Rationality and Policy-Making in Higher Education

There is now a substantial literature on the concept of rational decisionmaking and a number of studies concerned with the application of rationality to particular cases and areas. The basis of the rational model of policy-making is that it involves the selection of alternatives which lead to the achievement of previously designated goals, and that the process is characterised by search and evaluation. H. A. Simon’s classic work (Simon, 1957) focused attention on the goal-oriented nature of organisational behaviour, while Allison, approaching the concept from the analysis of foreign policy, chose the rational as one of his three models, drawing attention to a lengthy tradition, based on national interests, upon which such an approach rests (Allison, 1971). Others have developed the study of ‘policy science’ based on ‘a main effort to reassert the role of intellectualism and rationalism in guiding human destiny’ (Dror, 1971), or have offered advice on a range of techniques or strategies which might improve the objective rationality of public policy (Wildavsky, 1966; Garrett, 1972). Heclo, in a seminal review article, categorised a programmatic approach which seeks to ‘identify policy with a set of programme choices, among which is sought the most efficient means of employing scarce resources’ (Heclo, 1972

Destiny (ISS module · Ecological rationality · Economics · Epistemology · Intellectualism · Management science · Political science · Positive economics · Public policy · Rationalism · Rationality · Set (abstract data type · Sociology · Computer Science · Engineering · Higher Education Governance and Development · Law · Philosophy

• Testing the reciprocity norm in a recreation management setting

  Mark S Searle•Leisure Sciences•1989

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