Policy approaches to occupational and organizational health

Abstract

This chapter analyzes the policy context and clarifies the policy process of relevance to occupational, organizational, and public health. It discusses different levels of policy-level interventions and the role of stakeholders, presenting examples and differentiating between hard and soft regulation. Policy underpins occupational health and organizational practice in a complex way and through different avenues. For occupational and organizational health research to achieve its desirable outcomes, it is important that researchers are aware of the policy process, the stakeholders involved, and implementation issues. Research involving stakeholders in its process will have greater potential to achieve impact both in policy and practice. This kind of research is unfortunately limited and particularly when it comes to the evaluation of policy-level interventions. It is important that this gap is addressed in the future to achieve effective translation of research into policy and practice.