The founding and development of policy sciences have initiated from American scholars. And the policy sciences movement in the 1970s to the 80s has torched to the widespread of the U.S. policy theories into the world. The Korean policy community also ...
The founding and development of policy sciences have initiated from American scholars. And the policy sciences movement in the 1970s to the 80s has torched to the widespread of the U.S. policy theories into the world. The Korean policy community also has absorbed these American theories. However, the prime and essential theories in policy sciences have been negelected both in American and in non-American scholars because of the dichotomous development between policy process and policy analysis. Even the interdisciplinary and applied characteristics of policy sciences have well been accepted by the policy community, the main and prime theories have not been studied in and around policy scholars. And this study suggested five prime theories of policy sciences based on the research method, in which the expert Delphi questionnaire was conducted to the both American and Korean policy teachers to inquire the subjects of the main theories in policy sciences.
First, politics and policy studied common elements of politics in policymaking and suggested the client-politics. The politics of costs and benefits of policy itself be shared by common interests and value systems and their participations to the policymaking coordinated by policy leaders' balanced sense.
Second, democracy in policy sciences argued intrinsic elements between science and democracy for improving methodologies of democracy. Thus the policy sciences of democracy can practically be increased by participatory, discursive, and electronic democracy. And the oriential perspective to the democracy not by ruling but by the ruled democracy can be an alternative for the improvement to the road of democracy in policy sciences.
Third, policy ethics and philosophy suggested three main theories of policy ideology, policy ethics, and policy value. The oriential approaches to applied ethics and philosophies founded in oriential classics were reviewed for the practical applications of the policy philosophy theories. For examples, Confucius' disciplined practical ethics and morality by his/her names and positions, and Mencius' royal directions for ruling his citizens have applied to the actual ethical norms to policy practicioners and policy leaders.
Fourth, policy balancing theory introduced to build up policy knowledge by arguments and logical inferences based on some definitions of 'balance,' 'balanced-sense,' and 'policy balance,' in which theoretical underpinnings have rooted on the philosophies of Confucian and Buddhist 'Madhyamika. The balanced distribution of scientific and mental policy causations, the so-called distributive justice of policy outcomes and policy itself can be achieved by applying the tree principles of mutual identity, mutual dependence, and mutual non-obstruction, then the balanced policy can be called the status of mutual interpenetration.
And fifth, policy leadership theory was developed by the model, the self-purification, in which its theoretical principles and assumptions were the oriential philosophy of 'first with disciplined myself, then taking public charges for the citizen." The policy leadership paradigm has constructured by six-categories of self-diagnosis, self-regulation, self-determination, self-adaptation, self-actualization, and public mind, then the policy determination ability of policy leaders will be imporved through their sensemaking in both policymaking and implementation.