Public Opinion and Policy Making: An Essay on the Public Comment System

Abstract

This study clarifies the influence of public opinion on policy making by focusing on the public comment system. After explaining the outline of the public comment system, quantitative characteristics of public opinion regarding education policy based on the data collected from The Office of E-Government and Information Technology (e-Gov) from 2003 to 2013 are analyzed. Furthermore, the influence of each opinion received through the public comment system on higher education policy making is discussed. We conducted a limited analysis on the degrees of interest in each policy because the quantitative responses of public opinion to each policy and the contents of individual or drafted opinion are only obtainable through e-Gov data. A detailed case study is required for future research to better understand the substantial influence of public opinion on policy making.