is one that is nieant to embrace a wide range of interests in a new approach to policymaking. Because of this multiplicity of agencies there is considerable variation in values. strategies. interests and perceptions. In particular. the ICPP approach to policy planning points up the differences both within central government and
Planning
and Central-Local
Relations
41
within a local authority. Within the centre, the DOE had the responsibility for operating the in maintaining and process with an interest developing the system. This proved difficult both because of the lack of interest of many other government departments (and so the perceived failure of central government by some local authorities, to deliver its promise of partnership) and the difficulties of maintaining ministerial interest, another important initial promise of the system. Similarly, at the level of the local authority, it was should assume not always easy to see who responsibility for the operation of the partnership or programme. In a number of cases a unit within a local authority, such as corporate planning, has seen an advantage in taking responsibility because it gives the same kind of information and access that the overall PPS does for the DOE and its Regional Offices. But other parts of the local authority that are supposed to be involved, such as education or social services, may take a very different view of the system and their strategy may be to stop too much happening. The point is, that the inter-organizational nature of policy planning systems means that variety rather than uniformity is key. The variety inherent can be partly controlled by specification, but this cannot deal with the differences in outlook. These differences pressure the system away from a commitment to formal rationality towards negotiation and bargaining.
The Flow of Information A policy planning system (and indeed any policy system whether planned or not) involves a flow of information between the organizations in the network. A policy planning system attempts to structure the jlow of information through the specification of procedures and processes. These procedures lay down what information is to be collected, how it is to be processed, who is to deal with it and to whom it is to be transmitted. A policy planning system is supposed to change the nature and flow of information. It is meant to give a primacy to policy related topics as against those dealing with resource allocations. The setting up documents for both TPPs and ICPPs stressed the policy-led aspect of the systems. They also specified how this policy related information was to be handled and who was to be involved in the flow. Once again, the stress was on the interorganizational nature of involvements. A more fragmented system such as 16-19 education 15 less able to control the flow of information. It is unclear where responsibility lies because of the strong autonomy built into the policy system. One
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of the issues that arises for the centre, in this case, is the extent to which it is able to acquire the information that it needs for policy planning. With a policy planning system, central government departments become involved in dealing with new kinds of information. It is an important rationale of such systems that they increase the flow of information generally, and in particular, that they provide more information to central government departments. The DOE and DTp both regionally and centrally get access to the detailed policies of individual local authorities with the possibility of making interventions based on that information. But with this comes a difficulty, that of having the capacity in central government to handle this amount of information. It is often said by all governmental agencies, both central and local, that they would like more information about each other’s intentions; handling such information can be a formidable task. This is especially so when the original intentions are for logically organized general policy statements, followed by detailed policy arguments, leading to specific policy proposals, backed up by financial statements, all on a rolling programme basis. For many local authorities this may be a normal part of operation. The resources of people and expertise are already in place to handle the necessary processes. In the centre handling the amount of information generated has been a real problem. There is less likely to be either the capacity or the expertise to deal with local authority statements and proposals at the level of detail envisaged by the syrtem. As a result one can see the same process at work in both TPPs and ICPPs. Strategy considerations and the logic of the relationships between overall policy and specific projects can become a matter of lip emphasis switches to the service. The major programming of packages of projects within a mutual awareness of the ‘limits of the possible’. The information built into the original ideas underlying both TPPs and ICPPs was to allow three criteria of judgment to be used, namely, policy, progress and in processing process. Because of the difficulties information a relatively mechanical rule of progress came to be used more frequently. Once this movement had taken place it is a short step to evaluate proposals on financial rather than policy grounds. Other events pushed both TPPs and ICPPs in this direction. Evaluation through progress (time) and spending (finance) is easier than by means of policy content. The former two processes can be carried out quickly, efficiently and with accuracy. The latter is slower, subject to error and considerable debate with the agencies involved as to objectives and the relationships of programmes to objectives. To in effect downgrade the the requires of the systems policy content development of informal rules about what will be
1985 accepted and what will not. The regional offices become particularly important in this process, something which bolsters their commitment to policy planning systems.
Financial
Allocations
The ideas underlying policy planning systems emphasize equality of involvement and partnership. But any. inter-organizational network has relationships of relative dependence built in. The requirements of information produce dependencies, initially of the centre on the locality. The move to a simpler information and evaluation process pushes the balance of dependence towards the centre. If a financial allocation is part of the is planning process, then a resource dependency apparent.* In a policy system such as that for 16-19 education the balance of dependencies rests with local authorities and the other non-central agencies The DES is dependent on others for involved.’ information; ‘its’ resources are distributed through the general block grant; the legal situation and role of the centre in 16-19 education is by no means clear; there is no educational consensus on how to approach the issue; within central government there are several agencies involved in the issue, especially the Manpower Services Commission with its responsibility for job creation schemes and training. All of these factors work to distribute rather than concentrate dependencies. Not only is the DES interested in a policy planning system, but also in a block grant for education. This would potentially create major dependencies in favour of the centre with a convergence of legal, financial and decision-making resources. Both TPPs and ICPPs have grants tied to the process, tending to structure dependencies in favour of the centre. The rationale, from a local authority a programme or point of view, for becoming partnership authority is to acquire extra resources. It is ‘free’ money to be allocated outside major budget heads. To get this money a local authority is prepared to accommodate to the requirements of the centre. TPPs, of course, operate somewhat differently because they cover a complete class of authority rather than a group specially picked. But even so most local authorities want to receive grant, and as much as possible. Because of this it is to the advantage of local authorities to follow the and observe the requirements of the centre, informal rules. For most organizations involved in the process this is not necessarily seen as an issue, a dependency. It is only when something goes wrong that the dependencies become apparent; they are part of the structure of the inter-organizational relationships. But there are circumstances where the dependency
Policy created by a financial relationship does not work as predicted. The influence of a grant depends on its overall significance for the local authority concerned. For some ICPP and TPP authorities the relative amounts received are quite small in relation to their total budgets, so their room for manoeuvre is increased. Also, a resource, from the point of view of a local authority, is the political will of the members. The particular policy area may not be a high priority and the members may be resistant to central government attempts to change their priorities. Where the balance of dependence changes due to resources other than financial, then the centre has to be open to influence itself in order to influence local authorities. But in general, the existence of a grant turns the balance towards the allocator. It is this fact that underpins the debate about a block grant for education.
The Extent
of Innovation
Two further aspects are important about policy planning systems. One is that, because of their strong idealistic nature, they tend to be overambitious, promising more than they can reasonably deliver. The other aspect is that there are always prior inter-organizational relations, procedures and processes into which they are introduced. Both TPPs and ICPPs are the latest in a line of attempts to grapple with transportation and urban deprivation. TPPs were primarily seen as tidying up existing inter-organizational relationships and providing a clear policy-led focus. As such it was somewhat less ambitious than ICPPs. The latter was heralded as a new initiative which would bring together central government departments, local authorities and other agencies in a qualitatively new set of relationships. Partnerships in particular represented an attempt to innovate in a new and different way. The partnerships represent an attempt to set up organizations and processes which symbolize the working together of a variety of agencies. They also had the highly symbolic aspect of politicians at the various levels working together. A leavening of failure was inevitable because of the degree of innovation in structures and practices. But partnerships were set up, did operate to distribute urban aid and did produce programmes to combat deprivation. The TPP and the programme authorities are a much more limited innovation than the partnership. The programme authorities within the urban programme operate much more as do TPP authorities and could be judged as a limited success in terms of the original objectives of both outcomes
Planning
and Central-Local
Relations
43
and process. Even so, both TPP and programme authorities have had to wrestle with new ways of doing things, as have the DTp, DOE and regional offices. A policy planning system is innovative in the sense that it attempts to change the structure and processes in a network of relationships. With TPPs and ICPPs it has proved difficult to alter the standard, known patterns of relationship. The involvement of district councils and bus operators in the case of the former and of a wide range of departments of state, health and water authorities in the latter has been achieved only patchily. Involvement is related to interests and what one has to gain through such involvement. In interorganizational relationships, known ways of operating continue in the face of new requirements. This is not to say that policy planning systems have not altered sets of relationships; they quite clearly have. Rather, they have had to battle against established ways of operating which may be antithetical to the aims of the new organization. It is also in the nature of policy planning systems that they attempt to specify as many aspects of their operation as possible. Although on the surface a policy planning system is a quite detailed policy instrument, the amount of explicit guidance on how to operate has been small. As a result implicit, informal rules and processes, only discernible from practice, have grown up and often these are more related to known ways of operating rather than the aims of the innovation. The development of a policy field of education for 16-19 year olds is the latest in a line of reconceptualizations of crucial educational issues. This goes together with the reconstruction of organizational forms. The attempt to develop new forms and processes in this area of policy-making shows up quite starkly the attempt at innovation. An attempt in any area of education to produce a defined, systematized, formalized, programmatic system and organization is a break that is evident (and meant) from existing practices and cultures. It illustrates, as do the two actual systems of TPPs and ICPPs, the way in which a policy planning system is an innovation that is meant to mark a fresh approach to problem solving.
The Stability of Continuing Circumstances Change in central-local relations is endemic. It results from the changing issues with which government agencies have to deal. The particular ways in which those issues are dealt with is greatly determined by what those in power see as the contingent circumstances. The heyday of the rational planning approach to issue resolution came in the late 1960s and early 1970s. At that time
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resources were seen as relatively unproblematic, the role of government was thought to be essentially positive and planning was an obvious good. Hence, the rise of the policy planning system to harness these circumstances in a positive, policy oriented way. The environment in which the original innovations were planned has not remained static. Ideas change; resources change; priorities change. The efficacy of policy oriented, programmatic approaches has come under question. The availability of finance has altered, with resource constraint becoming a major issue. Priorities, explanations and definitions of needs and causes in all three policy sectors have changed. As a result of this variation since the circumstances of introduction, the network of inter-organizational relationships changes, the sets of interests involved alters and the processes are used to transmit different messages. Actually, this ability to use a policy planning system for a variety of purposes marks its utility and flexibility, especially for the centre. Both TPPs and ICPPs have been used to re-orient the spending priorities and patterns of local authorities, not as a matter ofjoint determination but through central government direction. Again, part of the desire of some for an educational policy planning system is to have more direct access and control over local authority policy and resource allocation. The operation ofpolicy-making systems, no matter what the claims made for them, cannot be divorced from the wider concerns of the government of the day. A specified, programmatic system provides a mechanism for passing whatever messages are required. The process of making decisions about public expenditure as a whole affects the operation of policy planning systems. Increasingly, from a central government perspective we have seen the decline of an interest in policy planning as a system for its own sake, to a much more instrumental view. Any policy-making system is an entity which adapts to changing sets of circumstances. There are points, though, at which the changes take the system so far away from the original aims and form that something qualitatively of organization different has occurred. At one point it seemed that this was likely to happen with partnerships with the attempt to use them to penalize overspending. With a planning system in place it may well be easier for the centre to change the directions of policy and resource allocation without having to make it a public matter.
In Conclusion Hopefully from what has been outlined it will be clear that policy planning systems do make a difference to the process of policy formulation and
1985 resource allocation although not always in the intended way. They have not necessarily radically altered policy outcomes as a result of their rational, policy oriented, programmatic base. TPPs, one might argue, were not meant to lead to radical change, but more a process of ‘tidying up’ a policy area. ICPPs have led to a concentration of effort on the problems associated with urban deprivation. Policy planning systems have made a difference in an organizational and instrumental sense. They have specified sets of inter-organizational relationships and processes which represent genuinely new and different networks. This is particularly the case for inner city partnerships, in spite of difficulties inherent in what was being attempted. These networks have been valuable, both in bringing together sets of previously unrelated interests, and forcing them to co-relate; and also from the viewpoint of central government in providing mechanisms for signalling and controlling changes in policy direction through decisions about resource allocation. This success is reflected in the attempts to bring more system and programme into the 16-19 education area because of the presumed benefits to both policy-making and control. A prime purpose of policy planrling systems has been to change and improve the process of policymaking. This is a difficult undertaking. Any attempt to improve a system usually offers more than is eventually delivered. This paper suggests that policy planning systems have delivered less than they promised due to problems inherent in managing any inter-agency system. These problems centre around gaining commitment of those involved (and recognizing that it will be differential); dealing with the flows of information generated; coping with the resource dependencies involved; handling the amount of innovation that is entailed; and reacting to changing contingent circumstances. All ofthese mean that implementing a policy planning system is about organizing for, and managing change.‘O The fact that there will be difficulties does not nullify the attempt. Decision-makers and practitioners do not start from ‘what is’ as ‘what must be’, although they may recognize the difficulty of moving from the former to the latter. Policy planning systems were meant to change things towards what was seen as a more desirable end state. In doing that, those responsible have to be aware of the magnitude of what they are attempting and face the issues that have been raised here. Practitioners have to recognize that policy planning systems are not necessarily seen as efficient, rational tools by those who have to operate them. While at a cognitive level participants may agree on the utility of policy planning and programmed implementation, it is only when such systems are made
Policy operational that those involved can start to come to terms with the emotional impact they will have. A designer of any system has to be aware that he is always asking people to change their behaviour and usually requiring them to change their attitudes. In doing this he has to demonstrate that it is worth their while to become committed to the change. One of the main lessons of the policy planning system dealt with here is that the problems tend to be magnified when the system is an interorganizational one. Three things in particular needed to be attended to much more than they were. Spending more time on them might have ensured more success:
(1) The
designers should have spent more time on checking out the variety of differences between those expected to be involved in the new systems. Because systems designers tend to be committed to their own ideas they become adept at ignoring real differences of interest. Inter-organizational planning systems try to combine quite wide differences and so have to handle consequent conflicts. There is no ‘pure’ rationality that will produce agreed solutions to problems. Conflicts that are bound to occur can only be handled within the system if there is a high level of commitment to the usefulness of that system.
Planning
planning systems operate (3) Inter-organizational within complex sets of relationships. If they manage to operate, in the sense of producing the necessary information, policies and programmes, they generate a great deal of work. In neither of the two PPSs dealt with here wag there sufficient capacity in either central or local government to deal with the processes and their output in the way envisaged by an ideal system. If there is actually going to be a process of evaluating policies, examining the rationality of programme documents and their relationship to policies, and evaluating progress, then considerable manpower is needed. Because of
Relations
45
the symbolic significance of the planning systems, the amount of extra work involved was played down. Designers have to make better estimates of what they arc asking from those responsible for operations. With both central and local government currently to cut back under a great deal of pressure expenditures and reduce manpower, the outlook for policy planning both internally and interagency is not good. It is precisely in the area of planning that cuts have been and are taking place. Because of the perceived partial failure of policy planning their relevance is questioned. It is only by demonstrating their usefulness to the taxers that such systems will survive.
Notes
and Reference3
(1)
C. R. Hinings, S. Leach, S. Ranson and C. K. Skelcher, Planning Systems in Central-Local Relations, Report Social Science Research Council (1983).
(2)
C. R. Hinings, Policy planning systems. and central-local relations, in: G. Jones (ed.). New Approaches to the Study of Central-Local Relationships, SSRC/Gower (1980).
(3)
J. 0. McLaughlin, Urban Approach, Faber (1969).
(4)
Planning Systems Research Project, Final Report, School for Advanced Urban Studies, University of Bristol (1977). Also see M. Stewart, Some of the issues in planning systems development and J. Earwicker, Service plans as corporate hazards, both in Corporate Planning Journal, 4 (3) (1978).
(5)
The actual research, supported by the Social Science Research Council, looked at 7 TPP authorities, 6 ICPP authorities and 7 local education authorities. An interview program was carried out in those authorities, departments of state at regional and national level, and other public agencies involved in the process.
(6)
Further details of the approach adopted in the research and the various results can be found in Hinings et al. (1983) op. cit.; Hmings (1980) op. cit.; S. Ranson et al., Domination and Distribution in Policy Planning Networks, I.L.G.S. (mimeo) (1980).
(7)
The central government department responsible for the Inner Cities programme is the Department of the Environment (DOE). It has an Inner Cities Directorate to organize the planning process and to draw in other areas of the DOE as necessary. The TPP system is managed, at central government level, by the Department of Transport Both of these departments have a number of regional offices outside London which are actively involved in the policy planning systems.
(8)
For a general view of organizational theories of resource dependency see J. Pfeffer and G. Salancik, The ExternalControl of Organizations, Harper & Row (1978). For its application to the study of central-local relations, see R. Rhodes, Controoland Power in Central-Local Government Relations, Gower (1981).
(9)
Education is a local authonty function with each local authority that is responsible for education having a separate education department. At central government level there is the Department of Education and Science (DES). It does not operate through local offices.
(2) It
is important to clarify the responsibility for ensuring that the policy planning system is working. Within organizations this is usually the responsibility of a planning unit. For interorganizational planning systems the focus of responsibility is liable to be lost. This certainly tended to be the case for ICPPs with its emphasis on partnership. In these situations it is easy for MO one to feel responsible. Designers cannot assume that a system will run itself. Either it requires clear hierarchical responsibility or the provision of a special inter-agency unit.
and Central-Local
(10)
and Regional
Planning:
Policy to the
A Systems
See C. R. Hinings, Organizational change and organlzlng change, Local Government Studies. 7 (1981).
for