The focus of policy analysis has shifted from policy (or programme) development to implementation and now back to questions of programme design. While programme design as an issue is largely neglected both by the public at large and by policy-makers as well, it is increasingly recognised as a condition of policy effectiveness. The choices to be made in programme design concern the intervention instruments as well as procedural and organisational arrangements which serve to structure the implementation process. Recent research on policy implementation has already provided useful empirical generalisations which can guide these choices, though a systematic theory is still lacking. Two contextual conditions of policy effectiveness are discussed in more detail, i.e. (1) the relationship between problems and programme design, and (2) the changing effectiveness of different policy types with changes in the macro-social environment.