Chapter five looks at how the policy window which is defined by Kingdon
as an opportunity for advocates of proposals to push their pet solutions, or to push
attention to their special problems was opened in the problem stream by the downturn
in tourism industry. Then the interactions and the coupling of the three streams
brought about by focusing event that moved the governmental agenda onto the
decision agenda for implementation are carefully discussed. Subsequently, the
decision for building the Disneyland theme park to revitalize the tourism industry had
spilt over to the adjacent areas like the promotion of heritage and cultural tourism in
Hong Kong. From the case study, it is found that Kingdon's theory developed under
the US federal system is equally applicable to the Hong Kong political context.
Finally, chapter six is the concluding chapter that wraps up the
argumentation in preceding chapters. Although Kingdon's streams model is not
without critiques, it is concluded in this chapter that his theory of agenda setting is a
valuable, comprehensive and important tool in helping people understand and explain
public policy making in Hong Kong as it is seen capable of explaining the whole
process of the agenda setting for the Disney theme park in a rather accurate manner.
Kingdon succeeded in a large part in his task of explaining how items got onto the
agenda. Lastly, it is observed that the interest and difficulty in public policy study lie
on the fact that it is a complex subject matter that involves numerous political
decisions rendering an accurate explanation difficult if not totally impossible. That
may be the challenge for students ofpublic policy making.