Abstract
This chapter deals with problem delimitation which is understood as a multidisciplinary field of study that seeks to analyse and understand causes of public policy problems, analyse and evaluate their different subjective representations, and try to suggest their formulation. First, two streams in thinking on problem delimitation, termed as 'political' and 'policy' streams are distinguished.
Then the different conceptualizations of 'policy problem' are described, and it is shown how they are related to the two streams. Two approaches are then discussed in more detail.
The article concludes by showing how these streams complement each other.