This book sets out political economy explanations for higher education policy reform in Europe in the initial decades of the 21st century. With a sustained focus on the national level of policy implementation, institutional change is considered in relationship to broader trends in economic development and globalization. Since the concept of a “Europe of Knowledge” was presented by the European Commission in 1997, the pursuit of global competitiveness sets the context for the international ...

How can we intervene in the systemic bureaucratic dysfunction that beleaguers the public sector? De Jong examines the roots of this dysfunction and presents a novel approach to solving it. Drawing from academic literature on bureaucracy and problem solving in the public sector, and the clinical work of the Kafka Brigade-a social enterprise based in the Netherlands dedicated to diagnosing and remedying bureaucratic dysfunction in practice, this study reveals the shortcomings of conventional...

Provides a provocative examination of the interplay between political culture and educational policy. The goal is to provide a better understanding of how different countries are responding to the global exchange of policy ideas that includes 'the standards movement' and 'new public management' or accountability in the public sector.

This book addresses the complex phenomenon in higher education of structural reforms in higher education systems. Across the globe, governments initiate comprehensive reforms of their higher education systems because they want their models to be the best and to excel at what they do. This regularly requires governments to change the higher education landscape to achieve their set objectives. Changes can include merger processes, the introduction of a new sector of higher education or a new...

Describes developments in healthcare systems over nearly four decades. Combining cross-sectional studies on healthcare financing, provision and policy values with in-depth country studies of Britain, Germany and the USA, this volume is a thorough examination of the convergence toward hybrid forms of healthcare systems.

Drawing on discussions of the "Creative Economy," the "Network Economy," and the "Green Economy," Rethinking US Education Policy critiques educational policies authored by the Obama administration and considers the need for a new educational policy framework that is better adapted to an era of accelerating innovation.

Evaluation research findings should be a key element of the policy-making process, yet in reality they are often disregarded. This valuable book examines the development of evaluation and its impact on public policy by analysing evaluation frameworks and criteria which are available when evaluating public policies and services. It further examines the nature of evidence and its use and non-use by decision-makers and assesses the work of influential academics in the USA and UK in the contex...

This book investigates the interrelationship between educational reforms and pedagogical and technological innovations, as well as the implications of this relationship for the quality of human capital. By analyzing recent educational reforms in Russia and the US, the authors shed new light on how these reforms may help or hinder innovations, such as the introduction of computer technologies into classrooms, new methods of teacher evaluation, constructivist teaching methods, and governance...

For you as an IT manager, changes in business models and fast-paced innovation and product lifecycles pose a big challenge: you are required to anticipate the impact of future changes, and to make rapid decisions backed up by solid facts. To be successful you need an overall perspective of how business and IT interact. What you need is a toolkit, enabling you to manage the enterprise from a helicopter viewpoint while at the same time accommodating quite detailed aspects of processes, organ...

'This starkly lucid and timely book absorbs the nuances of the largest festival – the elections – of the world's largest democracy. Hailing from a political family, the author conveys his passion and knowledge on the intricacies, as well as the heat and dust of his national fête. All data and events have been methodically examined in this absorbing analytical work which is an indispensable and scholarly book on the Indian elections.'– Thankom Arun, Professor at the...

This book examines the integration of the international, global, and intercultural dimensions in contemporary education systems. Yemini provides a comprehensive understanding of the process of internationalization from different angles including policy-making, curriculum implementation, media discourse, and individual agency. The book illuminates and analyzes a set of key tensions of internationalization across multiple levels of schooling and across the domains of popular discourse, polic...

Triantafillou analyzes the changing ways of governing the public sector and the ways in which public organizations have become the target of interventions seeking to improve their efficiency and quality. He exposes how political and social science theories were adopted in often unpredictable ways in the process of reforming the public sector.