POLI 311 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Joseph Howe, Secret Ballot, Responsible Government
12 May 2018
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POLI 321 LECTURES
Typology of public policy: public policy is defined as what governments do.
Types of policy:
- Distributive: apply to everybody (health, snow removal …)
- Regulatory: regulate industries, telecommunication, other aspects of life like “keep off
the grass” signs in parks telling people what to do, food industry, airlines,
- Redistribution: taxation,
- Symbolic: high degree of symbolism, language and legislation, flags
- Constitutional:
There is the issue in figuring out sometimes which category the policy fits into because it can be
both symbolic and redistributive
Joseph Howe
- 1830s Changed the practice of gov’t in British N.A
- By the 1830s, responsible gov’t meant that the gov’t even if elected, was responsible to
the monarch and the governor general
- Responsible gov’t meant it was responsible to the legislative: gov’t responsible to
parliament
The authority of the crown has shifted to the PM’s office
The electoral law favours the creation of government but doesn’t necessarily reflect the views of
the citizens but no system of law is free of biases because if everything needed unanimity,
nothing would get done
Australian Ballot: a secret ballot, the first ballot to be anonymous
Party whip: a system that makes sure everyone in the party votes the same or they are
“whipped”
Overall: policy is what the government does, it is what has the support of the people and it is
legitimate
- Gov’t is elected
Jane Jenson – week’s author discusses:
Policy mandate: the government generally doesn’t have one
We want to understand how human beings interact in complex systems to produce particular
results = we use difference complementary model to guide our understanding
Responsible government
In effect, the definition of policy in responsible government is policy is what the government
does
- Assumes that elections are ways to give mandates to elected officials (do Jane Jensen
reading for this info) → suggests that elections don’t provide a new mandate, simply new
candidates
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
