Yogyakarta, August 27th 2021─As a research center under the Department of Public Policy Management (MKP) of FISIPOL UGM, the Institute for Policy Development or PolDev conducts many assistants and workshops related to economic, socio-political and public policy issues, one of which is related to policy briefs making. On Friday (27/8), through the Zoom Meeting platform, PolDev held a training on writing policy briefs with the title “Scream Out Loud to Policy Makers Through Policy Briefs: Strategies for Designing Effective Policy Briefs” which was opened to the public.
Broadly speaking, the material presented by one of the Lecturers of the Department of Public Policy Management of UGM, Dr. Gabriel Lele, M.Sc., discussed two main topics, they were the structure and technicality of the policy brief presentation, as well as the substance of the policy brief. The substance of the policy brief is explained first by explaining four core points, namely problems, analysis, alternatives, and recommendations. In this section, activity participants are invited to ‘get acquainted’ with the policy brief, starting from its components, to the principles of the policy brief itself.
It was only in the second part, Dr. Gabi invited the participants to understand more technical matters, namely how to make policy briefs heard, seen, and used by policy makers. Dr. Gabi himself emphasized that extra work is needed to ensure that the policy brief is taken into account by policy makers. For that, in this section Dr. Gabi explained in depth the policy recommendations through a feasibility analysis, which consisted of six core points, namely substantively sound, administrative capacity, economic cost-benefit, social acceptability, political support, and legal framework.
One of the tips that Dr. What Gabi gives to activity participants who will or are currently making a policy brief is a dramatization of the first paragraph of the policy brief. Even though what is conveyed is an ordinary thing, the first paragraph must make it look extraordinary and touch the basis of the interests of policy makers, which can be done by providing a certain point of view and using rhetoric in the presentation.
The large number of participants who attended this training did not reduce the conducive atmosphere throughout the event. In fact, the participants gave many responses and questions during the training, which was moderated by Idin Virgi Sabilah, so that the event was not monotonous and the discussion went both ways even though it was held online.