Policy Endurance and the Power of Incumbents: Maintaining Agricultural Policy Through Policy Change

Agricultural policy is an extreme case of policy durability. Despite periodic reform efforts, agricultural policy remains a highly compartmentalized policy domain where peak organizations of farmers enjoy a privileged place in the formulation and implementation of income support policies. The case of agriculture has contributed to several theoretical developments including studies of interest groups, government-interest groups relations, and the role of ideas and paradigms in public policy. However, policy durability does not imply policy stasis. Agricultural policies have faced a variety of external pressures and challenges during the last three decades. On the one hand, these pressures have produced substantial changes in policy instruments. On the other hand, we see a remarkable stability in the core commitment of agricultural policy to allocate significant public monies to support farmers’ incomes as well as a remarkable persistence in the capacity of institutions to privilege commercial farming interests. In other words, what we observe in agricultural policy making is an ongoing process of policy change producing a high degree of policy stability. To appreciate and understand this seeming contradiction, we introduce the concept of policy endurance, defined here as a process in which policy incumbents cede a degree of control over the policy agenda in order to retain control of policy formulation, decision making and implementation. Policy endurance describes this capacity to respond to external pressures while preserving core policy commitments. What is common to both theories of change, whether punctuated or incremental, is a focus on the opportunities and constraints of the challengers. Change is typically understood as a struggle against incumbents who benefit from the status quo. In both accounts, these incumbents are conceived as simple veto players, blocking reforms using their control of institutions or their capacity to mobilize resources. We think this is missing half of the story by overlooking how incumbent actors play a much more sophisticated and proactive role in defusing or deflecting institutional and policy reforms. Our concept of policy endurance captures the variety of strategies incumbent actors deploy in order to ensure core policy commitments endure. Agriculture serves as an extreme case that is well-suited to the task of concept development. We use examples of agri-food policy making to illustrate how incumbent actors deploy various strategies to preserve the status quo. The concept of policy endurance can provide new insights into policy continuity and change in ways that improve upon existing concepts such as path dependence or incremental change.