Public policy is mainly a government technical function that is usually a very complex interactive process that is influenced by the various diverse nature of the socio-political as well as other environmental factors. The environmental forces are the ones which form the main policy context that leads to the variation in influences and policies that affect the policy impact and output. It is paramount to note that because of the contextual differences, the developed countries' public policies differ significantly as compared with the developing countries public policies. Public policy mainly refers to the humongous government actions and the various intentions that it utilizes in order to address some challenges or problems. Thus, public policy is a government course of action or inaction that it takes to respond to social problems. Making public policy requires selecting various alternatives and goals, and choice in order to settle on the best intention to curb effectively the problem or challenge. There are various types of policies which include regulatory policies, self-regulatory policies and redistribution policies (Fox, Bayat & Ferreira, 2006).
Policy analysis is a very important aspect during the development and implementation stages of public policy since it shows exactly is the stipulated roadmap of achieving the intended goal or objective is on the right track. It is worth noting that public policy sets the means and ways of achieving a solution that is facing the public such as health and therefore the development and implementation of the public policy should have a policy analysis. The policy analysis investigates whether what was agreed is being followed to the letter and if there are changes that have to be undertaken in order to ensure that the public policy is being undertaken fully (Knoepfel, 2011).
There are numerous social impacts of policies since majority of them deal with the public in general. Thus, public policies have a direct social impact on the society since they tend to improve the well being of the public. Public policies normally handle issues such as health, education, water and sanitation as well as societal developmental issues. Therefore, public policies are an important integral factor for any government that wants to improve the social factors of its population (Guess & Farnham, 2011).
There are various limitations policies that have on government power since all the public policies have to follow the law as well as the stipulated regulations in accordance with the constitution of that particular country. However, political will among the politicians is very essential for the public policy to be approved and this requires a lot of lobbying by the people in-charge of establishing and implementing the public policy. Issues of financing the public policy are also important since without finances, the public policy cannot be implemented even if the policy is how integral to the country (Fox, Bayat & Ferreira, 2006).
In conclusion, public policy is a very paramount part of the government since it has numerous impacts to the society and there are many social aspects that directly impact them. The government has the fundamental role of ensuring that it implements as many public policies as possible in order to uplift the lives of their citizens and political will has to be lobbied properly for the process to be successful. Regardless of the limitations policies that public policies have on the government power, there is a need to ensure that there is harmony in accordance to the stipulated regulations so that they do not contravene them. This will ensure that there are no litigations on the public policy to be implemented by the government (Guess & Farnham, 2011).
References
Fox, W., Bayat, M. S., & Ferreira, I. W. (2006). A guide to managing public policy. Cape Town: Juta.
Guess, G. M., & Farnham, P. G. (2011). Cases in public policy analysis. Washington, D.C: Georgetown University Press.
Knoepfel, P. (2011). Public policy analysis. Bristol: Policy Press.
