Harold lasswell's “problem orientation” for the policy sciences

Abstract

Harold Lasswell's ‘problem orientation’ is the keystone in his concept of the ‘policy sciences’. However, many critics have since rejected his view of policymaking as a problem solving science. I explain and critique Lasswell's problem orientation in a new way, in terms of his scientific conception of problem and solution. Lasswell derived his vision of the policy sciences from Dewey's conception of knowledge as problem solving. Lasswell modified Dewey's pragmatism by proposing a policy sciences composed of two separate poles, the scientific study of problems and policymaking around these problems. These were synthesized in a larger scientific perspective, the ‘problem orientation'for the policy sciences. However, this synthesis is neither scientific in theory nor in practice. The link between the two poles is contingent, rather than necessary. Lasswell suppressed the problematic to cast policy science as a non‐political politics. The relationship between the two poles, and the problem orientation in general, should be theorized as contingent and political.