Policy Reflection 5 min read
When Policy Meets Reality: Notes on Implementation
Good policy fails in execution more often than in design. A reflection on the gap between intent and outcome.
By Ali Wardhere
The distance between a policy on paper and a policy in practice is where most impact is won or lost. Design gets the attention; implementation gets the results.
Incentives travel further than intentions
A program rewards whatever it measures. If the measure is poorly chosen, well-meaning people will optimize for the wrong thing, exactly as the incentives instruct them to.
Evaluate honestly
Building evaluation into a program from the start is uncomfortable because it admits the possibility of failure. That discomfort is the price of actually learning something.
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