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While public consultation is a signature process of democratic policy formulation, many governments manoeuvre to refract citizen's opinions or conduct it perfunctorily. Using the case of a medium of instruction policy in Hong Kong, this article unveils the strategies that the state and citizens employ to put their opinion through to the final policy text, during a public consultation process. Recent literature has identified the mechanisms through which individual actors or organisations contribute to broad policy agenda-setting or policy programme development. However, yet to be investigated is how they – sometimes with conflicting interests – collectively negotiate a policy with the state via public consultations. This paper investigates this very phenomenon, building on previous work conducted in the public policy field, analysing 51 government-generated documents through both thematic content analysis and critical discourse analysis. The paper uncovers four strategies adopted by administrations (non-commitment, case closure, disengagement for irrelevance, and placation) to evade citizens' equity-oriented demands and stakeholders' three counter strategies (mobilising other stakeholders into a coalition, reopening the case pointing out a new problem, and appealing by affirming relevance). The state's discrete refusals and stakeholders' conjoint reengagement tactics draw our attention to the complexity and subtlety involved in negotiation via public consultations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper critically examines parents' and service providers' reception of the Pre-primary Education Voucher Scheme (PEVS), which was designed to enhance the quality of early childhood education in Hong Kong. The PEVS was a universal voucher policy that was designed to harness market forces and increase direct governmental control of quality in a private education market wherein pre-academic training and competition are emphasized. This paper presents the results of a survey of 413 parents and 215 service providers. Findings indicated that despite the government's efforts in promoting quality as 'child-centeredness' and the efforts of preschools in meeting the quality standards, parents remained relatively neutral about the policy's influence on preschool quality. However, all parents appreciated the financial benefits they accrued from the PEVS, and more socially-advantaged families allocated the additional disposable income on extra educational activities and programs for their children. Findings suggest the implementation of the PEVS in a fully private market might unexpectedly exacerbate inequity in educational opportunities. The enrolment size of the preschool was also found to be a determinant of respondents' views of the PEVS. We argue the government's idea of 'joyful learning' may be even harder to achieve with the current means of service governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]