Temporality issues (sequencing, trajectories, critical junctures,
volatility of policy mixes)
In addition to these spatial issues, the temporal aspect is obviously a
constitutive dimension of policy instrument research. We know that time
makes a difference in how instrument choices and patterns evolve and
that temporal sequences is a crucial (Taeihagh et al. 2013; Justen et
al. 2013a, 2013b) component of policy mix design and evolution. Through
a specific organization of events over time, for example, policy
instruments can undergo permanent effects and thus becoming highly
institutionalized and/or generate positive/negative feedbacks. And
policy solutions - a set of adopted policy instruments - at a given
point in time may enshrine problems as well as specific tools that
actors must eventually confront in the next decision-making moment.
Thus, negative and positive feedbacks of the adopted policy
instrument(s) will inform the policy debate such that the adopted
instruments will either be adopted or will result in a crisis at the
critical juncture which could be then an occasion for a shift from the
adopted set of policy instruments. Policymakers, for example, can
proceed by layering, conversion and drift (Thelen 2004).
All of these terms, however, are not clearly defined or consistently
employed by various authors working in the field and, in some studies,
are used without an appropriate understanding of the underlying concepts
or methods necessary to analyse and evaluate a policy mix.
Layering is thought to be the most commonly adopted process but layering
can be done in different ways. That is, policy instruments can be
assembled through processes such as packaging, patching, stretching, and
bricolage (Howlett and Rayner 2013; Capano 2018) which range in terms of
coverage and deliberativeness. At the same time, related to the produced
effects, layering can lead to policy instruments mixed in a consistent,
counterproductive and tense way (Capano 2019) or not.
However, if we know something about these general modes and types of
policy instrument design, we are missing reliable empirical knowledge
about the micro-components of these different kinds of processes. There
is a need to consider the effect of policy formulation processes on the
character and effectiveness of complex policy mixes (Feindt and Flynn,
2009; Kay, 2007; Larsen, Taylor-Gooby, and Kananen, 2006), for example
when existing mixes developed unsystematically through processes of
policy layering (Thelen, 2004; Van der Heijden, 2011; Carter, 2012;
Howlett and Rayner, 2007; OECD, 1996). From this point of view then, we
require better empirical evidence of the foundations of
design/non-design continuum. This would mean, for example, better
operationalizing concepts such as package and patching, as well tense
layering, in terms of instrument-based content.
There are thus many empirical gaps when the temporal dimension is
considered. For example, we know very little about whether and how the
speed of the sequence can make a difference in terms of choosing one
instrument or another and in terms of change or persistence of the
adopted of policy instruments. Furthermore, another under-investigated
dimension of the temporal dimension is the composition of the sequence
itself: what are the events of the sequence? What can be the relations
of the actors in the different events of the sequence itself?