Call for Papers

WHAT IS PROBLEMATIC ABOUT POLICY WORK?

There is increasing attention, both among scholars and practitioners, to the practices and organizational forms through which policy is generated – ‘policy work’. The work of ‘making policy’ is increasingly recognized in the organization and practices of government, but at the same time, it appears to be more problematic, and the conference will provide an opportunity for exploring some of the ways in which assumptions about policy are being challenged.

* Both academics and practitioners are moving beyond simple maps depicting the policy process in terms of ‘advising decision-makers’. There is wide recognition that the work of governing involves more than the activities of government – reflected in the increasing use of the term ‘governance’. Policy work may involve linking the activities of a range of governmental and non-governmental bodies.

* Policy is seen as extending beyond the control of the activities of government, and is reaching into the regulation of the ‘life-world’, in such matters as diet, smoking and child-rearing, where regulatory structures and practices are less overt.

* Increasingly, there is an international dimension to policy work. On a global scale, bodies like the World Trade Organization or the World Health Organization become major sources of policy. At the regional level, the development of the European Union is a force for the alignment of policy practice in the member countries around a common model.

* Regime change generates pressure for the transformation of policy practice. In Eastern Europe, there has been a searching for new ways generating policy, as part of the transformation of government that has followed the end of the communist era. On a global scale, the World Bank’s agenda of ‘good governance’ embodies particular assumptions about appropriate ways of ‘doing policy’.

* This raises the question of the source models of good practice in policy work, and the assumptions which underlie them.

The conference will provide a venue for the exploration of all of these dimensions of policy work, both at an empirical and an analytical level.

The conference will be a particularly suitable venue for PhD students to present their research, establish links with other scholars, and identify factors which can impede or stimulate research.

You may apply to attend and present at the conference only on-line on this web page, by filling out the Application form. The topic of your presentation and a summary (one to two pages) should be sent by the 30th April 2008.

Hal K. Colebatch

Chairman of the IPSA Research Committee 32

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Call for Papers