MAY CAN SHOULD NOTES FROM PROFESSOR

I want to visit with you for just a moment, about a 50 thousand foot overview of the process. In this
case, a fuller process of policy analysis than you typically get in the modern approach. You see most of
the time when we talk about policy analysis. In modern American political circles, what we really mean is
what option among the available options is the best? And we almost always answer that question in a
pragmatic way. We literally compare one and say, I like the outcome that better than the outcome of
another set of ideas that may be employed to solve a particular problem. But what I'd like for you to do
is you approach policy analysis in liberties, Public Policy program is to think of it a little more deeply
because there are some other questions that are going on other than just what's best between two or
more available options. And the way you should really approach that is by asking at least a three-part
question. May I do a particular thing? Can government do a particular thing? And then, and only then do
you reach what it normally dominates the political discussion of whether you should do a particular
thing. So you can think of it in that way, may, can, and should. Now, if you want some clarity on this, I
would encourage you to take a look at a couple of Supreme Court cases where the United States
Supreme Court took a long look at what they call the political question doctrine. You can look at cases
like Baker v. Carr or Nixon versus the United States, where the court looks at the difference between
those things that are legal questions and those things that are political questions. And that'll go a long
way to help you understand the difference between a meta-analysis and a should analysis. But let me
boil it down for you again from a 50 thousand foot, very general gestalt overview. It works something
like this. The Mahan now says it is asking when and from where does government get the authority to
do a particular thing? Now that's going to sound a little odd to most policy analyst because we tend to
presume these days that government may do anything that government wants to do. But that's not at
all how the founders viewed government. That's not at all how the government was approached when,
when we sent the Declaration of Independence to England, or design the United States Constitution that
set up the separation of powers. In Baker v car and in Nixon versus the United States. What the Supreme
Court is doing is drawing that distinction between saying, when are we talking about a question of
authority, usually legality, and when are we talking about a question of choices? What should somebody
do? Because that's the political question. So it works very much like this. If you're going to approach any
particular question where you're asking what the government should do in a particular situation. The
very first question that you have to answer is whether the government can and may do anything in that
realm whatsoever. So the first question, if you remember from frederick boss The off you haven't read
Frederick boss the OS, the law, you should. It's an excellent beginning point for this. Is this. Where does
government get the authority to do the thing that it would like to do? Now in the United States, That's a
very particular question because we're a nation of enumerated powers. Which means if government has
the authority to do a thing, the sovereign, We, the People, granted it that authority in the Constitution.
So there's 0.1 in your May analysis. You're asking very specifically whether the government has the
authority to do a thing from where did it gain that authority? So for the United States federal
government, the only place that authority could come from is the United States Constitution. But that
alone doesn't fully answer the question. Because you have to ask yourself, where did the authority of
the United States Constitution come from? And we're told, we're not hiding the ball. It said We, the
people in order to form a more perfect union. So you see that the authority that is built into the
Constitution arises from the people. But that begs yet another question, where did the people get the
authority? So I'd like for you to think of it very much like this. And again, if you'll review frederick boss,
the hasta la, you'll kinda see how this works. That if you can imagine that there's a God who holds all
authority, all authority that exist belongs to the Lord God who created the universe, ex nihilo. And you
can imagine that there's a picture and that picture contains the whole universe of authority. And he
pours out to man just a little bit of authority and says, Man, this is yours to govern with as you will. Now.
Man then has an, has rights that God gave him. Now, in the Declaration of Independence, we refer to
those as things that are, are absolutely apparent, that they are self-evident. Things like life, liberty, and
the pursuit of happiness. Now the Declaration of Independence goes a step further and says that it's for
the protection of these things that governments are instituted among men. So you see that man take
some of the authority that God has given him and he pours it out just a little bit. Not all the authority
that man asked, but just a little bit to government. Those are what we call the enumerated powers in
the United States Constitution. So then boss DR. drew, very logical conclusion. Instead, this, if you're
asking yourself whether government may do a particular thing, ask yourself this, would you be able to
do that thing? Because if the people don't have the authority to do a thing, then logically, the people
could not grant the government the authority to do a particular thing. Let me show you how it works in
real-world terms. Let's say, for instance, that we're examining an issue, one that that bossy I dealt with a
lot was one that he call plunder. We would call it redistribution of wealth or something along those
lines. Imagine asking yourself, government goes into a place, takes money from one group of individuals
and gives to another group of individuals boss, the odds analysis for the May analysis would look
something like this. It would say if you'd like to know whether government take money from one set of
individuals and give it to another set of individuals, ask yourself this, can an individual, could you, if you
wanted to go to your neighbor and take their money and give it to another neighbor that you liked
better or that you thought deserved it more. And the question is obviously no, that would be theft. We'll
Boston AA says exactly. That's the point. If you didn't have the authority to do that, because God didn't
give you the authority to take from your neighbor and give to another, then you couldn't pass that
authority on to government. So the government could take from one and give to another. That same
method works repeatedly in a variety of circumstances, such as life and death. Did God give you the
authority to take your own life will? If not, then you couldn't give that authority to the government for
purposes of euthanasia. Did God give you the authority to take innocent life of others? If not, then you
can't give authority to the government to take the life of the unborn. It works like that repeatedly over
and over again. Now, that falls into at least two categories. And you can see that from the discussion so
far. One is constitutionality and the others, what the founders called the laws of nature and nature's
God. So the very beginning point is that the authority arises from the laws of nature and nature's God.
And then you must show that that authority was transferred through the constitution to the United
States government only after you reach that point of saying the thing it's constitutional and does not
violate the laws of nature and nature's God. Have you reached a point where you can decide that the
government may take a particular action. That alone would keep the government out of so much
trouble. And that piece of the analysis that's generally ignored by common policy analysis. Now the next
question is a little more practical than that. It's simply one of can. If you remember when you were a
child and you ask your teacher of whether you can take some time off or whether you can go to the
restroom. She responded and say I don't know, can you and what she meant was you're asking whether
you have the physical ability rather than the authority. So in the May Analysis we're asking the question
of authority and in the can analysis, we're asking a very practical question of the possibilities that
generally falls into three categories. You're asking yourself whether it's physically feasible. In other
words, is it something that even given all the money and time in the world, can we really do it? Second,
we're talking about financial feasibility. It do we have the resources with which to carry out this plan?
And then the third is political feasibility. Do we have the political will and the political capital that we're
willing to spend to bring this thing into fruition. Let's take an absurd example. Let's say, for example,
that we all thought it was a fantastic idea to build a highway bridge to the moon. Now, there's nothing
that we can think of that would limit our authority to do that. There's nothing in the laws of nature and
nature's God says You can't build a highway to the moon. There's nothing. Maybe we've got the political
will to do it. But the fact is that financial feasibility and the spinning of the Earth and the rotation of the
moon are going to keep that from happening. It's simply not possible. Now, let's assume that we're
talking about things that, that are possible. Financial feasibility speaks for itself. But political. Now that's
something a little different because you're having to look at what motivates this is where you're reading
Shakespeare can help you so much in, in your planning of public policy. Because understanding what
motivates policymakers will help you do a thorough job of analyzing the political feasibility. Let's say that
it's possible physically. Let's say that the resources are there. But then figuring out whether the votes
are going to be there and the coalitions are going to be there is an entirely different job. Now, after you
answer those two broad questions that you have, that the government has the authority to take a
political measure and that there is the physical, financial, and political feasibility to carry it out. Only
then do we reach the question that typically dominates public policy analysis. And that is the pragmatic
question of between the available solutions which is the best. At that point we have reached what is,
what is a very proper practical, pragmatic discussion of comparing apples to apples and oranges to
oranges. And saying that the results yielded by one is better than the result yielded by the other. I hope
this will give you a basis for approaching policy analysis from a little more thorough of a, of an approach
than we typically have. And I hope you enjoy the class.

What Governments Can Do CHAPTER 5 PAGE 154-156 Kraft, M. E., & Furlong, S. R. (2021).
Public Policy: Politics, Analysis, and Alternatives (7th ed.). Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly.
ISBN: 9781544374611.

So how do analysts know which alternatives to consider? As we discussed in chapter 3, the

starting point is to see what governments are doing or can do. Among their options, governments
can regulate, subsidize, ration, tax and spend, contract out, use market incentives, privatize,
charge fees for service, educate, create public trusts, and conduct or commission research (J.
Anderson 2015; Patton, Sawicki, and Clark 2016). Figure 5-2 summarizes these activities and
illustrates them with examples.

If current policies are not working well enough and a change is needed, analysts might suggest
modifying the present policies or trying a different policy approach or strategy. Present policies
could be strengthened; for example, the federal government could raise standards and penalties
for clean air or water policies or toughen regulation of Wall Street banks; or, of course, it could
do the opposite. Or policymakers could fund programs at a higher level, which might permit
improved research, better enforcement, and better public information campaigns; or, once more,
policymakers could choose to reduce program funding, as the Trump administration sought to do
with many programs it considered to be low priorities. Analysts and policymakers also consider
alternatives to conventional regulatory policies, as was done for many environmental policies
during the 1980s and 1990s (Mazmanian and Kraft 2009; Vig and Kraft 2019).

For some policies and agencies, policymakers might try different institutional approaches, such
as a new way to organize the bureaucracy in charge. Reorganization was proposed in 2002 for
the much-maligned Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), widely considered to be one
of the least effective federal agencies. The George W. Bush administration endorsed a plan to
replace the INS with three new agencies, one for customs and border protection, one for
immigration services, and one for immigration and customs enforcement. All three agencies
were incorporated into the new Department of Homeland Security. Along with agency
reorganization, the present federal-state relationship, some form of which pervades most policy
areas, can also be changed. For example, many policies during the 1980s and 1990s were further
decentralized, giving the states greater authority to make decisions and allocate funds.

Many state and local governments are trying another interesting institutional reform option. They
make routine government services available online, from providing tourist information to
supplying government forms that can be filled out and filed online. The federal government is
also moving in this direction and has instituted an internet portal for all federal information at
USA.gov (www.usa.gov).
For many policy areas, actions are rooted in one of two views of the problem being confronted,
what might be called supply and demand perspectives. If analysts believe a problem such as
energy scarcity results from an insufficient supply of energy, they will likely recommend the
policy alternative of increasing supply. They will consider actions to boost supplies of energy,
whether from fossil fuels (oil, natural gas, and coal), nuclear energy, or alternative energy such
as wind or solar power. The actions may include changes in rules that control exploration on
public lands, various tax credits and incentives, and support for research that could speed up the
introduction of new energy sources. The Bush administration took this position in its national
energy policy proposal of 2001, much of which was approved by Congress in 2005, and the
Trump administration took many of the same actions as it sought to increase production of fossil
fuels. But what if the problem is too much demand for energy rather than too little supply?
Policymakers may consider energy conservation and efficiency measures, such as increasing fuel
economy standards for cars or providing tax credits for high-mileage hybrid or electric vehicles.
The most likely scenario will be a combination of the supply and demand perspectives.

In addition to considering which policy options will work best or be more efficient or fair,
policymakers must think about the philosophical and ideological aspects. Conservatives and
liberals, and Republicans and Democrats, differ significantly in the kinds of policy solutions they
favor. For example, Republicans in Congress were unanimous in opposing the Obama health
care reform proposals that were approved in 2010 because they opposed such a far-reaching
extension of the federal government’s authority and its mandate for individuals to purchase
health care insurance. Many states under Republican control sued the federal government to have
the act declared unconstitutional or at least substantially modified. Democrats generally favored
the act.