Evaluating Knowledge about the Instruments of Government: The Canadian Federal Experience

The proposition that “some forms of public action are more likely to address successfully certain public problems or social issues than others” lies at the heart of how governments approach choices about instruments, and governments have struggled for years to evaluate which instruments are best. ¹ Through the evaluation of instruments—laws, spending, taxation, information campaigns, etc.—policymakers look at instruments, as distinct from policies and programs themselves, to capture predictive information about how particular instruments perform or at least how they are likely to perform. ²