Measuring performance & effectiveness of tool deployment and
mixes
Governments design policies to reach specific goals, that is, to change
the quality of the performance of the addressed policies. Governments
reform education policy because they want more well-educated citizens
and more citizens with degrees; they intervene in environmental policy
because they want to pursue, for example, decreased pollution and better
water quality, etc.
While the link between policy instruments and their outcomes is indirect
and limited (Koontz and Thomas 2012) and policy performance is co-driven
by many other factors, it remains the case that the main method through
which governments can steer their policy systems is by adopting specific
sets of policy tools that address the behaviour of specific targets and
beneficiaries. Thus, the policy mixes that governments design could help
to readdress the way policies function as well as their performance.
However, we do not know much about this linkage between policy
instruments and policy outcomes, although some recent research has shown
that some policy instruments and some mixes are associated with better
performance (Capano,et al 2019).