Abstract
Analysis of policy ecosystems can be challenging due to the volume of documentary and ethnographic data and the complexity of the interactions that define the ecology of such a system. This paper uses climate change adaptation policy as a case study with which to explore the potential for QE methods to model policy ecosystems. Specifically, it analyzes policies and draft policies constructed by three different categories of governmental entity—nations, state and local governments, and tribal governments or Indigenous communities—as well as guidance for policy makers produced by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and other international agencies, as a first step toward mapping the ecology of climate change adaptation policy. This case study is then used to reflect on the strengths of QE methods for analyzing policy ecosystems and areas of opportunity for further theoretical and methodological development.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Kirby, P., Shepherd, L.J.: Women, peace, and security: mapping the (Re)production of a policy ecosystem. J. Global Secur. Stud. 6(3), ogaa045 (2021)
Stone, D.A.: Causal stories and the formation of policy agendas. Political Sci. Quart. 104, 281–300 (1989)
Lipsky, M.: Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Service. Russell Sage Foundation (1980)
Dubois, V.: Critical Policy Ethnography. In: Fischer, F., Torgerson, D., Durnová, A., Orsini, M. (eds.) Handbook of Critical Policy Studies. pp. 462–480. Edward Elgar Publishing (2015)
Eagan, B.R., Siebert-Evenstone, A.L., Hamilton, E., Faul, M., Ashton, L., Wong, N.: Engaging Policy with a QE Lens. In: Wasson, B. and Zörgő, S. (eds.). In: Third International Conference on Quantitative Ethnography: Conference Proceedings Supplement, pp. 139–147. International Society for Quantitative Ethnography (2021)
Shaffer, D.W., Collier, W., Ruis, A.R.: A tutorial on epistemic network analysis: analyzing the structure of connections in cognitive, social, and interaction data. J. Learn. Anal. 3, 9–45 (2016)
Bowman, D., et al.: The Mathematical Foundations of Epistemic Network Analysis. In: Ruis, A.R., Lee, S.B. (eds.) ICQE 2021. CCIS, vol. 1312, pp. 91–105. Springer, Cham (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67788-6_7
Marquart, C.L., Swiecki, Z., Eagan, B.R., Shaffer, D.W.: ncodeR: Techniques for Automated Classifiers. (2018)
Marquart, C.L., Swiecki, Z., Collier, W., Eagan, B.R., Woodward, R., Shaffer, D.W.: rENA: Epistemic Network Analysis. (2019)
Shaffer, D.W.: Quantitative Ethnography. Cathcart Press (2017)
de Sousa Santos, B.: Epistemologies of the South: Justice against Epistemicide. Routledge (2015)
Siebert-Evenstone, A.L., Irgens, G.A., Collier, W., Swiecki, Z., Ruis, A.R., Shaffer, D.W.: In search of conversational grain size: modelling semantic structure using moving stanza windows. J. Learn. Anal. 4, 123–139 (2017)
Ruis, A.R., Siebert-Evenstone, A.L., Pozen, R., Eagan, B.R., Shaffer, D.W.: Finding Common Ground: A Method for Measuring Recent Temporal Context in Analyses of Complex, Collaborative Thinking. In: Lund, K., Niccolai, G., Lavoué, E., Hmelo-Silver, C., Gweon, G., and Baker, M. (eds.) A Wide Lens: Combining Embodied, Enactive, Extended, and Embedded Learning in Collaborative Settings: 13th International Conference on Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) 2019, pp. 136–143. In: International Society for the Learning Sciences (2019)
Zörgő, S., Swiecki, Z., Ruis, A.R.: Exploring the Effects of Segmentation on Semi-structured Interview Data with Epistemic Network Analysis. In: Ruis, A.R., Lee, S.B. (eds.) ICQE 2021. CCIS, vol. 1312, pp. 78–90. Springer, Cham (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67788-6_6
Wineburg, S.S.: Historical problem solving: a study of the cognitive processes used in the evaluation of documentary and pictorial evidence. J. Educ. Psychol. 83, 73–87 (1991)
Shaffer, D.W., Ruis, A.R.: How We Code. In: Ruis, A.R., Lee, S.B. (eds.) ICQE 2021. CCIS, vol. 1312, pp. 62–77. Springer, Cham (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67788-6_5
Nader, L.: Up the Anthropologist—Perspectives Gained From Studying Up. In: Hymes, D. (ed.) Reinventing Anthropology, pp. 284–311. Vintage Books (1974)
Peck, J., Theodore, N.: Follow the policy: a distended case approach. Environ. Plann. a: Econ. Space. 44, 21–30 (2012)
Siebert-Evenstone, A., Shaffer, D.W.: Cause and Because: Using Epistemic Network Analysis to Model Causality in the Next Generation Science Standards. In: Eagan, B., Misfeldt, M., Siebert-Evenstone, A. (eds.) ICQE 2019. CCIS, vol. 1112, pp. 223–233. Springer, Cham (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-33232-7_19
Schnaider, K., Schiavetto, S., Meier, F., Wasson, B., Allsopp, B.B., Spikol, D.: Governmental Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic - A Quantitative Ethnographic Comparison of Public Health Authorities’ Communication in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. In: Ruis, A.R., Lee, S.B. (eds.) ICQE 2021. CCIS, vol. 1312, pp. 406–421. Springer, Cham (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67788-6_28
Acknowledgements
This work was funded in part by the National Science Foundation (DRL-1713110, DRL-2100320), the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, and the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research and Graduate Education at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. The opinions, findings, and conclusions do not reflect the views of the funding agencies, cooperating institutions, or other individuals.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Ruis, A.R. (2023). Quantitative Ethnography of Policy Ecosystems: A Case Study on Climate Change Adaptation Planning. In: Damşa, C., Barany, A. (eds) Advances in Quantitative Ethnography. ICQE 2022. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 1785. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-31726-2_29
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-31726-2_29
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-31725-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-31726-2
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)