Political Sociology meets Public Policy: Exploring Policy Formulation as a Locus for Assessing Power of Policy actors

Abstract

The uplift of a governance paradigm opened the door for different non-formal actors to join the policy-making process. This proliferation of actors posed some new questions about the relationship between them. One of the aspects of this relationship is the power of actors. The paper seeks to contribute to public policy literature in a way to explore if a policy formulation stage of a decision-making process can be used as an arena for assessing the power of the aforementioned actors. The argument this paper suggests is that policy formulation as a stage where the confrontation of actors is most visible and prominent is in fact an appropriate place for studying actors’ dynamics and should be taken into consideration when discussing the power of policy actors.