The Implementation of Public Policy: Still the Missing Link Robbie Waters Robichau and Laurence E. Lynn Jr. Although theories of public policy and theories of governance both seek to establish relationships between policymaking and its consequences, they do not complement each other very well. Public policy models tend to de-emphasize that which governance theories tend to emphasize: the influence on government performance of implementation, broadly described as the actions taken by those engaged in administration (including managers at all levels, those engaged in service delivery, and third-party agents) after a policy has been lawfully promulgated by elected officials and interpreted by the courts. A comparison of a recently developed theory of public sector performance with several prominent theories of policymaking suggests that multilevel governance theories can supply what continues to be the missing link in public policy theories. At the same time, governance theories might be enriched by the process modeling of public policy theories. Introduction The increasing use of “governance” as a conceptual frame for research on the determinants of government performance has produced valuable insights into causal relationships among public choice processes, public management, service delivery, and citizen and stakeholder assessments and reactions. Paralleling these efforts, public policy theorists have developed a variety of models to depict relationships between policymaking processes and their outputs and outcomes. Although both types of research seek to relate policymaking to its consequences, they do not complement each other very well. Public policy models tend to de-emphasize that which governance theories tend to emphasize: the influence on government perfor- mance of implementation through administrative systems, broadly described as the actions taken by public managers at all levels, those engaged in service delivery, and third-party agents after a policy has been promulgated by elected officials and interpreted by the courts. This article offers a preliminary consideration of how theories of governance and of public policy might better complement each other. We juxtapose a theory of Prepared for presentation at the Next Generation Policy Workshop in Norman, Oklahoma, February 27–29, 2008. The Policy Studies Journal, Vol. 37, No. 1, 2009 21 0190-292X © 2009 Policy Studies Organization Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc., 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA, and 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ.