Dr Michael Lerner

This course is available on the MSc in European and International Public Policy, MSc in European and International Public Policy (LSE and Bocconi), MSc in European and International Public Policy (LSE and Sciences Po), MSc in Public Administration and Government (LSE and Peking University), MSc in Public Policy and Administration and MSc in Regulation. This course is available with permission as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit.

The course is capped at 2 groups.

Students should normally be taking GV4E9 Approaches and Issues in Public Policy and Administration or already have a good knowledge of comparative public policy. Waiving of these requirements will be at the discretion of the course teacher.

The course examines explanations of policy change using comparative methods.

The course will focus on cases in key policy domains (chosen according to the literature available and interest for wider analytical questions, as well as the expertise available), but any pair of two jurisdictions can be used as examples in the assessed essay. Key topics include social policy, education reform, and environmental policy.

This course is delivered through a combination of seminars and lectures totalling a minimum of 20 hours across the Lent Term. This course includes a reading week in Week 6 of Lent Term.

Students will write one unassessed essay during the term.

There is no single textbook but the following are particularly useful introductions: 

A Dodds, Comparative Public Policy (Basingstoke, Palgrave, 2018);

Various authors, Special Issue: Twenty years of the Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice, Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice, Volume 20, Issue 1 (2018); and

M Moran, M Rein, and RE Goodin (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Public Policy (2008).

Essay (80%, 3000 words) in the ST.
Class participation (20%) in the LT.