RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 An Engine of Change? The Affordable Care Act and the Shifting Politics of Demonstration Projects
JF RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences
FD Russell Sage Foundation
SP 67
OP 84
DO 10.7758/RSF.2020.6.2.03
VO 6
IS 2
A1 Philip Rocco
A1 Andrew S. Kelly
YR 2020
UL http://www.rsfjournal.org/content/6/2/67.abstract
AB The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) made a number of institutional investments intended to expand the federal government’s ability to scale successful demonstration projects into national policy. This article considers how the ACA has reshaped the politics of programmatic innovation in Medicare and Medicaid. A qualitative synthesis of demonstration results suggests that, although the ACA has removed several important veto points to the expansion of successful demonstration projects, numerous barriers to the scaling of reforms remain. These barriers include procedures and techniques that make it difficult to certify the “success” of demonstrations yet make their limitations highly legible. From the analysis, this article draws several lessons for future efforts at delivery-system and payment reform, as well as understandings of policy learning and innovation.