Political Science Department, Maxwell School at Syracuse University

Reading list: Public Policy PhD exam

I. General Works, Theory Overviews, and Broad Themes

Lowi, Ted. (1979). The End of Liberalism. New York: W.W. Norton and Co. Chapters 1, 2, and 6.
Hacker, Jacob and Paul Pierson. (2014). After the Master Theory: Downs, Schattschneider, and
the Rebirth of Policy-Focused Analysis, Perspectives on Politics 12 (3), 643-662.
Pierson, Paul. (2005). The Study of Policy Development, Journal of Policy History 1, 34-51.
Sabatier, Paul A. and Chris Weible, Eds. (2014). Theories of the Policy Process, Third Edition.
Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Stone, Deborah. (2002). Policy Paradox: The Art of Political Decision Making. New York: W.W.
Norton.

II. Background and Classics

Dahl, Robert A. (1961). Who Governs, Democracy and Power in an American City. New Haven,
CT: Yale University Press.
Lasswell, Harold Dwight. (1950). Politics: Who Gets What, When, How. New York: P. Smith.
Lasswell, Harold Dwight. (1971). A Pre-view of Policy Sciences. Elsevier publishing company.
Lindblom, Charles. (1959). The Science of Muddling Through, Public Administration Review
19, 79-88.
Lipsky, Michael. (2010). Street-Level Bureaucracy, 30th Ann. Ed.: Dilemmas of the Individual in
Public Service: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Service. New York: Russell Sage
Foundation.
Lowi, Ted. (1972). Four Systems of Policy, Politics, and Choice, Public Administration Review
32.
March, J. G. and J. P. Olsen, J. P. (1984). The New Institutionalism: Organizational Factors in
Political Life, American Political Science Review 78, 734-49).
Ostrom, Elinor. (2015). Governing the Commons. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Schattschneider, E.E. (1960). The Semi-sovereign people: A Realists View of Democracy in
America. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Stiglitz, Joseph. (1988). The Private Uses of Public Interests: Incentives and Institutions, Journal
of Economic Perspective 12, 3-22.

III. Agenda Setting and Policy Change

Adler, E. Scott, and John D. Wilkerson. (2012). Congress and the Politics of Problem Solving. New
York: Cambridge University Press.
Baumgartner, Frank. R. and Bryan Jones. (2009). Agendas and Instability in American Politics (2nd
ed). Chicago: University of Chicago.
Baumgartner, Frank, J. Berry, M. Hojnacki, D. Kimball, and B. Leech. (2009). Lobbying and Policy
Change: Who Wins, Who Loses, and Why. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Bennett, Colin and Michael Howlett. (1992). The Lessons of Learning: Reconciling Theories of
Policy Learning and Policy Change, Policy Sciences 25 (August), 275-294.
Birkland, Thomas. (1998). Focusing Events, Mobilization, and Agenda Setting, Journal of Public
Policy 18, 53-74.
Boscarino, Jessica. (2009). Surfing for Problems: Advocacy Group Strategy in Forest Policy,
Policy Studies Journal 27, 415-435.
Boydstun, Amber E. (2013). Making the News: Politics, the Media, and Agenda Setting. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Cobb, Roger W. & Charles Elder. (1983). Participation in American Politics: The Dynamics
ofAgenda-building. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Cohen, Jeffrey E. (2012). The Presidents Legislative Policy Agenda, 17892002. New York:
Cambridge University Press.
Denzau, A. T. and M. C. Munger, M. C. (1986). Legislators and Interest Groups: How Unorganized
Interests Get Represented, The American Political Science Review 80, 89-106.
Downs, Anthony. (1972). Up and Down with Ecology: The Issue Attention Cycle, Public Interest
28, 38-50.
Edwards and Wood. (1999). Who Influences Whom? The President, Congress, and the Media,
American Political Science Review 93, 327-346.
Egan, Patrick. (2013). Partisan Priorities: How Issue Ownership Drives and Distorts American
Politics. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Gaventa, John. (1980). Power and Powerlessness: Quiescence and Rebellion in an Appalachian
Valley. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.
Grossman, Matt and David A. Hopkins. (2015). Ideological Republicans and Group Interest
Democrats: The Asymmetry of American Party Politics. Perspectives on Politics 13 (March),
119-139.
Hilgartner and Bosk. (1988). The Rise and Fall of Social Problems: A Public Arenas Model, The
American Journal of Sociology 94, 53-78.
Jochim, Ashley and Peter May. (2010). Beyond Subsystems: Policy Regimes and Governance,
Policy Studies Journal 38, 303-27.
John, Peter. (2003). Is There Life after Policy Streams, Advocacy Coalitions, and Punctuations:
Using Evolutionary Theory to Explain Policy Change? Policy Studies Journal 31 (4), 481-498.
John Kingdon. (2010). Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies, Updated Second Edition.
Longman Press.
Lieberman, Ideas, Institutions, and Political Order: Explaining Political Change, American
Political Science Review 96 (December 2002) 697-712.

2
May, Peter. (1992). Policy Learning and Failure, Journal of Public Policy 12, 331-354.
May, Peter, J. Sapotichne, and S. Workman. (2006). Policy Coherence and Policy Domains,
Policy Studies Journal 34, 381-403.
Cox, Gary W. and M. McCubbins. (2001). The Institutional Determinants of Economic Policy
Outcomes. In Presidents, Parliaments and Policy, edited by Stephan Haggard and Mathew D.
McCubbins, chapter 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Miller, Lisa. The Representational Biases of Federalism: Scope and Bias in the Political Process,
Revisited, Perspectives on Politics 5 (2), 305-321.
Mucciaroni, Gary. (1995). Reversals of Fortune: Public Policy and Private Interest. Washington,
DC: Brookings Institution Press. [Chapters 1 & 2]
Pralle, Sarah. (2003). Venue Shopping: Political Strategy and Policy Change: The
Internationalization of Canadian Forest Advocacy, Journal of Public Policy 23, 233-260.
Rochefort, David A. and Roger W. Cobb. (1994). The Politics of Problem Definition: Shaping the
Policy Agenda. Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas Press.
Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith. (1993). Policy Change and Learning: An Advocacy Coalition Approach.
Boulder: Westview Press.
Volden, Craig. (2006). States as Policy Laboratories: Emulating Success in the Children's Health
Insurance Program." American Journal of Political Science 50, no. 2 (2006): 294-312.

IV. Public Opinion and Public Policy

Benjamin Page and Robert Shapiro. (1983). Effects of Public Opinion on Policy, American
Political Science Review 77, 175190.
Burstein, Paul. (2014). American Public Opinion, Advocacy, and Policy in Congress. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Hobolt, Sara B. and Robert Klemmensen. (2008). Government Responsiveness and Political
Competition in Comparative Perspective, Comparative Political Studies 41 (3), 309-337.
Gilens, Martin and Benjamin Page. (2014). Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest
Groups, and Average Citizens, Perspectives on Politics, September 12 (3): 564-581.
Bryan Jones, Heather Larsen-Price, and John Wilkerson, Representation and American Governing
Institutions. Journal of Politics 71, 2009: 277-290.

V. Policy Implementation

Bemelmans-Videc, Marie-Louise, Ray C. Rist, and Evert Oskar Vedung, eds. (2011). Carrots,
Sticks, and Sermons: PolicyIinstruments and Their Evaluation. Vol. 1. Transaction Publishers.
DeLeon, Peter, and Linda DeLeon. (2002). Whatever Happened to Policy Implementation? An
Alternative Approach. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory: J-PART, 467-
492.

3
Elmore, Richard. (1980). Backward Mapping: Implementation Research and Policy Decisions,
Political Science Quarterly 94, 601616.
Lin, Ann Chih (2002). Reform in the Making: The Implementation of Social Policy in Prison.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Mazmanian, Daniel, and Paul Sabatier. (1983). Implementation and Public Policy. Glenview, Ill.:
Scott, Foresman.
McCubbins, Mathew D., and Thomas Schwartz. (1984). Congressional Oversight Overlooked:
Police Patrols Versus Fire Alarms. American Journal of Political Science, 165-179.
Pressman, Jeffrey and A. Wildavsky. (1983). Implementation. University of California Press.
[Chapters 1-3 and 5]
Robinson, Scott E. (2006). A Decade of Treating Networks Seriously." Policy Studies Journal 34,
(4), 589-598.
Salamon, Lester M., ed. (2002). The Tools of Government: A Guide to the New Governance. Oxford
University Press.
Tendler, Judith. (1997). Good Government in the Tropics. Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University
Press. [Chapters 1 and 3.]
Wilson, James. (1989) Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do and Why They Do It. New
York: Basic Books.
Wood, B. Dan, and Richard W. Waterman. (1991). The Dynamics of Political Control of the
Bureaucracy, American Political Science Review 85 (September), 801828.

VI. Social Constructions, Policy Design & Feedback, Retrenchment

Campbell, Andrea. (2002). Self-Interest, Social Security, and the Distinctive Participation Patterns
of Senior Citizens, American Political Science Review 96, 565-574.
Patrick Flavin and John Griffin. (2009). Policy, Preferences, and Participation: Government's
Impact on Democratic Citizenship, Journal of Politics 71 (2), 544-559
Hacker, Jacob. (2004). Privatizing Risk Without Privatizing the Welfare State, American Political
Science Review 98 (May), 243-60.
Lieberman. (1995). Social Construction (cont) and response, American Political Science Review
89 (June), 437-446.
Pierson, Paul. (1993). When Effect Becomes Cause: Policy Feedback and Political Change, World
Politics 45 (July 1993): 594-628.
Martin, Cathie Jo. (1995). Nature or Nurture? Sources of Firm Preference for National Health
Reform. American Political Science Review 89 (4), 898-913.
Mettler, Suzanne and Joe Soss. (2004). The Consequences of Public Policy for Democratic
Citizenship: Bridging Policy Studies and Mass Politics, Perspectives on Politics (March), 55-
73.

4
Mettler, Suzanne. (2005). Soldiers to Citizens: The G.I. Bill and the Making of the Greatest
Generation. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. [Introduction and Chapters 6, 7, 8 & 10.]
Oberg, PerOla, Martin Lundin, and Jonas Thelander, Political Power and Policy Design: Why Are
Policy Alternatives Constrained? Policy Studies Journal 43 (1), 2015: 93-114.
Patashnik, Eric. (2003). After the Public Interest Prevails: The Political Sustainability of Policy
Reform. Governance 16 (2), 203-234.
Jordan Ragusa. (2010). The Lifecycle of Public Policy: An Event History Analysis of Repeals to
Landmark Legislative Enactments, 1951-2006, American Politics Research 38 (6), 1015-1051.
Schneider, Anne and Helen Ingram. (1993). Social Construction of Target Populations:
Implications for Politics and Policy, American Political Science Review 87, 334-47.
Schneider, Anne and Helen Ingram. (1997). Policy Design for Democracy. Lawrence, KS:
University Press of Kansas.
Soss, Joe et. al. (2008). The Color of Devolution: Race, Federalism, and the Politics of Social
Control, American Journal of Political Science 52 (July), 536-53.
Soss, Joe and Sanford F. Schram (2007). A Public Transformed? Welfare Reform as Policy
Feedback, The American Political Science Review 101 (February), 111-27.