Think Tanks and Civil Societies: Catalysts for Ideas and Action - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0765809524 ISBN 13: 9780765809520

Publisher: Routledge, 2002

Synopsis

Government and individual policymakers throughout the developed and developing world face the common problem of bringing expert knowledge to bear in government decision making. Policymakers need understandable, reliable, accessible, and useful information about the societies they govern. They also need to know how current policies are working, as well as possible alternatives and their likely costs and consequences. This expanding need has fostered the growth of independent public policy research organizations, commonly known as think tanks. Think Tanks and Civil Societies analyzes their growth, scope, and constraints, while providing institutional profiles of such organizations in every region of the world.Beginning with North America, contributors analyze think tank development past and future, consider their relationship to the general political culture, and provide detailed looks at such examples as the Heritage Foundation and the Institute for Research on Public Policy. A historical and subregional overview of think tanks throughout Europe notes the emphasis on European Union issues and points to a dramatic rise in the number and influence of free market institutes across the continent. Think tanks in Germany, Spain, and France are profiled with respect to national politics and cultures. Advanced industrial nations of northern Asia are compared and contrasted, revealing a greater need for independent policy voices. Moving to countries undergoing economic transition, contributors deal with challenges posed in Russia and the former Soviet bloc and their think tanks' search for influence, independence, and sustainability. Other chapters deal with the developing countries of Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America, finding that the number, quality, and independence of think tanks is largely determined by the degree of democracy in individual nations.

About this title

About the Author:

James G. McGann is a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, and is president of McGann Associates, a program and management consulting firm specializing in the challenges facing think tanks, international organizations, and philanthropic institutions. He is the author of The Competition for Dollars, Scholars and Influence in the Public Policy Research Industry. R. Kent Weaver is a senior fellow in the Governmental Studies Program at the Brookings Institution. He is the author of Ending Welfare As We Know It: Context and Choice in Policy Toward Low-Income Families, Automatic Government: The Politics of Indexation, and The Politics of Industrial Change.

Review:

"Editors McGann (Foreign Policy Research Institute) and Weaver (Brookings) espouse the thesis that public policy research organizations ("think tanks") are needed not only to provide governmental decisionmakers with reliable and understandable information but also to serve the larger civil society as "catalysts for ideas and action..." The editors hope to encourage the emergence of think tanks reflecting particular national environments rather than a universal template and to provide managers, governments, and donors with a clearer understanding of how think tanks and civil societies interact in times of rapid change. Though specialized, this work should be in all large public and university libraries."

--J. A. Rhodes, Choice

"The book correctly elevates the visibility of think tanks in scholarly understandings of policy making and civil society. In its entirety, the book elaborates a valuable, sophisticated and complex framework for understanding how research and ideas are packaged and promoted to affect politics..."

"--Canadian Journal of Political Science"

"Editors McGann (Foreign Policy Research Institute) and Weaver (Brookings) espouse the thesis that public policy research organizations ("think tanks") are needed not only to provide governmental decisionmakers with reliable and understandable information but also to serve the larger civil society as "catalysts for ideas and action..." The editors hope to encourage the emergence of think tanks reflecting particular national environments rather than a universal template and to provide managers, governments, and donors with a clearer understanding of how think tanks and civil societies interact in times of rapid change. Though specialized, this work should be in all large public and university libraries."

--J. A. Rhodes, Choice

"The book correctly elevates the visibility of think tanks in scholarly understandings of policy making and civil society. In its entirety, the book elaborates a valuable, sophisticated and complex framework for understanding how research and ideas are packaged and promoted to affect politics..."

--Canadian Journal of Political Science

-Editors McGann (Foreign Policy Research Institute) and Weaver (Brookings) espouse the thesis that public policy research organizations (-think tanks-) are needed not only to provide governmental decisionmakers with reliable and understandable information but also to serve the larger civil society as -catalysts for ideas and action...- The editors hope to encourage the emergence of think tanks reflecting particular national environments rather than a universal template and to provide managers, governments, and donors with a clearer understanding of how think tanks and civil societies interact in times of rapid change. Though specialized, this work should be in all large public and university libraries.-

--J. A. Rhodes, Choice

-The book correctly elevates the visibility of think tanks in scholarly understandings of policy making and civil society. In its entirety, the book elaborates a valuable, sophisticated and complex framework for understanding how research and ideas are packaged and promoted to affect politics...-

--Canadian Journal of Political Science

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0765809524
• ISBN 13: 9780765809520
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 634
• Editor: Weaver R.