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What is Lesson-Drawing?

Richard Rose

Journal of Public Policy / Volume 11 / Issue 01 / January 1991, pp 3 - 30

DOI: 10.1017/S0143814X00004918, Published online: 28 November 2008

Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0143814X00004918

How to cite this article:

Richard Rose (1991). What is Lesson-Drawing?. Journal of Public Policy, 11, pp
3-30 doi:10.1017/S0143814X00004918

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Jnl Publ. Pol., I I , /, 3-30

What is Lesson-Drawing?

R I C H A R D R O S E , Public Policy, University of Strathdyde"

ABSTRACT
Lesson-drawing addresses the question: Under what circumstances and
to what extent can a programme that is effective in one place transfer to
another. Searching for fresh knowledge is not normal; the second section
describes the stimulus to search as dissatisfaction with the status quo.
Lessons can be sought by searching across time and/or across space; the
choice depends upon a subjective definition of proximity, epistemic com-
munities linking experts together, functional interdependence between
governments, and the authority of intergovernmental institutions. The
process of lesson-drawing starts with scanning programmes in effect
elsewhere, and ends with the prospective evaluation of what would
happen if a programme already in effect elsewhere were transferred here
in future. Lesson-drwaing is part of a contested political process; there is
no assurance that a lesson drawn will be both desirable and practical.
The conclusion considers the uncertainty and instability of judgements
about the practicality and desirability of transferring programmes.

The real world in fact is perhaps the most fertile of all sources of good research
questions calling for basic scientific inquiry.
Herbert A. Simon, Nobel laureate lecture

Every country has problems, and each thinks that its problems are
unique to its place and time. Up to a point this is true, since differences
in history and institutions make the budget deficit facing the President of
the United States different from that facing a Soviet leader. Every city
has a unique history and each mayor a unique electoral constituency;
inner city decay in Birmingham, Alabama is a problem to the citizens of

This article is based upon opening sections of the Ransone Lectures on Public Administration,
that I delivered at the University of Alabama in March, 1990 (Rose, forthcoming). An appoint-
ment as Guest Professor at the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin provided time for the initial reflec-
tion on which this work is based. A grant from the Anglo-German Foundation, London, to draw
lessons from the British and German experience of rising unemployment in the 1980s gave
practical experience in doing, as well as preaching about lesson-drawing.
4 Richard Rose
Birmingham, whereas decay in Birmingham, England is a problem to
citizens of the British West Midlands.
However, problems that are unique to one country, such as German
re-unification, are- abnormal. The concerns for which ordinary people
turn to government - education, social security, health care, safety on
the streets, a clean environment, and a buoyant economy - are common
on many continents. Within a given policy area there is much in com-
mon across state and national boundaries. Schools are expected to teach
children to read and write, social security is supposed to protect against
poverty in old age, and public health inspectors to prevent the spread of
epidemic diseases. It is easier to see similarities between the same policy
area in different countries than to find similarities between social
security and environmental or defence policies within a country.
Confronted with a common problem, policymakers in cities, regional
governments and nations can learn from how their counterparts
elsewhere respond. More than that, it raises the possibility that poli-
cymakers can draw lessons that will help them deal better with their own
problems. If the lesson is positive, a policy that works is transferred, with
suitable adaptations. If it is negative, observers learn what not to do
from watching the mistakes of others.
The traffic in lesson-drawing is in many directions. American federal-
ism can be described as a laboratory for social experiments among 50
different states. In Brussels, ministerial meetings addressing common
functional problems must consider carefully the similarities and dif-
ferences between national programmes. A team of American public
officials concerned with employment policies can go to Germany, Britain
and France, and issue a report entitled Lessons from Europe (Carlson et al.,
1986). A similarly motivated team of French policymakers concerned
with creating jobs can journey in the opposite direction, producing a
report entitled Lessons from the United States (Dommergues et al., 1989).
To understand where we are at present, we must have bearings in
time and space. Programmes are judged in relation to past performance,
and in anticipation of their future consequences. Programmes can also
be judged by comparison across space; how effective are they by com-
parison with what is done elsewhere? In search of lessons a local official
may telephone around friends and neighbours in a metropolitan area;
national officials are more likely to talk shop at international meetings.
Lesson-drawing is contingent. One cannot borrow blindly or con-
demn blindly, for the success of a programme is affected by the specifics
of context as well as generic attributes. The critical analytic question is:
Under what circumstances and to what extent would a programme now
in effect elsewhere also work here? Lesson-drawing requires more than
singling out examples of present success elsewhere. The need is prospec-
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 5
tive: understanding what others do today is meant to improve conditions
here in future. But finding a programme that has brought political
satisfaction elsewhere does not guarantee that it can be transferred
effectively. It may even be argued that however small the distance in
space, a measure effective elsewhere cannot possibly work here. The
assumption is: They are different, because they are there. The
uncertainty associated with lesson-drawing is not different in kind from
uncertainty about many policy proposals.
When dissatisfaction arises, the pressures to act force policymakers to
accept the costs of uncertainty. The question is: What to do? An
historian is likely to look for lessons from the past. Public administration
experts make rule-of-thumb recommendations drawn from current pro-
fessional beliefs about how institutions ought to work. Economists typi-
cally use logic to deduce prescriptions from abstract models of how an
economic system works. However, an intellectual solution is not necess-
arily a practical solution to a problem.
A policymaker is not a theorist but a social engineer seeking know-
ledge instrumentally. In policymaking circles, experience has a unique
status as a justification of effectiveness; it shows that a proposal is not
just based upon 'head in the clouds' speculation. Organizations such as
the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank regularly deal
with the concerns of 150 nations around the globe, and this experience is
often cited as a justification for advice. As the managing director of the
IMF, Michel Camdessus (1990: 115) declares:

Our task is to advise countries on economic policy matters. This means provid-
ing them with access to nothing less than the collective experience of 152
countries garnered over more than forty years - an experience with which we
are fully familiar thanks to the ongoing dialogue we have maintained with each
of them over all those years, examining successes and failures with each
individually.

The emphasis that policymakers place upon the lessons of experience

reflects their concern with feasibility. Is a proposed course of action
capable of being carried out, and if so, will it produce the predicted
result? Public officials have little interest in discussing measures that
have never been put into effect, and that appear likely to fail of
implementation.
The first step is definition; lesson-drawing is about whether program-
mes can transfer from one place to another; it is not about what politi-
cians think ought to be done. Searching for fresh knowledge is not
normal; the second section describes the stimulus to search as dis-
satisfaction with the status quo rather than the attraction of success
elsewhere. Lessons can be sought by searching across time or across
6 Richard Rose
space; the choice depends upon a subjective definition of proximity,
upon epistemic communities linking experts together, functional inter-
dependence between governments, and the authority of intergovernmen-
tal institutions. The process of lesson-drawing is the subject of the fourth
section; it starts with scanning programmes in effect elsewhere, and ends
with the prospective evaluation of what would happen if a programme
already in effect elsewhere were transferred here in future. Lesson-draw-
ing is part of a contested political process; there is no assurance that a
lesson drawn will be both desirable and practical. The conclusion con-
siders the uncertainty and instability of judgements about practicality
and desirability.

/. Lessons as Instrumental Programmes

Consciously or unconsciously, we are always drawing lessons from our
own past or from the experience of predecessors in a job. When we
travel, both differences and similarities are noticed. The differences are a
stimulus to draw conclusions about the way that we order our activities
at home. Just as Moliere's upstart man of wealth could speak prose
without tuition, so everyone concerned with public policy unconsciously
draws lessons across time and.space. What is it that intelligent people do
without thinking?
Whereas the goals of government are the primary concern of elected
politicians, the everyday activities of government concern programmes,
the instruments by which these ends may be secured. A modern state
cannot operate simply by the proclamation of good intentions. It is also
necessary to formulate specific and detailed programmes as the instru-
ments of achieving success. Given an authoritative policy goal, lesson-
drawing seeks to use knowledge from other times and places to improve
current programmes.
A programme is a creation of public law; a statute identifies its
purposes and the conditions under which it operates. Money to finance a
programme is appropriated in the budget. A specific public agency and
employees are responsible for adminstering a programme. The outputs
of a programme can take many forms: money (a social security benefit);
services of public employees (health care or education); or normative
rules (laws about environmental pollution). A programme is an instru-
ment of public policy, because it is a necessary means of achieving policy
intentions (Rose, 1985).
Whereas the intentions of politicians about prosperity and equality
are often vague or diffuse, programmes are concrete and specific. Pro-
grammes are also much more concrete than functional categories, such
as defence, social security, and health care. They embody particular
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 7
means of meeting these functional responsibilities. Programmes also
constitute clusters of interests drawing together public officials, interest
groups, professional experts and the programme's clients (Cf. Heclo,
1978). Their existence can be verified and their effects observed by
getting down to the nuts and bolts of what government actually does.
Defining lesson-drawing. In everyday speech, a lesson is knowledge that
is instructive, a conclusion about a subject drawn after the fact from
observation or experience. In its most primitive form, a lesson is the
assertion of'what everyone knows'. A lesson is here defined as an action-
oriented conclusion about a programme or programmes in operation
elsewhere; the setting can be another city, another state, another nation
or an organization's own past. Because policymakers are action-orien-
ted, a lesson focuses upon specific programmes that governments have
or may adopt. A lesson is more than an evaluation of a programme in its
own context; it also implies a judgement about doing the same
elsewhere. A lesson is thus a political moral drawn from analysing the
actions of other governments.
Lessons constitute what is learned. A lesson is more than learning for
its own sake; it relates actions elsewhere to substantive problems in a
government agency. Lessons do not require a change in behaviour as a
condition of learning; a programme elsewhere may be evaluated
negatively, or the conclusion may be that there is no way in which it
could be transferred. Whereas social scientists often focus upon how
policymakers learn (see e.g. Etheredge, 1981), very little attention is
given to the conclusions or lessons drawn from learning. Lessons belong
to the world of Angewandte Sozialwissenschaft (applied social science). The
German phrase expresses the idea that science is the common means of
analysing both social and natural phenomena; it also emphasizes that
scientific procedures can be applied to everyday social phenomena.
Concern with the transferability of a programme from one place to
another is a distinguishing feature of lesson-drawing. Whereas the evalu-
ation of an already implemented programme concludes with a positive
or negative judgement about what was done in the past, the critical
question in lesson-drawing is whether a programme that is successful in
one setting can be transferred to another. To draw a lesson properly, it is
necessary to devote as much care to examining the probability or
improbability of transfer as it is to evaluating its initial effect.
Because a lesson derives from the experience of another government,
it is not an innovation per se. An innovation is a completely novel
programme. A lesson is seen as a short cut, utilizing available experience
elsewhere to devise a programme that it new to the agency adopting it
and attractive because of evidence that is has been effective elsewhere.
In the process of attempted imitation, greater or lesser innovations can
8 Richard Rose
occur, through selectivity in emulation, or unintentionally (cf. Westney,
1987: 24 fi).
Understanding what a lesson is not can sharpen the idea of what it is.
A lesson is not a symbol, exploiting the name of a country to convey the
success or failure of a programme in effect elsewhere. In the rhetoric of
politics, symbols can be used to place an idea on the political agenda.
Depending upon partisan values, Britain or Sweden may be evoked as a
symbol of what to emulate, or what to avoid. Whereas symbols are
vague motives to action, lessons are full of the details of programmes.
Lesson-drawing is different from reasoning from first principles, the
natural mode of thinking in physics, and increasingly in use in econ-
omics. Although reasoning from first principle can lead to a logically
coherent prescription, it will be unrelated to the historical experience of
the country to which it is applied, omitting all consideration of institu-
tional constraints, normative preferences, and the inertia of established
programmes. The consequences hypothesized are pure speculation,
being based upon logical analysis devoid of empirical evidence.
Lessons are much more specific than the 'big ideas' that create a
paradigm shift in our understanding of such pervasive phenomena as the
management of the economy or what to do about poverty (Cf. Kuhn,
1962). By definition, such shifts in understanding are relatively rare.
The Keynesian revolution is an example of such a shift (Hall, 1989). The
'green' revolution, creating a demand for environmental programmes, is
another. In the decades or generations between paradigm shifts, poli-
cymakers concentrate upon the development of programmes within an
established paradigm.
Lesson-drawing differs fundamentally from conventional social
science comparisons, which concentrate almost exclusively upon after
the fact explanation (see e.g. Dogan and Pelassy, 1984). Almost invari-
ably, social scientists are concerned with testing theories against past
events or current evidence. By avoiding the logical trap of generalizing
from a single case study, such studies can explain why a programme that
worked in country X did not work in country Y. But it is unusual for
conventional social scientists to take the next logical step: to predict
whether a programme now in effect in country X would be effective if
transferred to country Y. Drawing such a lesson is the instrumental
concern of policymakers in country Y.
Evaluating nations, states or cities by ranking them in terms of their
performance on a specific policy indicator, such as economic growth or
health, can spotlight countries that may have something to teach, and
countries that need to draw lessons from experience elsewhere. The
massive development in data resources at all levels of government, from
cross-local to international, makes this readily practicable. Knowing
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 9
that one's country is below-average in a given policy area is sufficient to
give critics of government a stick to use to create dissatisfaction with the
status quo. But rankings, and particularly low rankings, do not tell a
harried government what to do. At best, rankings simply point to other
countries, near or far, that are doing better.
Lessons are different from the analogies that constitute the uses and
abuses of history. Lessons must identify circumstances that are different
as well as those that are the same, whereas an analogy between the
present and past assumes that the similarities justifying the analogy are
sufficiently powerful to offset all differences. Analogies also assume that
the problems facing policymakers are recurrent problems. In the judge-
ment of the authors of Thinking in Time, Richard Neustadt and Ernest R.
May (1986: xii), most contemporary American policymakers know so
little history that instead of trying to refine lessons from the past, they
simply invoke past events 'for advocacy or for comfort'.
Lesson-drawing differs from studies of the diffusion of public policies
from their initial point of innovation to other states or countries (see e.g.
Walker, 1969; Collier and Messick, 1975; Savage, 1985; Berry and
Berry, 1990). The diffusion literature concentrates principally upon the
attributes of those who adopt new measures sooner or later, and upon
the pattern of diffusion (Rogers, 1983). Is it determined by geographical
propinquity, socio-economic resources or by individual characteristics of
policymakers? Nearly all studies of the diffusion of measures, whether
public programmes or agricultural or pharmaceutical products, assume
that not only are there common problems but also a common response,
regardless of partisan values or political cultures. The emphasis is upon
the sequence of diffusion, rather than concentrating upon what is trans-
ferred. Diffusion studies seek to identify states or countries that are
leaders and laggards in adopting programmes, and to account for the
difference.
Diffusion studies often presuppose a kind of technocratic determinism,
whereas lesson-drawing tends to be voluntaristic. Technological
determinism assumes that the existence of common problems in many
places will dictate a common response. Looking for lessons accepts only
the first of these two assumptions, the premise that many problems
facing a government have counterparts elsewhere. But it does not
assume that there must be, or even can be, a common response. It is
particularly noteworthy that in such highly technical fields as the regula-
tion of environmentally polluting chemicals or data about individuals
held in massive computer files, there are substantial differences in the
ways that nations respond to common problems (see e.g. Hoberg, 1991;
Bennett, 1988).
Lesson-drawing by government faces far more difficulties than learn-
io Richard Rose
ing in the market place by individuals or by corporations. An individual
can compare different makers of the same product, and make up his or
her own mind. A business firm normally has a high degree of normative
consensus about what it wants, and it is easier to measure profits, sales
and market share than to evaluate the success of government. In the
political process, by contrast, normative disagreement is likely; the more
important the issue, the greater the likelihood that there will be contro-
versy about programme goals as well as means.

/ / . Dissatisfaction - The Stimulus to Search for Lessons

Searching for lessons is not driven by idle curiosity; policymakers,
whether elected officeholders, civil servants or interest group representa-
tives, have a superabundance of claims on their time. Doing nothing is
always a strategy that policymakers can follow. Inaction is efficient, for
it requires the minimum investment of effort. When policymakers pro-
nounce that everything is proceeding satisfactorily, what they mean is
that everything seemed to be all right the last time they looked. The
decision rule is simply stated: 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it'.
In the career of most programmes there comes a time when dis-
satisfaction disrupts routine. When confronted with dissatisfaction, poli-
cymakers will search for something that will work, that is, be effective in
dispelling dissatisfaction. Ignorance is the starting point. Dissatisfaction
is evidence that something has gone wrong, but it does not tell poli-
cymakers about what they ought to do. It emphasizes what not to do; the
status quo is not an option.
In searching for an effective programme, policymakers are not
engaged in research as that term is understood in universities. Poli-
cymakers are driven by the need to dissipate dissatifaction. Instead of
new knowledge, policymakers prefer the assurance of doing what has
worked before, or been effective elsewhere. Searching is instrumentally
directed. As Cyert and March (1963: 121) note:

Problemistic search can be distinguished from both random curiosity and the
search for understanding. It is distinguished from the former because it has a
goal, from the latter because it is interested in understanding only insofar as
such understanding contributes to control. Problemistic search is engineering
rather than pure science.

Policymakers do not have the time or the knowledge to be maximizers,

continuously seeking an ideal policy. In Herbert Simon's (1979: 503)
terms, they are 'satisficers'; satisficing behaviour can account for poli-
cymakers both starting and stopping a search for a new programme. The
relation between aspiration and achievement is the critical determinant
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 11
of action or inaction. As long as a programme's outcome matches aspira-
tions, then there is satisfaction, and it can run by routine. However,
when a gap opens between aspirations and achievements, this creates
dissatisfaction, pressing policymakers to find something that will remove
dissatisfaction.
Running by routine. In an era of big government, public organizations
must normally operate by routine. Otherwise, the everyday services of
government - education, health care, the payment of social security
benefits and the collection of rubbish - could not be delivered. The great
bulk of public officials are not concerned with learning fresh lessons from
elsewhere; they are rule-bound bureaucrats and technicians.
In the economy of administration, busy policymakers have a strong
incentive to ignore what officials under them are doing, for time is
limited, and the political system always generates more demands for
attention than there is time to take notice. As Simon (1978: 13) explains:
In a world where attention is a major scarce resource, information may be an
expensive luxury, for it may turn our attention from what is important to what
is unimportant. We cannot afford to attend to information simply because it is
there.

Policymakers can ignore programmes - as long as routine activities

appear to be producing satisfaction.
The definition of a satisfactory, or at least a 'not unsatisfactory',
programme, is problematic. The aspirations against which achieve-
ments are judged are not given; they are political constructions. As
Charles W. Anderson (1978: 191) emphasizes:
A policy problem is a political condition that does not meet some standard.
Problems can be appraised in the light of many different political principles
. . . . Public problems are not just 'out there' waiting to be dealt with. Poli-
cymaking is not simply problem-solving. It is also a matter of setting up and
defining problems in the first place.

Becoming dissatisfied. A necessary condition of lesson-drawing is that

policymakers want to learn something that they do not already know.
This occurs when routine is disrupted and policymakers can no longer
operate on the assumption that what was saitsfactory before is still
satisfactory. Capturing the attention of politicians in power is not easy,
for as Karl Deutsch has noted (1963: i n ) , power can be defined as 'the
ability to talk instead of listen, the ability to afford not to learn'.
From a satisficing perspective, promoting a programme as superior to
one already in place is not sufficient to justify change. A gap must be
created between present aspirations and achievements. Ideas-mongers
must generate dissatisfaction by raising aspirations about what it is
12 Richard Rose
possible to attain. The skills needed to generate dissatisfaction are often
very different from those required to generate new programmes; hence,
many new ideas are ignored for years. Adoption is often contingent upon
an exogenous crisis generating sufficient dissatisfaction to create a
demand for doing something new (Kingdon, 1984; Polsby, 1984).
Uncertainty in the minds of policymakers can generate dissatisfaction.
As government has become more involved in a greater variety of pro-
grammes, the relationship between programmes and between program-
mes and society becomes more complex, and this generates uncertainty.
Uncertainty can be disturbing, generating dissatisfaction when, as two
experienced Washington policy analysts note, 'to a far greater extent
than in the past, the individuals who must make the difficult economic
choices in Washington are in the dark' (Aho and Levinson, 1988: 8).
Changes in the policy environment can create dissatisfaction, as the
effects of a programme become negative, even though the programme
itself is unaltered. Economic policies that depend for effectiveness upon
what is happening elsewhere are particularly vulnerable to appearing
unsatisfactory because of changes in the international policy environ-
ment. An OECD (1988: 12) study, Why Economic Policies Change Course,
examined cases in which nations persisted in programmes deemed
necessary and desirable - and then abandoned them. It concluded that a
change of course was not the result of learning about superior alterna-
tives, but being confronted with palpable evidence that their programme
was unsustainable, that is, 'likely to result in discontinuities and disloca-
tions, such as a collapse of the exchange rate and accelerating inflation,
with severe costs that are economic, political and social'.
Changes in political values can create dissatisfaction with program-
mes that formerly had operated by routine. The government of the day
may seek to alter the terms of political debate; for example, the series of
anti-poverty programmes that constituted the 1960s American War on
Poverty was not so much a response to increased poverty as it was a
consequence of a shift in values that produced a demand to 'do some-
thing' about poverty. Electoral competition institutionalizes efforts to
manufacture dissatisfaction, for opposition politicians have a vested
interest in generating dissatisfaction with the current programmes of
government.
Dissatisfaction works by sanctions. The stimulus for search comes less
from the uncertain promise of benefits than it does from the certain
threat of pain if policymakers do not do something to remove current
difficulties. Policymakers who do not heed evidence of dissatisfaction are
threatened with the progressive deterioration of a programme for which
they are responsible, and loss of support, or even loss of public office. As
policymakers' awareness of dissatisfaction increases, the cost of inaction
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 13
rises (Rose, 1972). Dissatisfaction stimulates search with the argument:
'You can't afford not to'.

/ / / . Searching for Satisfaction Across Time and Space

Faced with a rising tide of dissatisfaction with a programme, poli-
cymakers think first of action. Policymakers do not have time or capacity
to search everywhere; they follow the line of least resistance. The basic
decision rule is: In response to signals of dissatisfaction, start searching near at
hand. In a time-space continuum, the definition of proximity is subjec-
tive. Proximity depends upon cognition; what is already known and
people and organizations already known will be appreciated before what
is unfamiliar (cf. Cyert and March, 1963: 12iff).
Varying the scope for search. Confronted with a problem, the first place for
an organization to look is to its own standard operating procedures. If a
programme is deemed inadequate, then the first remedy to try is: more
of the same. If there is dissatisfaction with primary schools or health
care, simply spend more money on teachers or on building new
hospitals; do not question the programmes on which money is spent. An
organization's own past is the second place to search. An agency has an
institutional memory based upon past experience. If a problem is cycli-
cal, such as inflation or unemployment, then it can invoke counter-
cyclical programmes that have been effective before.
However, when there is structural change in the policy environment,
then what worked before is no longer likely to be effective in dispelling
dissatisfaction. When a problem is unprecedented, such as the outbreak
of AIDS, an organization's past cannot offer a solution. At best, it can
only offer analogies drawn from previous epidemics, but analogies are
neither logical nor empirical assurance of effective lessons (cf. Neustadt
and Fineberg, 1983; Day and Klein, 1989). Policymakers must then
search further afield.
At this juncture policymakers have two alternatives. Speculating
about how a novel programme would work in future is one. Speculating
about the future does not require reference to any form of experience.
However, advice that is purely speculative may be treated sceptically,
because it is not grounded on experience but unbounded.
Searching across space is the other major alternative. The scope of
search is a function of the institution seeking help and the problem at
hand. Local government officials are likely to look to nearby local
authorities on the assumption that they have most in common with
neighbours, but American big city mayors must look to cities in other
states. American state officials are likely to turn to neighbouring states
or those considered in the vanguard in dealing with a particular issue. A
14 Richard Rose
national programme uniform throughout the country cannot vary in
basic design, for example, social security pensions. In such circum-
stances, national policymakers must look abroad for lessons.
Potentially, there is no limit to the distance that might be travelled,
when national policymakers start searching across international
borders. Among advanced industrial nations, differences in national
levels of income and socio-economic capacity are limited, by comparison
with differences between third world and first world countries. Third
world countries have the choice of looking to other developing nations
for programmes, or seeking to bridge bigger differences by learning from
advanced industrial nations. Former COMECON nations currently face
the difficulty of knowing what they do not want to imitate, namely, the
Soviet system, but being less confident about which country offers the
best practical lessons for their distinctive circumstances.
Subjective indentification is more important than geographical pro-
pinquity in directing search. Neighbours are not necessarily friends.
Australia will not turn to a poor neighbour for ideas but to Britain or the
United States. British government rarely looks for lessons in public
policy to either of the two countries nearest at hand, France and Ireland.
Since most countries share borders with a multiplicity of other nations,
policymakers normally have a choice of neighbours from whom to seek
information. Finns can look to the Soviet Union or to Sweden; and
Germany can look to Scandinavia or to Poland.
Political values influence the direction in which search is undertaken.
For most of the postwar era Communist-dominated nations of Eastern
Europe were not allowed to consider programmes adopted by their
neighbours in Western Europe, and Western European countries did not
want to emulate the programmes of centrally planned economies.
Partisan differences can cause divisions within a nation about where to
search for examples. Leftwing parties will look to programmes spon-
sored by leftwing governments, and rightwing leaders to programmes
sponsored by rightwing governments.
A small number of countries exert a pull as exemplars, attracting a
stream of visitors to examine their programmes. The United States, by
virtue of novelty and scale, has long been an exemplar. Sweden has been
an internationally recognized exemplar of a social democratic welfare
state, attracting many policymakers who admire their programmes, and
a few critics looking for ammunition to use against similar proposals at
home. Japan has moved from seeking lessons from other countries
(Westney, 1987: 21 iff) to being an example, particularly for the 'Four
Dragons' of South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore.
There is a 'push' effect too in lesson-drawing, when one country or
group of countries has disproportionate power vis a vis others, (Majone,
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 15
1991). The initial impetus to Japan's efforts to import all forms of
Western programmes, from the army to the post office, came from the
country's evident weakness vis a vis the United States and Europe
(Westney, 1987: chapter 1). Planners seeking to develop European Mon-
etary Union with a single currency issued by a European central bank
look to Germany for lessons about how to organize a central bank with
effective anti-inflation programmes. One reason for doing so is Ger-
many's success in combatting inflation. Another reason is that in politi-
cal, economic, and population terms, Germany is the biggest nation in
the Community.
Trial and error is the best way to describe the search. When dis-
satisfaction is high, the pressure is great to do something, even some-
thing that is likely to fail. In the first instance, the actions that
policymakers take may be hurried, lack any theoretical or empirical
justification, and have little chance of success. Even if it fails, the
attempt to implement a new programme then becomes a source of
knowledge. As long as there is feedback, errors are corrigible and pro-
grammes can be adapted to remove deficiencies (Braybrooke and Lind-
blom, 1963), then mistakes are not a total loss. They are the tuition
charge that an agency must pay in order to learn how to dispel
dissatisfaction.
The response to dissatisfaction is indeterminate and non-linear, but
not random. The process is indeterminate because no set of fixed rules
will predict or guarantee success. It is non-linear because if steps in one
direction fail to produce satisfaction, then policymakers can move in
another in search of something that satisfices.
Epistemic communities as informal networks. When searching for ideas
experts draw upon specialist knowledge as well as government experi-
ence. A public health official confronted with an epidemic will search for
ideas in medical journals and scientific meetings as well as in agency
meetings and bureacratic documents. Insofar as diseases have common
attributes regardless of country, then officials can read with interest the
results of programmes in foreign countries, seeking lessons that can
promote health care at home.
As individuals, policymakers have more or less specialized knowledge
derived from contacts that cut across institutional and geographical
boundaries, and this is particularly true of public officials whose position
depends upon expertise. Professional interests and associations bring
together experts who work in many different types of institution; thus,
economists are likely to know other economists working in universities,
government, the private sector, non-profit institutions, and often in
intergovernmental or international organizations.
An epistemic community is a knowledge-based network of individuals
16 Richard Rose

with a claim to policy-relevant knowledge based upon common pro-

fessional beliefs and standards of judgement, and common policy con-
cerns (Haas, 1990). An epistemic community may base its claims to
authority upon knowledge of hard sciences such as aeronautical
engineering, upon a social science such as economics or social policy, or
upon common education for professional practice, as is the case of
lawyers.
An epistemic community can operate at many levels, state, national
and international. Locally or regionally, a community of education spe-
cialists draws together head teachers in the schools, local administrators,
department of education officials, a variety of academics in teacher
training and educational evaluation, and a few free-floating experts.
Leading members of a state or regional community will be active in the
national education policy network; a few may be active at international
levels. The locus of meetings may shift, but the subject matter remains
constant: the concerns of educational policymakers. This stream of infor-
mation can be drawn upon as lessons for action, as and when dissatisfac-
tion arises at home.
Even though many members of an epistemic community may be
employed by government, their authority does not depend upon votes or
official position, but upon claims to expert knowledge. They operate in a
shadowy world between transnational and transgovernmental contact
(Nye and Keohane, 1971: 38ofF). In the first instance, experts relate to
each other as individuals sharing common professional interests; the
basis of the relationship is nongovernmental, a characteristic of transna-
tional interactions. But experts who hold public office can use their
knowledge to formulate public policies. Even when participating in pro-
fessional meetings, their capacity to make commitments that lead to
action remains bound by their bureaucratic positions.
Members of an epistemic community may share concepts and
methods, but often they do not agree about public policies. Because
policy advice combines technical knowledge with political judgements
about what is and is not desirable, experts in the same profession often
disagree; economists provide frequent examples of this phenomenon.
Many government organizations employ a multiplicity of experts, and
this can result in disagreements between different epistemic communi-
ties. For example, environmentalists concentrate upon characteristics of
nature that are regarded as priceless, whereas economists are prepared
to calculate the costs and benefits of everything, and make trade offs
between environmental pollution and economic growth (see Kelman,
1981).
For policymakers, there is a positive advantage in the existence of
divergent opinions within an epistemic community. As long as there is a
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 17
diversity of political outlooks this ensures that there will always be some
experts sharing values consistent with the elected government of the day.
Elected officials searching for lessons prefer to turn to those whose
overall political values are consistent with their own. Although epistemic
communities can be a source of new ideas necessary for lesson-drawing,
they lack the political authority to impose binding decisions.
Functional interdependence. When two or more countries share a problem,
then each must look to the other in order to achieve an effective outcome.
Collective problems can be shared in two contrasting ways. Several
countries can act jointly to deal with a problem. One nation can
externalize the costs of its own activities upon another. Even if poli-
cymakers do not have equal influence in the determination of outcomes,
when a collective problem arises they cannot afford to ignore actions by
other countries that influence a problem that is not confined within a
single country.
Environmental policy provides many illustrations of functional inter-
dependence due to the permeability of national boundaries. Although in
the literal sense every country has always had environmental conditions,
it was only in the 1960s and 1970s that the environment emerged on the
political agenda of national policymakers. The emergence of the
environment on the agenda of national politics in many countries reflec-
ted the rapid transnational transmission of expert ideas and information.
The pollution of the Mediterranean by the discharge of industrial,
municipal and agricultural wastes from 18 European, Middle Eastern
and North African countries is a classsic example of a collective goods
problem. All nations contribute to the pollution of the Mediterranean
and all suffer its effects. Any action taken by one nation would be
insufficient to prevent its shores and coastal waters from being awash
with pollution from other countries. The problem has been met by the
creation of a special-purpose functional institution, the Mediterranean
Action Plan, authorized by a 1976 Convention establishing an
administrative headquarters to coordinate and advise on the implemen-
tation of pollution control programmes in each signatory country to the
benefit of all (Haas, forthcoming).
When there are asymmetries of power, and one country externalizies
its problems onto another, the dissatisfied country knows where to
search, but the outcome is problematic, for the country exporting the
problem is not within its jurisdiction. This situation arises in the case of
Canada's acid rain problem, which is caused more by prevailing
southerly winds exporting airborne American pollutants such as sulfur
dioxide to Canada. In consequence, Canada has been involved in
importing and exporting anti-pollution programmes to the United
States. (Hoberg, 1991).
18 Richard Rose
Trade is another field in which the programmes of one government
depend for their impact upon trade policies of other importing and
exporting countries. As awareness of the complex causes of competitive
advantage increases, national governments pay more attention to pro-
grammes that may indirectly as well as directly contribute to trade
competitiveness. Governments of countries having difficulty with
exports look to successful exporting nations for ideas about how to 'catch
up'. For example, a British government white paper on education and
training (Cmnd. 9823, 1986: 2) declares:
Comparisons with where we were a few years ago are irrelevant, as are com-
parisons with what other British companies and organizations are doing. The
comparison which counts is that with our overseas competitors, and that is to
our disadvantage.

Intergovernmental institutions. Within a nation, there are often opportuni-

ties for lesson-drawing, because several different public agencies are
likely to be involved with an issue, whether operating in parallel or in a
vertical hierarchy. The constitution establishes ground rules for net-
works exchanging ideas. In a unitary state such as France, there is an
explicit hierarchy of authority, and prefects and deputies can move ideas
up and down this hierarchy.
In a federal system, the disaggregation of authority produces a multi-
plicity of sources of ideas in what is sometimes described as the 'quasi-
laboratory' of federalism. When agencies in each state have the same
responsibilities and are subject to the same federal rules but operate with
substantial discretion and are accountable to different legislatures, there
is substantial scope for variations, whether random or non-random.
Given a framework of common institutions within a federal system,
service-delivery practices in state X should be capable of adoption in
state Y.
Horizontal communication is the major source of new ideas for pro-
grammes in American states. Officials rank informal communication
with coworkers in their own agency as of first importance, and ideas
gathered from professional conferences, publications and informal com-
munications across state lines as second in importance. Other sources of
ideas include interest groups, citizens, the news media, and academic
contacts. Federal government contacts rank bottom in significance
(Grady and Chi, 1990: Table 1).
The movement of ideas between nations lacks the authority of a
unitary or federal government. The Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD) is concerned with moving ideas
across national boundaries; however, the OECD does not have any
operating authority or resources. It does not issue laws and regulations
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 19
that member-states must obey, nor does it disburse large sums of money
to encourage new programmes in member states. It is a clearing house
for statistical information that national policymakers (and their critics)
can use to compare their performance with that of other countries.
The European Community is an example of an intergovernmental
institution that does have some binding authority over its members,
and some financial resources. The 12 member states are bound to
accept directives of the Community on a host of issues concerning trade,
industry, employment, agriculture, monetary policy and associated
policy areas. Much of the activity of the Commission in Brussels is
concentrated upon compiling reports about the diverse ways in which
national governments respond to problems, and the extent to which
differences in programmes are consistent with economic integration.
Given that these reports may subsequently serve as the basis for Com-
munity directives, national officials have an immediate incentive to pay
close attention to cross-national similarities and differences in
programmes.
The European Community is pledged to the creation in 1992 of a
Single European Market with a harmonious set of economic and social
programmes (cf. Kahler, 1988: 378ff; Majone, 1991). Even though this is
unlikely to create uniform programmes among the diverse members of
the Community, the Single European Market will create competition
between programmes. If programmes in industry, employment, trans-
portation, or other fields appear more effective, then a national govern-
ment must ask: Could that programme work in our country?

IV. Drawing a Lesson

Evaluation and lesson-drawing are inextricably linked. A lesson includes
a judgement about a programme in effect elsewhere and the position of a
potential user. Only if another country is doing better in handling a
specific problem can a positive lesson be drawn. If it is evaluated as
doing worse, then any lesson will be about what not to do. Lesson-
drawing goes well beyond post hoc evaluation research about a particu-
lar programme in a single country. It is also concerned with the prospec-
tive question: Can a programme now operating in country X be put into
effect in country Y in future?
Scanning programmes elsewhere. The first step in lesson-drawing is to seek
information about programmes of public agencies elsewhere that have
addressed a similar problem. The object in examining the experience of
other nations is not to become an expert about foreign experience, but to
gain fresh ideas relevant to a problem that one's own government is
handling badly. It is the emphasis upon conclusions applicable across
20 Richard Rose
national or state boundaries that distinguishes lesson-drawing from
mere information-gathering or the study of alien cultures for their own
sake (cf. Rose, 1991).
A policymaker wants a programme that has a chance of being effective
in his or her own country, and not an exact replica of a programme
whose success elsewhere is no guarantee of successful importation. At
the end of the process what is required is not descriptive detail but
knowledge that can be transferred because it is both generic and
applicable.
Hence, the second step is to produce a conceptual model of a pro-
gramme. The model should be accurate as description but its elements
should be generic, rather than labelled by their names in French or
German. A model should contain the basic elements of a programme,
but no more detail than is necessary to incorporate what is needed to be
effective. If more than one state or nation has a programme of interest,
then a separate model should be made of each.
A model shows how a programme works, spelling out the cause and
effect relationships between its parts, and identifies outputs. To say that
this is how a programme works is to make a descriptive statement, like
saying that a model of an aeroplane engine shows how it works. It does
not mean that the programme or its goal is desirable in itself. The idea of
a 'working' programme is here used in an engineering sense; a pro-
gramme that works operates effectively. To claim that a programme will
produce results without being able to demonstrate how it will work is to
substitute a statement of faith for a statement of cause and effect.
For purposes of lesson-drawing, a model need not be a fullblown
computer simulation. Since lesson-drawing is about generalizing, it
would be distracting or even counterproductive to prepare a full-scale
study, for ideographic details of foreign practice can distract attention
from essentials, and confuse what is generic and potentially transferrable
with what is specific to time and place. Specifying the mechanics of a
programme guards against selective perception, with policymakers
emulating the easy parts of a programme, and omitting the hard parts
needed to make it effective (Muniak, 1985).
A cause and effect model does not have to estimate with precision a
programme's impact upon its target population. A potential borrower is
not interested in improving marginal efficiency, which requires
estimates of effectiveness accurate within a few percentage points.
Instead, an outsider is seeking a qualitative change, substituting a pro-
gramme effective elsewhere for one that is ineffective at home.
The third step is to compare models of foreign practice with a model of
the programme causing dissatisfaction at home. Are more effective pro-
grammes different in degree, or in kind? It is also important to evaluate
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 21
the programme in terms of its political acceptability. When the impact of
a programme is disputed, an outsider may be less interested in techni-
calities than in knowing whether it produces political satisfaction among
groups similar to the policymaker's constituency. A third consideration
is whether the resources required elsewhere could be matched at home.
Creating a new programme. Lesson-drawing draws upon empirical
evidence of programmes in effect elsewhere to create a new programme
for adoption at home. The formulation of a programme is best con-
sidered as a creative act, rather than as a process of copying. Especially
in cross-national lesson-drawing, some adaptation to take account of
local circumstances will be necessary. Because the model of a successful
programme is a construct, the elements can readily be adapted, or
elements mixed from programmes in two or more countries - as long as
whatever is added enhances effectiveness or acceptability, and whatever
is subtracted is replaced by something that is functionally equivalent.
The simplest type of lesson-drawing is based upon copying a pro-
gramme in effect in another state or country (Table i). Within a nation,
copying is often possible, using practice elsewhere literally as a blueprint.
In the United States, the National Conference of Commissioners on
Uniform State Laws annually drafts and circulates model legislation on
matters as diverse as criminal laws and conserving historic buildings,
and monitors the enactment of model laws, more or less intact (Council
of State Governments, 1990). Copying assumes that a great many dif-
ferent institutional and contextual variables remain constant.
From the perspective of a global theory, national governments may
appear as no more than intervening variables between international
forces and programmes within national political systems (cf. Przeworski
and Teune, 1970). But from the perspective of national policymakers,
it is impossible to ignore the mere 'intervening' variables of national
political institutions.
In the real world, we would never expect a programme to transfer
from one government to another without history, culture and institu-
tions being taken into account. While rejecting copying in every detail,
emulation accepts that a particular programme elsewhere provides the
best standard for designing legislation at home, albeit requiring adap-
tation to take different national circumstances into account. When
national differences are taken into account then, as Westney (1987: 224)
comments in her study ofJapanese lesson-drawing, 'emulation produces
innovation'. Emulation can also be undertaken with the intention of
improving the original model. Bennett (1991) characterizes the
Canadian Access to Information Act as a conscious and 'extended
attempt to adapt and improve upon the American model', the Freedom
of Information Act.
22 Richard Rose
TABLE I : Alternative Ways of Drawing a Lesson

1. Copying. Adoption more or less intact of a programme already in effect in another jurisdiction.

2. Emulation. Adoption, with adjustment for different circumstances, of a programme already in

effect in another jurisdiction.

3. Hybridization. Combine elements of programmes from two different places.

4. Synthesis. Combine familiar elements from programmes in effect in three or more different places.

5. Inspiration. Programmes elsewhere used as intellectual stimulus for developing a novel pro-
gramme without an analogue elsewhere.

A hybrid proposal combines recognizable elements from programmes

in two different places. For example, policymakers in a unitary state may
want to transfer a programme in use in a federal system. In the absence
of a federal structure, the substantive design may be borrowed from one
country while the administrative means for delivering it may be based
upon a unitary system. Europeans visiting the United States may draw a
lesson that is a hybrid combining substantive elements of American
innovation while replacing elements unique to America with what is
normal in their own political.system. Whatever the combination, each of
the parts of a hybrid programme can be observed in action, albeit in
different places.
A synthesis is created by combining elements familiar in several dif-
ferent programmes into a whole that is distinctive. The logic is compar-
able to assembling familiar parts of human anatomy to create a unique
human figure. Insofar as the object of lesson-drawing is to design a new
and effective domestic programme, then a synthesis is justifiable. But
because the result is synthetic, having no counterpart elsewhere, its
potential effectiveness is more difficult to evaluate.
Programmes elsewhere can be used for inspiration instead of analysis.
This is particularly likely to happen when a policymaker unfamiliar with
foreign countries travels abroad. Viewing a familiar problem in an
unfamiliar setting expands ideas of what is possible, and can inspire
fresh thinking about what to do at home. But it does not demonstrate
how any particular programme actually works. If the result is a pro-
gramme that looks unusual because it has no analogue elsewhere, this
shows it is inspired. But a fresh breath of air is also insubstantial, in the
sense that the experience of other countries cannot be used to evaluate it.
Inspiration is thus not a form of lesson-drawing but a form of
speculation.
Prospective evaluation across time and space. T h e final step in drawing a
lesson is to make a prospective evaluation of its likely success. Prospec-
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 23
tive evaluation involves comparisons across both space and time.
Transferring a programme from one country to another is an exercise in
comparative dynamics. Where country X is today, we hope to be tomor-
row. Their present is meant to be become our future.
Since the applicability of a lesson is contingent, prospective evaluation
is necessary to justify the conclusion that a programme that works
elsewhere will or will not work here. Prospective evaluation combines
empirical evidence about how and why a programme works in country
X, with hypotheses about its likely success or failure in country Y. An
element of speculation is inevitable, but it is not unbounded, as in purely
speculative prescriptions. Prospective evaluation is constrained, because
it compares observable characteristics of an effective programme in one
country with observable conditions in another; speculation is confined to
reckoning the future effect of changes in the latter.
The ideal of prospective evaluation would be a system-dynamic model
incorporating all the elements examined in initially making comparisons
between programmes. Because it specifies cause and effect relationships,
a system-dynamic model has both a logical and an empirical basis. It
thus differs from a judgement of the future that is mere opinion, or
derived from the spurious asumption that if two programmes have the
same name, they will have the same effect. Empirical evidence about
past rates of change can be used to test the credibility of estimates of the
impact of a new programme. The model can be run under different
assumptions to test the sensitivity of outcomes to variations in operating
conditions. While reasonable analysts may differ in their evaluation of
the prospective effect, if all the assessments produce results better or
worse than the status quo, there is a consensus about action.
Prospective evaluation differs from conventional evaluation research,
which is retrospective, examining a programme after it has been in effect
for several years. Retrospective evaluation has the scholarly advantage
of basing conclusions on empirical evidence. But for policymakers under
pressure to act in conditions of uncertainty, it has the disadvantage of
providing too much (or too little) knowledge too late. The demand of
policymakers is for ex ante assessments that can be instrumentally useful
in determining whether they should emulate programme A, adopt a
hybrid of A and B, a synthesis of several different programmes, or lower
their aspirations and accept that their present programme is the best
that can be achieved.
Prospective evaluation is routinely used in tax policy, for there are a
limited number of ways in which significant amounts of money can be
raised through taxation. Equally important, there is great experience in
surveying national tax systems and offering advice to nations about ways
of increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of revenue-raising (see e.g.
24 Richard Rose
Goode, 1984). Although the particulars of a tax may vary from one
country to the next, the effects of choosing one alternative rather than
another are to a substantial degree predictable. For example, Value-
Added Taxes are in effect in 46 countries scattered across every con-
tinent. Although there are many variables in the specifies of a Value-
Added Tax, from this experience lessons can be drawn, and the conse-
quences of introducing VAT evaluated by comparison with existing
revenue resources (Tait, 1988).
Prospective evaluation can give forewarning of failure when condi-
tions necessary to make a programme work in country X are not met in
country Y. For example, there is widespread dissatisfaction in Britain
with the low level of vocational education and training for youths in the
labour market, because this leads to a shortage of skilled adult workers.
After reviewing a variety of different alternatives, the Thatcher
Administration adopted as its model the German dual system
(Berufsbildungssystem) which combines training at work by specially quali-
fied and experienced adults with off-site vocational training at further
education colleges. The British government's attempts to implement this
system will take most of the 1990s. However, with the German model as
a template for a prospective evaluation, it can be demonstrated that the
British effort will largely fail, because of the lack of the specially qualified
workers (Meisters) who play a central role in the success of the German
system (Rose and Wignanek, 1990). A constructive conclusion of this
prospective evaluation would be that if Britain wanted to emulate the
German system, it should increase the supply of trainers before increas-
ing the demand for training.
Lesson-drawing is not a mechanical set of deterministic procedures
leading to unalterable conclusions. Obstacles to transferring program-
mes would be permanent only if the present differences in space could
not be bridged in time. By thinking in terms of both time and space we
can undertake a prospective evaluation that not only identifies the block-
ages that exist today, but also highlights steps that can be taken to make
a programme effective in one country succeed elsewhere tomorrow.

V. Is Lesson-Drawing Practical or Desirable?

In principle, every programme can be appraised by two very different
standards: Is it practical? It is desirable? The articulation of desires is
the legitimate domain of elected officials; the determination of what is
possible is a primary concern of career officials and experts (cf. Rose,
1987). The ideal programme is both practical and desirable. As long as a
programme produces satisfaction, then it meets both criteria; there is no
need to search for lessons, because there is no pressure to change.
However, once a gap opens up between aspirations and achievement,
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 25
then it is no longer practical or desirable to maintain established pro-
grammes, and a search commences for measures that are both practical
and desirable.
Distinguishing practicality from desirability. To describe a programme as
'feasible' is ambiguous, confusing two distinct types ofjudgements. Pro-
spective evaluation is about technical feasibility, whereas elected politi-
cians think in terms of political feasibility. Is there a majority in the
governing party and the legislature for this programme? If not, how
would it have to be altered in order to make it politically feasible? If the
results are as promised, would this gain or lose support with
constituents?
Technical feasibility is taken for granted in abstract theories of social
science that assume perfect fungibility; programmes that operate logi-
cally in a theoretical model are expected to be applicable anywhere and
everywhere. The logic is that of an engineering science, which starts with
a model of how an automobile engine works, and designs parts that can
be exchanged between a Ford automobile, whether it is made in Detroit,
Cologne or Barcelona. Even if a few adaptations are necessary, e.g. to
accommodate right-hand drive in Britain, the basic principle remains;
everything can transfer. Prescriptions drawn from abstract models face
difficulties in the first real country to which they are applied.
At the other extreme, theories grounded in history, institutions and
culture assume total blockage, that it is technically impossible to transfer
a programme from one country to another, one city to another, or even
to apply past experience to the present. Every problem is regarded as
having a unique configuration of characteristics specific to a particular
time and place. From this perspective, the important feature of the
income tax in the United States, Britain or Germany is not the generic
attributes of taxation stressed in economics texts, but the fact that one
tax is American, the other is British, and the third is German. Conclu-
sions drawn from over-determined historical studies of a single country
are difficult to apply as lessons in a second country.
When the programme is the unit of analysis, then holistic statements
about total fungibility and total blockage have no specific meaning, for
they ignore specific characteristics of particular programmes and policy
environments. From a programme perspective, it is usually impractical
and undesirable to think in terms of drawing lessons from one policy
area to another, e.g. to run schools like the armed forces. A corollary is
that within a given policy area there are substantial cross-national
similarities in the means and ends of programmes. Because defence and
education programmes differ within a nation, then educationists are
more likely to look abroad for lessons than to look to their own armed
forces for lessons in educating youths.
26 Richard Rose
Japan provides an instructive example of the extent to which lesson-
drawing is practical at the level at which it counts, specific programmes.
After Japan was opened to foreigners in the mid-nineteenth century no
country could have appeared more different. Yet between 1869 and 1882
the Japanese government sponsored the introduction of five programmes
emulating those in France, starting with the Army; four from Britain,
starting with the Navy; three from the United States, starting with a
primary school system, and one each from Germany and Belgium
(Westney, 1987: 13). In no sense did this mean that Japan in the 1870s
was like these Western nations. But it did not need to be similar in all
respects to introduce a programme. All that was required was the
minimum number of elements essential for a programme. For example,
Japan could emulate the British Post Office, which relied heavily upon
railways, by substituting runners to carry letters. As Japan's resources
expanded, it was then possible to make programmes more similar to the
original Western model, or even to switch from one Western model to
another, as Japan did in reorganizing its army on German lines in 1878,
a decade after initially founding an Army on French lines.
Logically, there are four possible ways to combine technical
appraisals of the feasibility of transfer and normative evaluations of
political desirability (Figure 1). Two reinforcing combinations permit
straightforward interpretations. A programme that is deemed desirable
by politicians and capable of transfer by experts is likely to be adopted
and produce satisfaction. A programme that politicians regard as
undesirable and experts describe as likely to be ineffectual if transferred
is doubly rejected.
The most interesting confrontation between political desire and tech-
nical expertise occurs when politicians are attracted by the siren call of a
programme that has produced desirable results in another setting, but
prospective evaluation indicates would fail if transferred. The attractive-
ness of a Japanese programme associated with its economic miracle may
be as compelling to Western policymakers as the call of the female sirens
was to sailors in Greek mythology. However, the siren call of mythology
lured the sailors onto rocks; the siren call of Japanese success may
attract policymakers to a programme that is likely to fail, because the
preconditions for effectiveness in Japan are not met elsewhere. If politi-
cians heed the warning, the problem can be looked at again, with experts
trying to increase the probability of success. Just as late-nineteenth
century Japanese had to adapt Western programmes to meet the condi-
tions of their country then, so late twentieth-century Westerners can be
required to adapt Japanese programmes as a condition of possible
emulation.
A programme will be dismissed an an unwanted technical solution,
 What is Lesson-Drawing? 27
F I G U R E 1: Desirability and Practicality of Transferring Programmes.

Desirability
High Low

Prospective evaluation
of transferability (Outcome)

Positive Satisfactory Unwanted

transfer technical solution

Negative Siren call Doubly

rejected

even though social scientists deem it capable of transfer, if its ends or

means are unattractive to the government of the day. The supply of a
technically proficient solution to a policy problem is not a sufficient
condition to produce a politically effective demand.
Uncertain and unstable preferences and knowledge. Assessment of a particu-
lar lesson necessarily reflects the values and knowledge of the moment.
Since there is uncertainty about values and knowledge, decisions about
whether a programme can be, should be or will be adopted are always
subject to change.
At any given point in time, politicians will collectively differ about
what is desirable, for politics is about the advocacy of conflicting goals.
In the course of advocating competing claims about which party can
best achieve popular goals, politicians often disagree about means as
well. Washington is an extreme example of heterogeneity of goals and
means, for Congress, bureaucrats, interest groups and the White House
operate in an institutional framework designed to encourage debate
rather than concentrate authority. The resulting confusion has been
described as a 'garbage can model' of decisionmaking (Cohen et al.,
1972) in which there is a high degree of uncertainty about programmes
and preferences.
Experts can cause uncertainty by disagreeing about whether a pro-
gramme is likely to be effective. A study of the adoption of international
public health measures to prevent the spread of contagious diseases such
as cholera found that the major obstacle to action was not a difference of
opinion about policy goals, but technical disputes about the causes of
contagious diseases. Richard N. Cooper (1989: 257), himself a macroe-
conomist, explains:
All scientific parties to the debate were aware of the evidence, but the evidence
was ambiguous and could be used to support conflicting theories. Epidemiology
in the nineteenth century was much like economics in the twentieth century: a
subject of intense public interest and concern, in which theories abounded but
28 Richard Rose
the scope for controlled experiments was limited . . . So long as contention
continued over the efficacy of different courses of action, it was similarly imposs-
ible to get agreement among countries on a common course of action.
In the course of time, technical uncertainty about how to combat conta-
gious diseases was resolved by scientific advances, and effective pro-
grammes to combat their spread were then widely adopted. Changes in
the policy environment can also introduce uncertainty where once there
had been certainty, for example, in the evaluation of the effectiveness of
Keynesian macroeconomic prescriptions.
Conflicts about what is desirable are likely to lead to instability across
time. Changes in the policy environment can create a level of dissatisfac-
tion that forces policymakers to alter their views about what they will
and will not do. A swing in the electoral pendulum can change control of
government so that a programme that was politically unfeasible, e.g.
'Mrs Thatcher would not stand for it', can become feasible upon the
departure of that Prime Minister. Other changes in the political climate
occur with less regularity. Advocates of a momentarily unwanted pro-
gramme need not abandon their idea; they can adopt a patient stance,
waiting for the winds of political fortune to shift, and drive support in
their direction, after the next election, or after the next major shift in
national political priorities (cf. Kingdon, 1984; Marmor, 1986).
Decisionmaking in uncertain and unstable conditions is an argument
for caution and patience, but when dissatisfaction is high, it cannot be
an argument for inaction. The search for lessons is initiated in hopes of
finding a programme that is identified as effective and satisfactory by a
concurring majority of politicians and experts. If no such programme is
easily found, dissatisfaction with the status quo can force policymakers
to begin again a search for programmes that are both practical and
desirable.

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