ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that lies in the growing autonomy of the policy environment. Because policy is evermore its own cause, programs depend less on the external evironment than on events inside the sectors from which they come. The Law of Large Solutions implies that the greater the proportion of the population involved in a policy problem, and the greater the proportion of the policy space occupied by a supposed solution, the harder it is to find a solution that will not become its own worst problem. The force of the Law of Large Solutions increases when there are so many big programs that the policy space is densely rather than lightly packed. A trend toward sectoralization of policy is evident; whether this trend will result in the "new corporatism" or stop someplace short no one knows. Governmental agencies have adapted to greater interdependence by combining the two approaches: sectors want greater autonomy, thus disaggregating policy by subject matter.
