ABSTRACT
Before looking at the policy process of the voucher scheme, this chapter establishes an analytical schema for the study. It specifies the elements that are involved in the analysis of the policy process. This is achieved through examining some important approaches to the study of the political system and process, as well as other relevant theoretical arguments. Specifically, David Easton’s ‘systems analysis’ and other approaches which focus on the ‘process’ of policy making, models of British politics, Giddens’s structuration theory, and the work on state autonomy and policy networks are discussed.
