With this in mind it remains useful to consider politics as, in the dictionary’s
terms, “the art or science of government.” Politics is therefore a profession unto
itself and an object of study. As such, it is the “the total complex of relations between
people living in a society,” as defined by Merriam-Webster.com. What does
this have to do with public policy? The study of public policy is the study of how
we translate the popular will into practice. Of course, this is a simplification—the
nature of the popular will is itself highly debatable—but it’s a good general way of
considering what we study.