Twenty-One - Trends and directions in Canadian policy analysis and policy advice

Summary

Conducting policy analysis and giving policy advice are the art and craft of ‘speaking truth to power’—an expression commonly espoused in the Canadian public administration and governance literature (Dobell, 2015; Good, 2003; Savoie, 2003; Zussman, 2015). Over time, however, the concepts of truth and power in relation to policy advice have changed, as have ideas such as policy capacity, and their meanings therefore need investigating in the contemporary context. Nothing is more political, organizational, and relational than doing policy work in and for the state. Of course, rationality is important in policy development and decision-making (Azzie, 2015; Pal, 2014). Yet the subtle craft of policy advice in public service settings is typically characterized by ambiguous goals, multiple roles and structures, resource constraints, uncertain outcomes, and competing interests, ideas, and policy agendas. Moreover, the milieu in which the art and craft of policy advice is done has changed significantly in a number of respects over the last few decades in Canada, as in many other countries. This chapter reviews these changes and discusses their repercussions for policy advice as public service work. Under the speaking truth to power model, policy advice is, largely, a bipartite relationship involving public servants and executive politicians, with career officials offering advice to cabinet ministers. For some time now, however, it has been clear that a plurality of advisory sources exists, with an array of actors both inside and outside government offering various kinds of policy advice and analysis in various forms to decision-makers. This pluralism of policy advice has implications for the roles and relations of government analysts to governing politicians and their staffs, and to non-state actors in think tanks, lobby associations, and polling and consulting firms. It also raises disquieting issues of the capacity and influence of civil society organizations and clientele groups. To the point, changes in both the context and content of Canadian politics and government have produced a shift in the approach to policy analysis: public service policy advice has moved away from ‘speaking truth to power’ and toward what we may describe as “sharing truths with multiple actors.”