Instrument constituency and policy transfer How a collective actor mediates the transnational movement of policy instruments

Within the context of increasing instrumentalization of policy transfer, this chapter elaborates on the relatively new concept of ‘instrument constituency’ in comparative public policy and argues that the concept can be used to systematize the understanding behind the specific dynamics and mechanisms underpinning the transfer of policies. It offers a framework to better understand policy transfer as a simultaneous and interdependent process of the development of the instruments and their instrument constituency. This process proceeds in five stages: instrument formulation, commodification, conceptual replication, problem co-construction and chasing, and ripening of collective interest. Such a perspective treats policy transfer as a continuous and iterative process of learning and constant refinement of policy instruments, offered to scholars as a way to better unpack the activities of instrument constituencies and to systematize future research on policy transfer.