Christopher M. Weible

This chapter examines policy-oriented learning—referred to here simply as learning—through the lens of the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF), a leading theoretical approach in policy studies. The ACF provides a structured platform for analyzing how advocacy coalitions—groups of actors who share policy core beliefs and coordinate their behavior—engage in continuous learning to more effectively influence policy subsystems and advance their objectives. Within this Framework, learning is defined as enduring changes in thought or behavioral intentions resulting from experience, aimed at better realizing a desired state of the world. Although learning originates at the individual level, it can scale to the coalition level when a substantial number of members adjust their positions based on shared experiences. This chapter summarizes insights from the empirical applications of learning under the ACF and explores the mechanisms of both within and between coalition learning, emphasizing the conditions under which such learning occurs.

The study of public policy has long required scholars to engage with daunting complexity. Such complexity arises partly from the multiple values and diverse, interacting variables that shape the po...

Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) research has been continuously evolving to improve the understanding of coalition studies. This study aims to critically examine the most common methods for coalition identification in ACF research and to identify strategies to strengthen their clarity and interpretation. We identify and develop ideas around four key steps in using social network analysis (SNA) to study coalitions: collecting and understanding data, choosing a community detection algorithm, applying data transformations, and, most importantly, interpreting community structures. We argue that neither this paper nor any others can provide a definitive approach for understanding advocacy coalitions. Instead, our charge to those using the ACF is threefold. First, recognize the elusiveness of advocacy coalitions and the inherent limitations of any representation. Second, acknowledge that network analysis of advocacy coalitions involves numerous combinatorial choices determined by data characteristics, algorithm selection, and data transformation choices. Third, encourage researchers to understand their data, select among these combinations, interpret results, and effectively communicate the sensitivity and robustness of their analyses.

O que é o processo de políticas públicas como campo de estudo? Como ele se relaciona com outras disciplinas e áreas? Por que as teorias são fundamentais para o avanço do conhecimento nessa área? E como a pesquisa sobre políticas públicas na América Latina pode continuar a progredir? Este ensaio aborda essas questões com ênfase particular na produção teórica e empírica na América Latina. Começa com um breve relato da emergência da pesquisa sobre políticas públicas como área de estudo, amplamente enraizada na produção acadêmica nos Estados Unidos, oferecendo múltiplas descrições para esclarecer o que o campo abrange. Em seguida, argumenta sobre a importância contínua da teoria na geração de conhecimento sistemático e generalizável sobre políticas públicas, utilizando o framework de Coalizões de Advocacy, ou de Defesa (ACF) como ilustração do que as teorias de políticas públicas podem alcançar. O ensaio explora, então, os desafios e as oportunidades que moldam a pesquisa sobre políticas públicas na América Latina no passado, presente e futuro.

One of the most significant innovations within policy process theories is the concept of advocacy coalitions, namely how policy actors self‐organize to collectively pursue shared goals. Despite the centrality of advocacy coalitions and extensive research spanning decades on this concept, questions remain about their functional purpose in a democracy. For this paper, we introduce the novel concept of “advocacy coalition representation” to describe how advocacy coalition members act as representatives of their constituencies. Taking an Advocacy Coalition Framework perspective, this paper begins with an argument incorporating democratic representation into the theoretical infrastructure of the Framework. It illustrates this argument by examining advocacy coalition representation in Colorado's abortion policy subsystem through interviews with pro‐ and anti‐abortion‐access actors. Ultimately, we find that the two coalitions offer patterns of advocacy coalition representation distinct from one another along two key variables: constituencies ( who advocates represent) and engagement ( how advocates represent). This paper ends with theoretical and empirical implications before returning to the theme of democracy and policy process research. Related Articles: Myers, N., A. T. Ann Pendergast, H. A. Gage Atwood, W. Brian and H. Danielle. 2025. “Roles in Resilience: The Intersection of Genetic Counseling, Policy Advocacy, and Community Resilience.” Politics and Policy 53, no. 2: e70023. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.70023 . Silagadze, N. 2021. “Abortion Referendums: Is There a Recipe for Success?” Politics and Policy 49, no. 2: 352–389. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12398 . Swigger, A. and B. T. Heinmiller. 2014. “Advocacy Coalitions and Mental Health Policy: The Adoption of Community Treatment Orders in Ontario.” Politics and Policy 42, no. 2: 246–270. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12066 .

Most studies of policy change within the ACF have been descriptive, single-instance explorations that confirm one or more of its four pathways: external shocks, internal shocks, negotiated agreements, and policy-oriented learning. To advance ACF studies of policy change, this chapter takes a different approach to assessing the drivers of change. Rather than looking to confirm one of the four pathways for a single instance of change, we inductively explore what policy actors cite as “antecedents”—or potential influencing, motivating, or driving factors—for multiple policy changes in a textbook subsystem. We identify antecedents through policy actor references in the public discourse related to 77 new or modified policies in the Colorado oil and gas subsystem between 2007 and 2021, drawing on public and government documents, public testimony, and news articles. We then compare the inductively identified antecedents of each policy change with the four pathways of change outlined within the ACF. We find references to internal antecedents were the most commonly mentioned, followed by references to external antecedents. We conclude by discussing the significance of these results for studying policy change, the importance of including both inductive and deductive methods to expand the existing pathways, and guidelines for conducting a medium-sized analysis of policy change over time.

Scholars and practitioners who seek to understand collective decision-making and governance utilize frameworks and theories to identify what matters (and does not) in shaping public policy creation, implementation, and revision. Useful frameworks and theories will attempt to identify the primary elements of the policy-making process and characterize the critical interactions among them. The Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) was developed for that purpose. In the four decades since its first articulation in the early 1980s, the Framework has been widely applied, criticized, and revised in cases across the globe. This chapter briefly recounts that development and evolution, highlighting key milestones and adaptations that have shaped its current form. We present the three main theories embedded in the Framework and offer a characterization of the “textbook” version of the ACF that one is likely to encounter in overviews, applications, and courses on theories of the policy process. We then provide an overview of this volume's empirical chapters, highlighting a cross-section of the most exciting new scholarly developments within and outside this textbook version.

Over 30 years ago, Paul Sabatier and Hank Jenkins-Smith edited a seminal volume that described and applied the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF). Building on over three decades of subsequent research on the ACF, this volume's primary contribution comes from an orientation to ACF scholarship that involves distinctions between textbook and non-textbook applications. This orientation raises a question: What adjustments do scholars make when applying the ACF outside its textbook “comfort zone”? This chapter addresses this question with the following argument: The ACF has always simplified and structured the complexity of policy processes by implicitly situating subsystems and the broader system architecture on key conceptual scales and levels, wherein the placement of the textbook ACF is just one possible (albeit very useful) configuration among many. When researchers apply the ACF outside the textbook context, they consciously or unconsciously adjust these levels or operate on entirely different scales and levels. Moving forward, critical tasks for ACF scholars will be to make these scales and levels explicit, recognize the configurations that apply to any given research project, engage in conduct cross-scale and cross-level research, and focus inquiry into which scales and levels are most crucial in advancing knowledge about policy processes and contributing to a better world.

Devil and Angel Shifts are commonly applied concepts in policy research. Using the two concepts in related but different theoretical frameworks – the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) and the Narrative Policy Framework (NPF) – provokes potential challenges of cross‐theoretical dialogue, the establishment of methodological best practices, and mutual research advancement. How do these frameworks conceptualize Devil and Angel Shifts theoretically and how do they empirically study this concept? To what extent do similarities and differences exist that influence comparability and research progress? This paper starts from the foundational roots of the two concepts that were developed to advance the understanding of collective action and inter‐coalition conflict. It then provides a systematic literature review of existing applications that sheds light on conceptualization, measurement, hypotheses, and findings. Drawing from these insights and complementing them with psychological research, it makes an integrated argument that ACF and NPF are developing the same sub‐theory of the Devil and Angel Shifts and offers recommendations for improvements.