I would argue that most standard measures of policy performance tend to be somewhat cavalier regarding their conceptualisation and measurement of policy output. However, a systematic and comparable assessment of policy output is necessary to link outputs with outcomes. There's some discussion in public policy literature on how to get to such an assessment, see e.g. Howlett/Cashore (Howlett, M., & Cashore, B. (2009). The dependent variable problem in the study of policy change: Understanding policy change as a methodological problem. Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis, 11(1), 33-46.)  or Knill et al. 2012 (Knill, C., Schulze, K., & Tosun, J. (2012). Regulatory policy outputs and impacts: Exploring a complex relationship. Regulation & Governance, 6(4), 427-444.). Also, my own work has dealt with this question.

Hope this helps. Cheers, Sebastian

Thank you, Sebastian! This is very helpful. In an upcoming project, I really need to go into this literature. Appreciate that you took the time to list these references. Best wishes, Thomas

Assessing policy effectiveness entails varying indicators since the public sector or social policies exist in a system whose stakeholders are numerous. 

Ayee (2000:4) asserts that the question of what constitutes success or failure has attracted a great deal of attention…although there is no agreement on the criteria to be used to measure the success or failure of public policies and programs, six dimensional criteria have been recognized. His six dimensional framework has these elements;

Effectiveness; which refers to whether a given policy or alternative, results in the achievement of a valued outcome (effect) of action, that is, an objective. In other words, effectiveness is the degree to which a policy or program attain objectives.

Efficiency; this refers to the amount of effort required to produce a given level of effectiveness. This is synonymous with economic rationality.

Adequacy; this refers to the extent to which given level of effectiveness satisfies the needs, values or opportunities that gave rise to the problem

Equity; this is closely related to legal and social rationality and refers to the distribution of effects and effort among different among different groups in society.

Responsiveness; this refers to the extent to which a policy satisfies the needs, preferences or values of particular groups

Appropriateness; this refers to the value of worth of a program’s objectives and to the tenability of assumptions underlying these objectives (also argued by Dunn, 1994). 

These six attributes could be subsumed under three major categories for the purpose of policy evaluation and analysis; policy design- the conception of the policy is from appropriate perspective (is the policy is based upon an appropriate ideology and acceptable values?. And also consensus and agreement (to what extent are those involved in making and implementing policy and are affected by it, in agreement that it is a good policy?

The second criterion deals with policy process in terms of how the policy is dealt with in the context of policy arena. It has three sub elements, that is, efficiency; implementability ( how has the policy been implemented? How well?  Is it feasible policy in terms of implementation, or is it the case that it cannot be implemented or is( or will be) sabotaged in implementation? The last element is sustainability; has (or will) the policy be terminated or substantially altered?

The third criterion is policy achievement and concerns effectiveness and adequacy of the policy in achieving its goals. This has also got sub elements: achievement of goals and objectives. 

I hope these would just make you more open varying indicators of assessing policy effectiveness. 

Thanks a lot, Emmanuel! Indeed valuable. Thanks for sharing this. /Best regards, Thomas