FRAMING DRUG POLICY: whats the problem represented to be

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FRAMING DRUG POLICYwhats the problem
represented to be?

• Carol Bacchi
• Politics Discipline
• University of Adelaide

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Whats the problem represented to be?An
approach to policy

• Introduce the approach
• Offer a list of questions outlining a Whats the
  problem (represented to be)? approach.
• Identity some areas where the approach could be
  usefully applied in the field of alcohol and drug
  policy.

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Comparing a Whats the Problem? approach to
Conventional Approaches to policy
Meredith Edwards (2004) Public policy addresses
societal problems and is about what governments
do, why they do it and what difference it
makes. a reactive approach based on the
assumption that governments react to fixed and
identifiable social problems and do their best to
resolve them.
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A Whats the problem (represented to be)?
approach draws attention to the ways in which
governments (and others) give a particular shape
to social problems these shapes are called
problem representations problem representations
have effects
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How are we to identify problem representations?

• Distinction between cause and concern
• Examine specific policy proposals (provides
  pointers to how the issue is being
  conceptualized)
• Scrutinize policy debates

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Whats the Problem (represented to be)? Questions
to ask

• 1. What is the problem (of problem gambling,
  problem gamblers, drug use, domestic
  violence, pay equity, child care, etc.)
  represented to be either in a specific policy
  debate or in a specific policy proposal?
• 2. What presuppositions or assumptions underlie
  the representation/s? Identify binaries and
  contradictions.
• 3. What effects are produced by this
  representation of the problem?

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Questions to ask (continued)

• What is left unproblematic in this
  representation? Where are the silences?
• How would responses differ if the problem
  were thought about or represented differently?
  Here it is useful to think about shifts in
  representation of the problem over time or
  across cultures.

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Effects of problem representations

• How subjects are constituted within a problem
  representation
• Limits of what can be said
• Limits on what will change and what will stay the
  same
• Benefits for some harm to others

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Applying a whats the problem represented to
be? approach

• Dominant representations of drug problems
• The harm minimization response
• Drug use as a health issue
• Broader social policy frameworks social
  exclusion, whole of government, partnerships
• Broader social and cultural context eg
  consumptogenic culture

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Implications for those with a reform agenda

• Conduct a whats the problem represented to be?
  analysis of problem representations (including
  those that lodge in ones own proposals)
• Try to shape reforms that avoid effects we
  consider deleterious
• Consider context