The role of state regulatory agencies is to execute and enforce the statutes passed by state legislatures. Agencies do this by writing and implementing administrative rules that elaborate on unspecified details of requirements found in law. These rules themselves have the force and effect of law. In this paper the authors find great diversity in...

In February and March 2022, Evidence for Democracy hosted 25 early-career researchers for their inaugural Science to Policy Accelerator program. This article outlines some of the program’s key takeaways about public policy, and how scientists and researchers can contribute to the science policy ecosystem in Canada.

Lack of consistency and coordination has long been noted as a failing of UK government policies, but it has previously been difficult to assess the extent of the policy discontinuity. In this paper, the authors present evidence from text analysis of a startling lack of coordination in government policy with a special focus on the...

In this report, Jonathan Slater, who was the most senior civil servant in the Department for Education (UK) from 2016 to 2020, writes that while public engagement is a core part of the role of local government policy-makers, it is not seen as important for their counterparts in central government.

The civil service is central to government in the United Kingdom. But it lacks a clear identity, defined responsibilities and a system of oversight and accountability. This report proposes a new statutory role for the civil service to reflect its permanence, values and objectives, and how it should be run and held to account.