Policy-making in the Federal System

Policy-making in the Federal System

Federal Policy

Federalism is a system in which the power of all government regulations is split among the local, national, and central or federal governments. United States is one of the major examples of the federalism system, where the authority is divided among various level of government, which includes state, national, and local authorities. Federalism is divided in to two dimensions; constitutional dimension and financial dimension. They both play a major role in policy making process (Gerston, 2007).

A constitutional dimension of federalism in US highlights certain powers being provided to national government, whereas it also provides certain responsibilities to the state government. The national constitution of US 1789, which is among the oldest constitutions in the history of the world, highlights the overall structure and practices followed in the federal system.

Policy-making in federalism is shaped through the financial dimension of federalism, where spending is divided among those three levels of government. Federalism plays an important role in identifying various perspectives and interests of the bureaucrats and policy makers which helps them in developing and implementing policies. The best example of policy making can be taken from health care and education sectors. The health care policy making involves the primary contribution through national government, whereas the state government plays a secondary but significant role. In educational policy making, all three governmental levels play significant role. State government is involved in primary constitutional as well as monetary responsibilities, national government plays secondary but very important role, whereas the local government involves in providing the educational services. The following parts of the paper will discuss education policy in a greater detail (Drake, and Nelson, 1999).

Elements of the Education Policy

State government plays a very important role in the education policy of the system. State government assigns local government the responsibility of delivering educational services to the children. State governments in US have established local bodies, such as local school districts, which usually involves a board of local people, which is responsible for hiring of a superintendent, who would further be responsible for induction of principles and teacher staffs (Anderson, 2010).

History of the Policy

Education policy remains one the most crucial part of the US government, where all the three levels of government play a key role. In US constitution, the term of 'Education' is not mentioned. However, the constitution was amended when a case was filed raising the issue. ...