When talking about public policy, what do we really mean? Actors and issues in Chile

Abstract

Since 1990 the use of the concept of public policy has been increasingly used in Chile. State measures aimed at solving public problems are scrutinized by both academic and political actors. Public policy is the most popular approach for framing content within a public debate. Who is teaching and discussing public policies? This article offers a preliminary analysis of the way policy is taught in Chilean undergraduate and postgraduate programs as well as its use in the country’s main think tanks. We sustain that is economics is the dominant discipline in this approach. This is explained by the relationship between expert knowledge and economics. We conclude that economics dominates postgraduate programs in public policy, while this approach is not generalized among major think tanks.