Policy‐oriented learning: A case on initiating long‐term care insurance in China’s social security sector

Abstract

This paper explores the initiation process of the long‐term care insurance (LTCI) policy in China’s social security sector, and focuses on policy‐oriented learning activities to develop initia-tives from German lessons. It presents a case from the LTCI pilot program, which serves as a new policy product that provides care to the elderly and disabled and upgrades the social security sec-tor’s performance. This study implements policy‐oriented learning to construct an analytical framework and applies it to China’s social security system. This research suggests that policy‐oriented learning is a rational tool used to manufacture policy products that enable intellectual development and can provide roadmaps for administrative reform. The findings contribute to the current knowledge on policy‐oriented learning by offering new insights from China’s experience with LTCI, thus helping to fill the gaps that are created when policy‐oriented learning is applied to different systems and contexts, with unique cultural, traditional, and political characteristics.