tremendous socioeconomic changes in the 1990s and beyond that were initiated by the reform and opening-up, vulnerable children have emerged as a growing population. In response to the rising needs of those vulnerable 

children, the Chinese government has developed a series of social welfare policies (SWPs). However, few 

studies have examined the policymaking processes and the mechanisms for forming and changing China's 

SWPs for vulnerable children. Therefore, to bridge that research gap we have focused in this study on the 

agenda-setting of SWPs for vulnerable children in China. We selected the Multiple Streams Framework (MSF) as our conceptual framework, and we used the process-tracing approach to analyse the mechanisms of China's SWP development for vulnerable children. Using a multicase study, we found that a specific ‘focusing event’ 

formed a problem stream in each case. Then, helped by the media and the Internet, those focusing events 

triggered the national mood and shaped public opinion, which in turn formed a politics stream. Feeling growing pressure from the public, political leaders assigned tasks via written instructions intended to solve the problems and ensure that local governments act immediately. Hence, written instructions became a policy stream, and 

political leaders were the policy entrepreneurs. This article contributes to the theory by examining the MSF 

with China's cases and then modifying the framework with Chinese characteristics.

作者：Renxing Chen, Lin Zhu, Ying Lu

文章来源：《Social Policy and Administration》2024-11