Mapping scientific research on policy capacity: A bibliometric analysis and qualitative framework synthesis

Abstract

It is a shared understanding among policy scholars and practitioners that governments with high levels of policy capacity are better able to design and implement public policies for driving economic growth and social development. Despite the centrality of policy capacity, a common definition and measurement of policy capacity remain elusive. There exists a long list of concepts that seek to encapsulate the ability of the governance system to deliver desired policy outcomes–such as state capacity, administrative capacity, governance capacity, bureaucratic capacity–that stimulates greater academic enthusiasm but more often contributes to intellectual divergence on the subject. This paper performed a conceptual analysis of policy capacity through a bibliometric analysis and qualitative framework synthesis of relevant literature various fields like political science, public administration and policy studies. It identified a pattern of fragmentation in the overall approach in defining and operationalizing capacity, which underlies the divergence in the conceptual and operational understanding of policy capacity. A synthetic framework is offered with the intention of putting together this disparate research into a process-oriented dynamic of the development of policy capacity.