Describing and delimiting the mechanisms which tools activate to
attain their effects and impacts
Recently, developing a mechanistic approach to policy design has been
proposed (Capano and Howlett 2019; Capano et al. 2019). Regarding
underlying mechanisms, policy design (and thus policy instruments
research) can be explanatory without the need for broad-reaching
theories while providing a deeper understanding in terms of answers to
the why and how questions and on how policy instruments can reach or not
reach their effects, that is, on how policy instruments/mixes can
directly encourage or structure policy targets’ behaviour to achieve the
expected results. Consequently, a mechanistic approach to policy
instruments could offer a better understanding, and possibly an
explanation, of the potential links between policy design and its
effects.
This approach implies that policy solutions should be seen as a set of
policy instruments, the adoption of which is conducive to achieving the
expected results. Accordingly, the key analytical point is how the
adopted solution can be a genuine driver of the pursued outcome, that
is, capable of generating the proper mechanisms and thus the
causal chain. From this perspective, policy instruments and their mixes
can be considered as “activators” of specific mechanisms conducive to
the expected results. A mechanistic perspective could be a very
promising way to understand policy dynamics and the development of
policy mixes over time that also allow for the inclusion of outcomes.