Policy entrepreneur

Policy entrepreneurs are individuals who exploit opportunities to influence policy outcomes to increase their self-interests – without having the necessary resources required for achieving this goal alone. They are not satisfied with merely promoting their self-interests within institutions that others have established. Rather, they try to influence a given reality to create new horizons of opportunity using innovative ideas and strategies. These persistent individuals use innovative ideas and non-traditional strategies to promote desired policy outcomes. Whether they come from the private, public or third sectors, one of their defining characteristics is their willingness to invest their resources – time, energy, reputations and sometimes money – in the hopes of a future return. Policy entrepreneurship was established as a theoretical concept mainly in John Kingdon's (1995) influential work. Kingdon's framework considers the role of the individual within the policy process and explains why change occurs (or does not).

The term entrepreneur is derived from the French word entreprendre, i.e. to undertake. The French economist Jean-Baptiste Say first coined the term in 1803 and defined an entrepreneur as an individual who "shifts economic resources out of an area of lower and into an area of higher productivity and greater yield".

Many decades later, scholars gradually have expanded the use of the idea of entrepreneurship and adapted the concept from business to the public sector. John Kingdon (1984) was one of the earliest scholars to apply the term entrepreneurs to the public sector; he first coined the term "policy entrepreneur" in his work Agendas, Alternatives and Public Policies.

Cohen, Nissim (2016) “Policy Entrepreneurs and Agenda Setting”. In Zahariadis, Nikolaos (ed.), Handbook of Public Policy Agenda Setting. Edward Elgar, pp. 180-199.

Cohen, Nissim (2012) “Policy Entrepreneurs and the Design of Public Policy: Conceptual framework and the Case of the National Health Insurance Law in Israel” Journal of Social Research & Policy, 3 (1): 5-26.

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