Major actors in health care policy development will be identified within the context of the forces and institutions that they react to in shaping health care policy. This course will provide practical mechanisms for the health care administrator to intervene on behalf of programs or institutions. The study of politics is the study of influence and the influential. Harold Lasswell . When, How .
Policy is a process as well as a product.
It is used to refer to a process of decision-making and also to the product of that process. A set of interrelated decisions taken by a political actor or group of actors concerning the selections of goals and the means of achieving them within a specified situation where these decisions should, in principle, be within the power of these actors to achieve. A course of action or inaction chosen by public authorities to address a given problem or interrelated set of problems. An Introduction , Second Edition. A policy consists of a web of decisions and actions that allocate values.