Identify the two major barriers that government confronts in its ability to understand problems. Describe the typology of the kinds of policy formulation that are available to policymakers in light of these barriers.

What will be an ideal response?

The first major constraint is the lack of basic facts about policy questions. Frequently, there are no agreed-upon indicators of the nature of social indicators to assist in discovering basic facts. Secondly, government decision-makers often lack adequate information about the underlying causes of the problems they want to solve. The simplest type of policy formulation involves routine policy. This is policymaking in an environment in which policymakers have adequate information and an accepted theory of causation. It typically requires routine adjustment of existing policies and for the most part the changes made will be incremental. Creative policy formulation occurs when policymakers have neither adequate information nor an adequate theory of what is causing the problem. These policies require that reversibility is built into the policy so that creative formulations that prove unworkable can be corrected. Conditional policies arise when there is sufficient information available but an inadequate understanding as to what is causing the problem. Under this set of circumstances changes in certain indicators will trigger a policy response of some sort. It is advantageous to build a certain amount of automaticity into the policy response or at least to provide some insulation against policy delay or interference. Lastly, sometimes government understands the cause of a problem but lacks sufficient information to be confident in any policy that is formulated. Craftsman policies are used in this instance. These policies depend upon developing a number of contingencies and potential forms of response as well as identifying means of assessing the risks of possible occurrences.