CHAPTER 2

Making Politics Visible: The WPR Approach

Abstract This chapter offers an analytic strategy, or “tool”, called “What’s

the Problem Represented to be?” (the WPR approach), to facilitate post-
structural policy analysis. It elaborates a poststructural understanding of
politics as strategic relations and practices, and of theorizing as political
practice. The WPR approach is introduced as a means to engage in such
theorizing and to assist in the analytic task of making politics visible. To this
end it offers seven interrelated forms of questioning and analysis to critically
scrutinize problematizations (the ways in which “problems” are produced
and represented) in governmental policies and practices, understood in
broad terms. Policy workers and other analysts are enjoined to deploy
WPR in practices of interrogating problematizations, reproblematization,
and self-problematization.

Keywords politics ! essentialism ! becoming ! contestation ! critique !

silences ! “the real” ! problem representation ! WPR approach

In the Introduction, we positioned policy workers as involved in theoriz-

ing. Here we proceed to introduce the “tool”, referred to as the WPR
approach, that we offer to facilitate this critical practice. Because the
“What’s the Problem Represented to be?” (WPR) approach offers a way
of thinking differently about commonly accepted categories and govern-
ing practices, it is relevant also to students and scholars in many other

© The Author(s) 2016 13

C. Bacchi, S. Goodwin, Poststructural Policy Analysis,
DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-52546-8_2
14 POSTSTRUCTURAL POLICY ANALYSIS

fields, including sociology, social work, anthropology, cultural studies,

and human geography.
WPR is an analytic strategy that puts in question the common view that
the role of governments is to solve problems that sit outside them, waiting
to be “addressed”. Rather, it considers how governmental practices,
understood broadly, produce “problems” as particular kinds of problems.
Alongside and through the production of “problems”, governmental
practices contribute to the production of “subjects”, “objects”, and
“places” (see Part II). The WPR approach heralds the importance of
directing critical attention to this productive activity. What exactly is
produced? How is it produced? And, with what effects?
An underlying goal is to make the politics involved in these productive
practices visible. Countering the commonly touted view that “objects” are
clearly “objects”, people are just “humans”, and countries and other geo-
graphical entities simply exist, attention shifts to considering how these
“things” have come to be and continue to be “done” or “made” on an
ongoing basis. Since “things” are not “natural”, since they are made to be,
they involve politics. This expansive understanding of politics extends well
beyond political institutions, parties, and so on to include the heterogeneous
strategic relations and practices that shape who we are and how we live.
From a poststructural perspective, phenomena are not singular, fixed,
or discrete entities that can be attributed an essence. Instead, they are best
viewed as combinations or patterned networks of diverse elements and
relations that are coordinated, arranged, combined, or patterned to appear
as a convergence. This heterogeneous arrangement is regarded as “strate-
gic” in accordance with Foucault’s argument that such arrangements
involve “strategies without strategists”. “The mechanisms brought into
play in power relations are ‘strategic’ but are not the property or achieve-
ment of autonomous agents” (Ezzamel and Willmott 2010: 90).
There is no suggestion of conspiracy; nor is there talk of “vested
interests”. Rather, Foucault (1979: 26) refers to a “micro-physics of
power”, to ensure recognition of the plural and diverse practices involved
in the production of “things”.
Sawicki (1991) captures these distinctive contours of a Foucault-influ-
enced approach, as it would be applied to policies surrounding new
reproductive technologies in the US:

Thinking specifically about the history of childbirth in America, a

Foucauldian feminist does not assume a priori that the new reproductive
 2 MAKING POLITICS VISIBLE: THE WPR APPROACH 15

technologies are the product of a long-standing male “desire” to control

women’s bodies or to usurp procreation. . . . Employing a bottom-up analy-
sis, a Foucauldian feminist would describe the present situation as the out-
come of a myriad of micro-practices, struggles, tactics and counter-tactics.
(Sawicki 1991: 80–81)

In addition, assumptions about the being of “things” are replaced by

references to their becoming (Chia 1996). The physicality of “objects” is
not questioned. However, “objects” are seen as in continuous develop-
ment, as “in formation”, rather than as fixed. In effect, practices and
relations replace “objects” (Veyne 1997). Hence, “things” become
open-ended and malleable, creating space for contestation and unmaking.
“Subjects” too are considered to be in a process of continuous develop-
ment, rejecting an essentialism that portrays human beings as sovereign
subjects who grasp meaning intuitively (Foucault 1972: 227).
A particular way of thinking about “knowledge” is at work here.
“Knowledge”, such as that produced in research, is no longer treated as
“truth” or as a set of “true” statements about “reality”. Instead, “knowl-
edges” are seen to play a critical role in governing practices and in the
making of “reality”. In line with this view, the production of “knowl-
edge”, through research, is understood to be a form of political practice.
The term “ontological politics” captures this proposition that research
makes, rather than reflects, worlds (Mol 2002).
Such a stance challenges policy workers cum analysts to reflect critically on
the “methods” they use and the categories of analysis they adopt. Foucault
offers some pointers as to the form of critique that is required. He states:

A critique does not consist in saying that things aren’t good the way they
are. It consists in seeing on what type of assumptions, of familiar notions, of
established, unexamined ways of thinking the accepted practices are based.
(Foucault 1994a: 456)

Barbara Johnson (1981: xv) elaborates:

It [a critique] is an analysis that focuses on the grounds of the system’s

possibility. The critique reads backwards from what seems natural, obvious,
self-evident, or universal to show that these things have their history, their
reasons for being the way they are, their effects on what follows from them,
and that the starting point is not a (natural) given but a (cultural) construct,
usually blind to itself.
16 POSTSTRUCTURAL POLICY ANALYSIS

In effect, here, Foucault and Johnson outline the agenda for a WPR
analysis, as illustrated in the accompanying Chart (see WPR Chart on
page 20). Its seven interrelated forms of questioning and analysis “work
backwards” from policy proposals to examine the “unexamined ways of
thinking” on which they rely, to put in question their underlying premises,
to show that they have a history, and to insist on questioning their
implications. The intent, displayed in the question format, is not to reveal
“truths”, which would contradict its poststructural commitments, but to
encourage a particular kind of interrogation, as elaborated below.
The key term in a WPR analytic practice is problematization. The
word can be used in two ways, either to signal a form of critical analysis,
putting something into question, or to refer to the products of govern-
mental practices, that is, how issues are problematized (see Chapter 3).
Pursuing the latter meaning, Rose and Miller (1992: 181) describe
“government” as a “problematizing activity”. As Osborne (1997:
174) explains, the suggestion here is that “policy cannot get to work
without first problematizing its territory”. In other words, to intervene,
to institute a policy, “government”, including but beyond the state, has
to target something as a “problem” that needs fixing.
The dominant view in most approaches to policy is that the task of
government is (simply) to address and to attempt to solve “problems
that exist”. Problem-solving is a recurrent mantra. The intent and
purpose of the WPR approach is to challenge this premise. It makes
the case that policies do not address problems that exist; rather, they
produce “problems” as particular sorts of problems. Further, it is
argued that the manner in which these “problems” are constituted
shapes lives and worlds. The critical task, therefore, becomes inter-
rogating the particular problematizations within policies. This study
of governmental problematizations provides a means to make visible
the politics—in the broad sense discussed above—involved in the
making of “problems”.
The WPR approach starts from a simple idea: that what we propose to
do about something indicates what we think needs to change and hence
what we think the “problem” is. This thinking can be applied to policies.
Because they are proposals for change of some sort, they produce or
constitute a particular representation of the “problem” they purport to
address. It follows that it is possible to “read off” the implied “problem”—
what is seen as in need of “fixing”—from specific policy proposals or plans
of action. If, for example, activity regimes for children are introduced as a
 2 MAKING POLITICS VISIBLE: THE WPR APPROACH 17

way to reduce childhood “obesity”, the “problem” is constituted as

children’s inactivity. By contrast, if regulations are introduced to limit
the amount of advertising of fast food during prime time children’s tele-
vision, the “problem” of “obesity” is represented to be aggressive or,
perhaps, even unethical advertising.
Another way to make this point is to note that childhood “obesity” is
problematized differently in the two contrasting proposals. Importantly,
the concern here is not how different people might problematize the issue
but how the policy itself problematizes it (see Bacchi 2015a). The proble-
matization forms a part of the policy. Moreover, to say that a policy
represents a “problem” in a particular way does not imply that we are
talking about an image or impression of the “problem”, as if we could
wish it otherwise. Rather, we are talking about how the “problem” is made
to be a particular kind of problem within a specific policy, with all sorts of
effects. The subsequent claim is that we are governed through these con-
stituted “problems”, meaning that governing takes place through
problematizations.
Bacchi (2009) coins the term “problem representation” to refer to the
form of a problematization or the problematized phenomenon in a specific
site. The analytic task becomes teasing out the conceptual premises under-
pinning problem representations, tracing their genealogy, reflecting on
the practices that sustain them and considering their effects (see
Chapter 3). Harking back to Johnson (1981: xv; above), the objective is
to examine critically the “grounds of the system’s possibility”, the politics
involved in its making.
The simple idea that it is possible to “work backwards” from a proposal
to how a “problem” is represented—to “read off” the problem representa-
tion from the proposal or proposed solution—can be applied in a vast array
of contexts. It promotes a novel way of thinking that opens up many kinds
of material to original and inventive interrogation. For example, this think-
ing can be applied to theoretical or academic analyses, which are in effect
forms of proposal. Concepts, too, can be seen as proposals (Tanesini 1994;
see Chapter 6). The same kind of thinking can be used to instigate critical
analysis of some forms of media material. “Working backwards” from the
proposals in such material—theories, academic analyses, concepts, media
representations—provides the opportunity to examine and reflect critically
on the deep-seated assumptions upon which they are based.
The focus of this book is the application of this way of thinking in the
realm of policy. Policy, as explained in the Introduction, is understood in
18 POSTSTRUCTURAL POLICY ANALYSIS

an expansive sense to include both the activities of state institutions and of

other agencies and professions involved in maintaining social order. For
policy workers cum analysts, written texts can provide useful starting
points. Thus policy texts can include documents, such as organizational
files and records, legislation, judicial decisions, bills, speeches, interview
transcripts (see Appendix), media statements, organizational charts, bud-
gets, program contracts, research reports, even statistical data. In particu-
lar policy sites, written texts could include institutional records,
organizational reports, syllabi, etc. “Texts” can be understood expansively
to include images, videos and forms of digital communication (e.g.,
websites, hyperlinks across websites; see Marshall 2012b).
Importantly, if a text is selected for analysis, it provides only a starting
point. The WPR approach does not involve a study of modes of language
use or rhetoric. It therefore stands at a distance from the so-called “lin-
guistic turn” where the focus is primarily on the content and linguistic
construction of a text (Fairclough 2013). By way of contrast, the WPR
approach uses texts as “levers” to open up reflections on the forms of
governing, and associated effects, instituted through a particular way of
constituting a “problem”. To deploy this “lever” necessarily involves
familiarity with other texts that cover the same or related topics or
circumstances.
Analysis can also be applied to phenomena that are not literally textual
and “objects” not found in formal documents, such as ceremonies (as
spoken and acted text), organizational culture (as symbols), buildings,
and mechanisms of government. For example, Bottrell and Goodwin
(2011: 4) describe how modern schools with their “uni-purpose facilities
located on enclosed land, fenced and gated” reflect a “hidden curricu-
lum” that problematizes the moral and cognitive training of young
people. As an example of a governmental mechanism, Rowse (2009)
shows how the current Australian census problematizes Indigenous peo-
ples as part of a population binary, Indigenous and non-Indigenous,
inviting analysis of the sort of political claims such a statistical distinction
facilitates or blocks.
The key distinguishing characteristic of the material that can be
adopted for a WPR analysis is that it is prescriptive—that it can be under-
stood, possibly in a loose sense, as a form of proposal and a guide to
conduct. Foucault (1986: 12) described his domain of analysis as “texts
written for the purpose of offering rules, opinions, and advice on how to
behave as one should”. As explained in the Introduction, this focus reflects
 2 MAKING POLITICS VISIBLE: THE WPR APPROACH 19

a broad conception of “government” as “the conduct of conduct”,

incorporating self-governance, interpersonal relations, relations within
communities or institutions, as well as “relations concerned with the
exercise of political sovereignty” (Gordon 1991: 2-3). As proposals to
guide conduct, the material adopted for analysis will—following the
simple idea introduced above—necessarily indicate what is targeted for
change and hence what the “problem” is represented to be. To repeat
the key point, the WPR approach asks us to identify a “proposal” or a
“proposed solution” so that we can “read off” the implicit problem
representation within it.
Nikolas Rose (2000: 58) uses the language of “answers” and “ques-
tions”, instead of “proposals” and “problems”, to argue something simi-
lar. He says:

If policies, arguments, analyses and prescriptions purport to provide

answers, they do so only in relation to a set of questions. Their very status
as answers is dependent upon the existence of such questions. If, for exam-
ple, imprisonment, marketization, community care are seen as answers, to
what are they answers? And, in reconstructing the problematizations which
accord them intelligibility as answers, these grounds become visible, their
limits and presuppositions are opened for investigation in new ways.

In Rose’s analysis, imprisonment, marketization, and community care

function as prescriptive guides to conduct that problematize behaviors in
particular ways. The critical task becomes reconstructing the problemati-
zations that accord these “guides” (e.g., marketization) intelligibility as
answers. By reconstructing the problematizations, says Rose, it becomes
possible to identify “limits and presuppositions” in the “answers” that
demand interrogation.
These exact goals—identifying, reconstructing, and interrogating
problematizations—are accomplished through the forms of questioning
and analysis in a WPR application. The approach, which is outlined in the
Chart below, consists of six questions and an undertaking to apply those
questions to one’s own policy proposals. Since the seven modes of
analysis necessarily involve overlap and some repetition, their listing as
separate “steps” serves a heuristic function and ought to be treated
accordingly. The remainder of this chapter clarifies how to apply the
approach by explaining the goal of each “step” and how to put it into
practice.
20 POSTSTRUCTURAL POLICY ANALYSIS

What’s the Problem Represented to be? (WPR) approach to policy

analysis
Question 1: What’s the problem (e.g., of “gender inequality”,
“drug use/abuse”, “economic development”, “global warming”,
“childhood obesity”, “irregular migration”, etc.) represented to be
in a specific policy or policies?
Question 2: What deep-seated presuppositions or assumptions
underlie this representation of the “problem” (problem representation)?
Question 3: How has this representation of the “problem” come about?
Question 4: What is left unproblematic in this problem representa-
tion? Where are the silences? Can the “problem” be conceptualized
differently?
Question 5: What effects (discursive, subjectification, lived) are
produced by this representation of the “problem”?
Question 6: How and where has this representation of the “pro-
blem” been produced, disseminated and defended? How has it been
and/or how can it be disrupted and replaced?
Step 7: Apply this list of questions to your own problem
representations.
Adapted from Bacchi, C. (2009), Analysing Policy: What’s the
Problem Represented to be? Pearson Education, Frenchs Forest.

The goal in Question 1 is to identify a place to begin the analysis. We

are looking for a way to open up for questioning something that appears
natural and obvious (see Johnson 1981 above)—e.g., a specific policy or a
governing technique. The selection of a starting point depends upon the
pertinence to one’s work and political priorities.
In a WPR approach this first step involves identifying a problem repre-
sentation (see above). To identify a problem representation one “works
backwards” from a proposal, broadly understood, to see what is proble-
matized. For example, the governing mechanism of a census (see Rowse
2009) assumes as problematic the shape, number, etc., of a population,
which becomes the problem representation. Problem representations pro-
vide the springboard, or lever, to the rest of the analysis. It is important to
remember that policy texts are often complex constructions that may well
involve more than one problem representation.
 2 MAKING POLITICS VISIBLE: THE WPR APPROACH 21

In this form of analysis, the objective is not to try to identify the

intentions behind a particular policy or program. Nor is the goal to assess
the distance between promised changes and the failure to deliver those
changes—we are not contrasting stated “solutions” with stated “pro-
blems”, and finding the “solutions” wanting. Rather, we start from stated
“solutions” to inquire into their implicit problematization(s).
Rowse’s (2009) example of a census and Rose’s (2000) example of
marketization indicate that identifying a “proposal” has to be understood
in the context of “guides to conduct”. One does not need to find an
explicit statement or recommendation about “how to behave as one
should” (Foucault 1986: 12; see above), though oftentimes such state-
ments do appear in policy directives. More commonly, however, a govern-
ment report may refer simply to the desirability of some condition such as
“social cohesion”, signaling thereby that lack of social cohesion is repre-
sented or constituted to be a problem of sorts. In this way such assertions
provide a problem representation, a starting point for interrogation.
The goals in Question 2 are several. First, we consider how this parti-
cular problem representation was possible by identifying the meanings
(presuppositions, assumptions, “unexamined ways of thinking”, knowl-
edges/discourses) that needed to be in place for it to make sense or be
intelligible (see Chapter 3). Note that we are seeking these meanings
within the policy, program or technical instrument, not in the heads of
social actors (e.g., policy workers, social workers, academics). Second, we
identify how the problem representation is constructed—which concepts
and binaries, such as public/private, man/woman and citizen/migrant,
does it rely upon? Finally, we identify and reflect upon possible patterns in
problematizations that might signal the operation of a particular political
or governmental rationality (see “Governmentality: Rationalities and
Technologies” in Chapter 3).
As indicated above in the reference to knowledges/discourses, in a
Foucault-influenced poststructural analysis, discourses refer to knowledges
rather than to language. They comprise both general background knowl-
edge, apparent in epistemological and ontological assumptions, and forms
of relatively bounded social knowledges, such as disciplines. These knowl-
edges are understood as “in the true” or “sayable” (Foucault 1991a: 58),
as forms of truth, rather than as “truth”. The task, which Foucault
describes as “archaeology”, is to critically interrogate these “unexamined
ways of thinking” (Foucault 1994a: 456; see above), reflecting on their
possible implications. For example, for the census we would consider
22 POSTSTRUCTURAL POLICY ANALYSIS

epidemiology, medicine, social anthropology, etc. For activity regimes to

combat childhood “obesity”, exercise physiology, occupational science
and childhood psychology would all figure as relevant knowledges to
examine and question.
To understand how these knowledges acquire “truth” status it is neces-
sary to locate them within the relevant networks of relations and practices
that produce them, which Foucault called “discursive practices” (Bacchi
and Bonham 2014). These comprise a wide array of elements, including
sites, “objects”, and subject positions, together with interconnecting
mechanisms and processes (see Chapter 3). Relevant to our examples of
the census and childhood “obesity” would be the discursive practices of
health, biology and security, among others.
The goal in Question 3 of a WPR analysis is to examine how a specific
problem representation has come to be. It is important to note that the
intent of this question is to challenge any search for origins or any sugges-
tion of some easily traceable evolution of a policy. Rather, the objective is to
bring to light the plethora of possible alternative developments. The intent
is to disrupt any assumption that what is reflects what has to be.
Question 3 involves a form of Foucauldian genealogy. It requires the
detailed mapping of practices that produce identified problem representa-
tions. Differential power relations form an important part of this analysis,
considering for example the operation of specific discursive practices that
create forms of authority for certain knowledges (see Chapter 3).
Particular attention is directed to “subjugated knowledges”, those minor
knowledges that challenge the scientific consensus and that survive at the
margins (Foucault 1980: 83; see Chapter 3).
The goal in Question 4 is to encourage a critical practice of thinking
otherwise. The point is to destabilize an existing problem representation
by drawing attention to silences, or unproblematized elements, within it.
Question 4 also opens up the opportunity to be inventive, to imagine
worlds in which a specific confluence of circumstances is either not pro-
blematized or problematized differently.
The analyses performed in Questions 2 and 3 prepare the ground for
asking Question 4: “What is left unproblematic in this problem represen-
tation? Where are the silences? Can the ‘problem’ be conceptualized
differently?” Comparing problematizations of selected issues, across time
and cross-culturally, provides a particularly powerful intervention to pro-
mote an ability to “think otherwise”. Such comparisons help to identify
the particular combination of practices and relations that give a “problem”
 2 MAKING POLITICS VISIBLE: THE WPR APPROACH 23

a certain shape in a specific context, and indicate that different practices

can produce contrasting problematizations.
Question 5 invites analysts to consider the effects of identified problem
representations. Effects ought to be thought about as political implica-
tions rather than as measurable “outcomes”. Three specific “kinds” of
effects are considered—discursive effects, subjectification effects, and lived
effects—though these need to be understood as interconnected.
Building on Question 4, a study of discursive effects shows how the
terms of reference established by a particular problem representation set
limits on what can be thought and said. Subjectification effects draw atten-
tion to how “subjects” are implicated in problem representations, how
they are produced as specific kinds of subjects (see Chapter 3). Lived
effects, as an analytic category, ensures that the ways in which discursive
and subjectification effects translate into people’s lives form part of the
analysis. These interconnected effects can coalesce in what Foucault
(1982: 208) calls “dividing practices”, which function to separate groups
of people from one another and which can also produce “governable
subjects” divided within themselves. Taken together, discursive, subjecti-
fication, and lived effects bridge a symbolic-material division, showing that
the form of analysis promoted here does not reside in some representa-
tional universe cut off from daily life. Question 5 thus makes it possible to
reflect on the complex array of implications that problematizations entail
in certain contexts and to promote interventions that aim to reduce
deleterious consequences for specific groups of people.
The earlier questions in the approach lay the groundwork for Question
5. To direct attention to subjectification effects, we return to the dis-
courses identified in Question 2 and focus on the subject positions within
them. To investigate the “playing out” of problem representations in
people’s lives (“lived effects”), it is possible to adopt a wide gamut of
empirical techniques, as part of a commitment to selected political goals.
Hence, one can include quantitative measures of social location, ethno-
graphic studies of social interactions, interviews, etc., in one’s analysis,
though the use of this material needs to reflect poststructural premises.
For example, such use ought to exclude assumptions about a foundational
subject (see Appendix). Also, to be consistent with a poststructural sensi-
bility, judgments on the basis of this material have to remain open to
disputation, variation, and revision.
As with Question 3, the purpose of Question 6 is to emphasize the
existence and possibility of contestation, to destabilize taken-for-granted
24 POSTSTRUCTURAL POLICY ANALYSIS

“truths”. On one side it highlights the practices that install and authorize a
particular problem representation. Mol (2002: vii-viii) describes such
practices as acts of “coordination” that produce “the real”, highlighting
the importance of questioning them. On the other side Question 6 opens
up space to reflect on forms of resistance and “counter-conduct”
(Foucault 1978) that challenge (or could challenge) pervasive and author-
itative problem representations (see Chapter 3). Questions 2 and 3 pro-
vide material for this part of the analysis.
The last “step” in the WPR approach is an undertaking to apply its six
questions to one’s own proposals and problem representations. The rationale
for this commitment to self-problematization is that, given one’s location
within historically and culturally entrenched forms of knowledge, we need
ways to subject our own thinking to critical scrutiny. This theme, commonly
described as “reflexivity”, is well-rehearsed in contemporary social criticism
(Bacchi 2011) but takes on special significance in Foucauldian analysis given
Foucault’s (2001: 1431) commitment to problematizing “even what we are
ourselves” (“même ce que nous sommes nous-mêmes”). To this end, the WPR
approach moves beyond easy-to-make declarations of the need to become
“reflexive” to endorse a precise and demanding activity—subjecting one’s
own recommendations and proposals to a WPR analysis.
In terms of practical application of WPR, it is possible to draw selec-
tively upon the forms of questioning and analysis just described, so long as
a self-problematizing ethic is maintained. Not every question needs to be
asked every time one engages with the critical thinking the approach
offers. At the same time, it is highly likely that a WPR analysis may well
need to be applied more than once in any particular application. This is
because problem representations tend to lodge or “nest” one within the
other. For example, when Bacchi (2015b) inquired into how the World
Health Organization represented the “problem” of alcohol consumption
within its reports and associated publications, she found that alcohol use
was problematized in terms of “alcohol problems”. This “answer” invited
the subsequent question—what kinds of “problems” are “alcohol pro-
blems” represented to be? This example illustrates the importance of
examining the selected body of material carefully for problematizations
within problematizations.
Questions are sometimes raised about the usefulness of poststructural
analysis, in particular Foucault-influenced forms thereof. The suggestion is
made that something like WPR leaves us mired in a field of competing
interpretations with no precise recommendations on “ways forward”.
 2 MAKING POLITICS VISIBLE: THE WPR APPROACH 25

Foucault (1991b: 84), of course, was explicit in distancing himself from

reformers who declared, “this, then, is what needs to be done”. And yet,
with Foucault, the WPR approach, as seen above, does not shy away from
discussions of power and contestation. Indeed, it invites analysis of forms
of authority and assessment of effects, and promotes a view of research as
political practice.
Is it possible to claim to support an egalitarian politics while refusing to
advocate specific reforms? We would argue that, in fact, the two perspec-
tives are not only compatible, they are necessary to each other. This is
because reform programs often buy into problematic premises that need
highlighting and questioning—as examples, consider the analysis of
“social inclusion”, “literacy”, and “wellbeing” offered in Chapter 6. The
goal, therefore, is to create the space to reflect critically on all proposals for
change, including one’s own recommendations, in order to govern “with
a minimum of domination” (Foucault 1987: 129). The task, as Foucault
(2001: 1431) describes it, is to engage in “a work of problematisation and
of perpetual reproblematisation” (“un travail de problématisation et de
perpétuelle reproblématisation”).
In line with this thinking one of the authors (Goodwin) describes four
ways in which the WPR approach informed a background paper she wrote
on family-centered employment for the Australian Government.

1. I interrogated how and by whom and for what purposes populations

were to be governed through this new social program.
2. I had to theorize about the possible harms of different knowledges
involved in producing a relationship between families, unemploy-
ment, and government for the purposes of social programming.
3. I sought to promulgate an alternative vision in my representation of
the relationship between families, unemployment, and government.
4. Participating in this process was political work; it involved engaging
in the politics (in the governing) of poverty and family life, and
necessitated reflecting on my own views on the policy area.

Goodwin’s account provides an example of what WPR brings to the policy

table. It illustrates the usefulness of opening up governing practices to
critical scrutiny by examining how these practices problematize an issue. It
highlights the importance of identifying and assessing the impact of
governing knowledges and of promoting less harmful alternatives, while
keeping in view one’s own problematizations. Most crucially, it indicates
26 POSTSTRUCTURAL POLICY ANALYSIS

the political nature of policy work and invites policy analysts to engage in
this politics through the form of theorizing a WPR approach offers. The
kinds of new questions promoted by this form of policy analysis include:

• How do specific policies, read broadly, represent the “problems”

they claim to address?
• Which knowledge practices are involved in this production of
“problems”?
• How do these knowledges acquire authority?
• How do governmental problematizations get played out in people’s
lives?
• Which scenarios are encouraged? Which alternatives are closed off?
• How are political “subjects” produced within specific problem
representations?
• Which “objects” and “places” are created, and with what effects?
• What alternative problematizations are possible?