ABSTRACT
This chapter describes and compares policy analysis in central governments in different jurisdictions. It provides overview of policy analysis in four central governments: Australia, Canada, Germany and the Netherlands. The chapter also provides the reader with an empirical understanding of the variety of policy analysis in central government. It focuses on the following aspects: context of policy analysis; institutionalization of policy analysis in central government vis-à-vis other institutions; people doing policy analysis; and core issues and problems. The choice of countries was both pragmatic and intentional. As for the pragmatic reasons, these four countries have been reviewed in the ILPA series. The chapter gives a tentative comparison between the four countries. It also focuses on these two trends in more detail showing that even these general trends are present in different forms in particular countries. The chapter concludes with some implications for both theory building and empirical research.
