In the literature on the role of agency in the policy process, relatively little attention has been devoted to how agents define policy problems. This article helps to address this gap by asking when and how policy entrepreneurs are successful in defining problems. The article rests on a framework that shows how policy entrepreneurs holding specific ideas and given a propitious socioeconomic context are able to define problems, translate those problems into new frames, and draw on those frames, while using their personal skills and political and institutional resources, to help build supportive coalitions in favor of policy change. Illustrated by a puzzling case in the field of European mobility policy, the article offers a new perspective on the role of ideas at the problem definition stage of the policy process, while providing a richer understanding of the policy entrepreneur as a driver of policy change.

Many studies put forward the argument that local policy experimentation, a key feature of China's policy process in the Hu Jintao era, has been paralysed by Xi Jinping's (re)centralization of political power – otherwise known as “top-level design.” This narrative suggests that local policymakers have become increasingly risk-averse owing to the anti-corruption campaign and are therefore unwilling to experiment. This article, however, argues that local governments are still expected to innovate with new policy solutions and now will be punished if they do not. By introducing the analytical framework of “experimentation under pressure” and drawing on an analysis of over 3,000 local government regulations and fieldwork data related to foreign investment attraction policies in two localities, Foshan and Ganzhou, the authors highlight new features developing within current experimental policy cycles. Local cadres now have no choice but to experiment as the political risk of shirking the direct command to experiment may be higher than the inherent risk of experimentation itself.

Coronaviruses have emerged as a potential disruptive force in policymaking. Using a comparative case study method, we examine two social policy responses in Jakarta, Indonesia: the Social Safety Nets (SSN) programme and the health policy. Such examples demonstrate an aggressive change in policy direction from means-tested systems and government-centred approaches to a total relaxation of conditions with the involvement of non-state actors in the provision of services. Our study analyses the ideational dimensions of the policy process that produces abrupt and radical change. From our analysis, the policy change may be explained by the emergence of a new policy paradigm created through the emulation-contextual process – an alternative model of policy learning. The theoretical implication of our research is that policy response in this study cannot be viewed in a completely path-dependent process. Instead, we propose a ‘path-creation accelerator,’ which represents an infrequent instance of policy change.

Policy entrepreneurs play a pivotal role in policy changes in both electoral democracies and authoritarian systems. By investigating the case of healthcare reform in Sanming City, this article illustrates how the fragmented bureaucracy in China enables and constrains local policy entrepreneurs, and how entrepreneurial manoeuvring succeeds in realigning the old institutional structures while attacking the vested interests. Both structural conditions and individual attributes are of critical importance to the success of policy entrepreneurship. Four factors and their dynamic interactions are central to local policy entrepreneurship: behavioural traits, political capital, network position and institutional framework. This study furthers theoretical discussion on policy entrepreneurship by elucidating the fluidity of interactional patterns between agent and structure in authoritarian China. The malleability of rigid institutions can be considerably increased by the active manoeuvring of entrepreneurial agents.