Although policy subsystems are well established concepts in policy analysis, their emergence and development has not been sufficiently conceptualized by now. This might be caused by the focus on policy output as dependent variable in many policy studies, but constitutes a basic shortcoming in the modelling and explanation of policy making.
Our aim is to contribute to these conceptual questions at hand. We will draw upon sociological field theories and compare them with the concept of the policy subsystem to gather more insights into the influence of ideas, interests, actors, and institutions on the development of policy subsystems. In a first empirical step, we will use our insights to sketch a mapping of the internet policy field to show the value of our theoretical considerations.
