Evidence and policy‐making: an organizational approach

Abstract

Strengthening the role of evidence in policy-making is increasingly seen as crucial for the quality and legitimacy of public policies. Both among practitioners and scholars, there is a growing awareness that evidence-informed policy-making not only depends on the rigor and relevance of the research, science communication or features of policy-makers. It also depends on how expertise arrangements in public organizations are organized. Yet, we currently lack a solid understanding of how organization matters for the role of evidence in policy-making. The article presents an organizational-theoretical perspective on how the formal organization of public bureaucracies shapes evidence use in policy-making, with important implications for both analysis and design of expertise arrangements in public administration. The article thereby sets a new research agenda at the intersection of organizational theory and scholarship on evidence and policy-making, which speaks directly to public administration practice.