REFRAMING SOCIAL POLICY: lowing quote, from a representative of a major INGO, reflects to some degree the necessity of a common framework of understanding policy issues. ‘The only way to make the policies work would be to have one person as the Prime Minister, and the head of the World Bank and the Head of European Union at the same time to make an efficient Government and an efficient donor commu­nity. I think structural issues such as the donor coordination and government sta­bility and efficiency are the key things, and not the endless strategies or programs.’ Analysis of this remark reveals a possible discrepancy, if not a gulf, between what INGO’s are trying to promote – decentralisation, deconsolidation or multi­level governance – and the thinking of individuals within them. Conceptualising Social Policy In order to gauge the role of actors in policy making, the way social policy has been understood by the Government can’t be ignored. This research showed that Government officials and civil servants reflected a very narrow understanding of Social Policy as a discipline or a field of oriented action. Indeed, the idea wasn’t countenanced that Social Policy may contribute to wider debates about resource allocation, rights and responsibilities, and as such as a framework for action it was considered a matter best left to the Ministry of Labour. Half of the respondents thought there is no such a thing as Social Policy in Albania, while one third of them considered it a matter for high officials, not civil servants who carry out day­to-day programs. Even at the university level, social policy was being taught as only a single two-term subject in the social work department at the university of Tirana. However strange it may seem, it was clear that even though they were de­signing and actually implementing social policy, respondents claimed to be un­aware of its existence. Welfare programs in health education were running, yet they weren’t considered as related to Social Policy. In a group discussion with four civil servants(2002), about the individual and institutional conceptualisation of Social Policy in Albania during the last decade, Social Policy was considered a political term applying to the work of the Ministry of Labour. Of those who did appreciate social policy as a discipline, when asked about policies in health and education, many did not think these programs amounted to a Social Policy‘like the ones in the west’ ‘I don’t think we understood the concept of Social Policy at the time.’ hence, its development was undermined – ‘What social policy?(Laughing) This Government does not have a social policy. All they do is run some programmes for Social Assistance- the same old ones since 1993.’ 214