This course introduces class participants to the political significance and societal consequences of challenges facing U.S. and international policymakers. It is designed to help participants develop skills to analyze policy proposals and advocate for their preferred options for issues on the public policy agenda ahead. The class assumes basic knowledge about governing institutions and democratic processes, while recommending supplemental materials for further study to complement reading links provided. The course focuses on future policy challenges, while examining the broad historical context in which policies are adopted and implemented. As the course evaluates how issues are advanced by private sector interests, non-governmental organizations, and government policymakers, it examines how groups become effective policy advocates. Particular attention is paid to how winning coalitions are formed and how issue framing shapes the outcome of policy campaigns. The goal is neither to produce partisan talking points, nor to favor one governance philosophy over others. Rather it is to clarify the public policy challenges ahead and to enhance participants’ understanding of how policy options are adopted in the real world arena of contemporary politics.
Gerry Warburg and Dee Dee Myers Post Lecture Discussion
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Public Policy Challenges of the 21st Century
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從本節課中
The Media and Changing Nature of Politics
Clinton White House Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers explains issue framing, coalition building and how modern media in shapes public policy options.
與講師見面
- Professor Gerry WarburgProfessor of Public Policy, Assistant Dean for External Affairs
Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy
Dee Dee, in your wonderful book, Why Women Should Rule The World,
you talked about the challenge for women and exercising raw power, and
I was fascinated by how you characterized some of those challenges.
Could you share a bit, a little bit of your wisdom on that?
>> Well sure you know the first thing I,
I interviewed a lot of powerful women to write the book.
And I asked every single one of them, do you consider yourself powerful?
And to a person, they said no, I like to think that I have influence, but
they didn't want to characterize themselves as powerful, power.
Is for reasons perhaps cultural, perhaps more complicated.
Is not something that women feel comfortable associating themselves with,
at least outwardly.
Even though there are a lot of powerful women.
And, and I think that that,
that's not only in terms of how they describe themselves and
how they think about themselves, but
sometimes how they exercise their roles and, and, and carry out their jobs.
I think, again you know, and the traditional idea of power is kind of
a masculine, top down, authoritarian, you know, you know, tough guy kind of thing.
And that is not a, a po, position that works for most women.
And so I think, one of the challenges for
women is how, is to kind of thread that needle.
Between how can you be authoritative and yet feminine?
How can you be a good leader, and also be a good wife, a good mother, a good?
All the other things that people want to be in their complex lives.
>> I think back to your position as the first White House press Secretary who
was a woman and I suffer as as a friend saying well who were your mentors?
Who were your role models?
Who could you look to?
Who did you look to, at that point in time in your life?
When you're, you're wrestling with alligators daily in the White House
press room, who could you look to for that kind of guidance as a role model?
>> To the core of your question, I think it's very helpful for people, men or
women, people of color, whatever, to look around and
see people who look like them, in jobs that they want to have.
And that they can imagine themselves doing that same job.
And so.
You know, the, that's why I think success is kind of you know,
it's a bit of a forced multiplier.
The more people succeed the more, you know, they create opportunities for
other people that are like them to do the same.
>> What do you think, from a master's of public policy program,
will be the greatest value, and what kind of character traits should we sort,
seek to encourage in kids who are going to have an extraordinarily?
Viable degree from what I parochially consider the,
the greatest public university in the world.
[LAUGH] but, but what do we want to bring out of that and what did they bring to
the table having had that extra focus on, on, on policy analysis?
>> Well, I mean I think there's,
I tell people all the time, young people, what do they want to be.
You know, public policy professionals, or
journalists, or any other kind of Washington-centric careers.
Public, public relations, communications.
So again, it's very helpful to be an expert on some substance, right.
>> Mm-hm. >> To understand the,
to be able to go deeper on the issues affected by your.
Work, whatever it is.
Whether it's again, it's communicating, lobbying,
you know [LAUGH] being a policy person or being a journalist covering stuff and
I think it's very important to understand how it works.
And the best journalists I worked with, for example, were people that maybe they
didn't have a degree in public policy, but they could have taught a class.
>> Yeah. >> because they took the time to get deep,
to understand, to know, to know the history, and I think that having
a degree in public policy, and taking the time to do that on the front end of
your career is incredibly helpful, and you, something you can then build on.
I think the you know, over the course of a lifetime, but having that good foundation,
of understanding how things work, how policy gets made.
What, you know, what's worked and what hasn't?
I mean, history is so important and
we, there's there's never enough people who have a complex understanding of
what we have tried and what's worked and what hasn't worked.
And what's, maybe, like let's look beyond our own borders.
What's worked in other places?
And so I think as a character thing, I, I, I think you want people who.
Well there's, there's a lot of room for
a lot of different kind of people in a public policy school program,
just as there is in the world of group policy work, right?
There's people who are very data-centric, and they're,
they're the people that really understand the numbers and they can put together the,
you know, the really detailed analyses and ideas around how to make things work.
And then there's people who communicate that, there's people who,
you know, who forge consensus around ideas.
So I think you need all of that.
But I think the one thing you hope people bring to it,
and that they come here for is that there's some sense of
being invested in something bigger than themselves.
Right? And wanting to make it work.
And being you know hopeful about the ability, the, the,
the, the, the prognosis if you will.
That all of this effort is going to make life better for people.
And, so, that, you know, that's, that's not an ideological point of view.
>> No. >> But it's a characterlogical
point of view.
And, I think, that's even if there's one quality that you want to feel at
a policy school, it's that.
It's like, these people, be, they're invested and they believe in, they're
willing to work hard for, you know, this elusive goal of trying to make things work
better, make the, make life better for more of our, of our, of our citizens.
>> Thanks, I have a followup to that, which I was reminded of
when you spoke earlier today to our students here at the Frank Batten School.
And its about leadership and I was listening very carefully on the edge of
my seat as a Professor of Leadership at the university,
what's going to be the single defining trait.
And I almost came out of my chair applauding, because.
You didn't go with.
You know, the ability to do this.
The ability to do that.
You talked about the ears.
>> Mm-hm. >> And
I just would would invite you to to share a little bit of your wisdom there.
Because there's a surprising answer.
It's not one that you hear very often.
>> Yeah, I, I think that perhaps the most important quality in a good leader is
the ability to listen.
Nobody has all the answers.
Whether you're the CEO of a Fortune 100 company the President of the United States
professor of public policy at the greatest public university in the world.
There's always things that you don't know.
And particularly in an environment where the world is moving so fast and
changing so fast, and there's so many data points, and so many perspectives.
How can any one person, be the repository of all of that?
And so the ability, and, and then on, on top of that is sort of
you're always going to learn more and re, refine and you know.
That so much of what leadership, leaders are required to do is forge con,
consensus, or bring people together around a common solution.
And you can't build a solution, or a deal among people who don't
necessarily disagree without understanding where the common ground might exist.
And the only way to find that, is to listen.
You can't, you have to hear what the other person is saying, and
then say hey, well you know what.
I, I, I think we've got somethin' here.
I think that's a good idea.
I like that, I think that's a problem, too.
Let's start there.
And sometimes you start with a small solution, and
you build out from small to bigger, and
sometimes a small solution is all you get, but it's better than no progress at all.
And, and, and maybe then you come back in a later round
to tackle something bigger because you build trust.
Listening builds, not only provides information and provides opportunities.
It builds trust.
And trust is what allows progress to be made.
Particularly when there's a lack of consensus about how to move forward.
>> I want to ask you about the hyperpolarized environment that
that everyone is working in now as citizens.
And how it has changed since you first got in politics, and how it's evolved,
both because the technology and the, the altered nature of the news cycle.
>> Mm-hm. >> And the altered,
altered nature of control over the news.
How has it changed, and what is your prescription for us, 300 million
plus citizens, for how to adapt to that change, so we can have a more effective?
Way of achieving consensus on public policy.
>> Yeah. It's complicated but
we do live in hyperpartisan age and you know, partisanship wasn't with us always.
It's, it was baked into the cake at the founding because.
You know, having a robust debate about complicated issues gets you
to better solutions.
And you know, testing your ideas and your, and your prescriptions up
against somebody who doesn't necessarily agree with you is really important.
But, what happens when it goes off the rails like it is now?
I do think on the policy side right,
I would like to see more non-political redistricting.
>> Mm-hm.
>> I think we outta, you know, and, and there's California where both you and
I are from has moved to a, you know, a more administrative
process as opposed to a political process, to draw congressional districts that
are contiguous communities and, you know, common interests, common histories.
As opposed to pure partisan politics and
I think that's, there are other states that, that have similar.
I, I think it would be great if we had more states doing it, but
that's a long term solution.
I think part of what we need is, is just good leadership.
You know?
And, and not that, that I mean we always have some good leaders.
But I think we, we, we it would be great if somebody could stand up and,
you know, try to reach across the aisle and, and, and make a deal and.
Maybe it was a seat over it.
I mean nobody runs for office to lose.
Or not be re-elected after trying their best to serve their communities.
But you know sometimes you have to do what's right,
as opposed as opposed to what's expedient in order to.
Break the log jam and you know it's much harder now than it used to be.
You know, there you know you, you go back you certainly have the 1964
Civil Rights Act in mind, because this is the 50 anniversary, but there were, that
bill never would have having people think of it as a democratic accomplishment.
But the truth is, it never would have passed without the help of Republicans in
both the House and the Senate.
But for them, there would have been no Civil Rights Act and
many of them were midwestern and
Great Plains Republicans, who did not have large African-American constituencies.
But they had a long connection to the abolitionist roots of the,
of the party of Lincoln.
>> Mm-hm. >> And
so they stood up for what they thought was right.
And when the bill passed, you know, it had to pass the House and
then pass the Senate, break a filibuster which was organized by,
you know, segregationist Democrats from the South.
the, you, you, you know,
you look back at moments like that and you think that's what's different right there.
There is no one in either party.
Who's doing what those Republican leaders [INAUDIBLE] in the Senate.
Bill McCaulken in the House did to change, try change the country.
>> Thanks so much.
>> Sure, my pleasure. >> I really appreciate your time.
>> Sure, happy to be here.
