Designing the Pathology Model of Public Welfare Governance in Iran

Policymakers' inability to identify and analyze public issues to formulate necessary policies, the weaknesses of agents and executives in implementing the procedures, and the lack of optimal use of existing resources are among the most prominent disadvantages of public welfare governance in various societies. The purpose of this research is to provide a model to understand the inefficiency of public welfare governance in Iran.

The present research is a mixed-method type (quantitative-qualitative) of research. In order to identify the concepts, dimensions and indicators of the model, theme analysis (qualitative) was used, and structural equation modeling (quantitative) was employed to fit the conceptual model of the research. 26 experts, professors and experts in the field of policy and public welfare have been selected for the socio-statistics of the qualitative part. The statistical population of the quantitative part consists of 240 experts, managers and senior managers in the field of policy and social welfare. 148 people participated considering Cochran's formula.

In the qualitative part; 50 initial indicators were identified and after coding, 45 indicators were confirmed by theme analysis. Six dimensions (management and decision-making; public finance of the government; planning; internal environment; external environment and sectoral governance), and four components of causal, contextual, strategy, and consequence factors were confirmed. In the quantitative part, the dimensions of management and decision-making and public finance of the government were found to have an effect on the dimensions of the internal and external environment as well as on the dimension of planning, and the dimension of planning also affects the governance of a sector. The dimension of management and decision-making was ranked first with an average of 6.54, and the dimension of governance was ranked last with an average of 5.14.

A comprehensive model for identifying public issues enables the country to determine and implement priorities and strategies. The design requirements for the pattern of public welfare pathology in Iran will be six dimensions and 45 indicators extracted in this model.