Transformation of Society and Governance

Course goals

After completing this course students will:

• be familiar with social changes and their impact on the transformation of public governance and organization (I1);
• be familiar with the main theories that are used by governance scholars to study social change and related transformations in governance (I2);
• appreciate the value of these theories as analytical tools for understanding the impact of social changes on public governance (A1, A4);
• have a practical understanding of how public, but also private organisations cope with social changes through the transformation of policy making and governance (T2);
• be able to critically analyse the implications of broad social changes on the public sector (I2, A1, A4, T2);
• be able to present, both in writing and verbally, their findings on social change and the impact on public governance and organization (A6).

Content

Broad social shifts occur that can be grasped as a shift from modernity to late modernity. These changes challenge existing values and organisational arrangements and have a fundamental impact on how decision-making and policy implementation is organised and how organisations function. We start the course by introducing an important argument by Robert Putnam. In ‘Bowling Alone’ Putnam argued that the depth and extent of social capital has declined. These social changes have an impact upon government and democratic institutions. Similar changes occur in organisations involved in government and in the inter-organisational relations between government actors. Giddens and other sociologists have argued that a shift occurs from ‘modernity’ to ‘late modernity.’ In late modernity, the balance between actors and institutions changes. A ‘new risk society’ emerges in which risk is no longer exogenous, but instead ‘manufactured.’ This shift has strong implications for policy, governance and the organisation of policy implementation. In all these domains, we observe a growing emphasis upon ‘activation’ and ‘responsabilisation.’ The allocation of responsibilities changes. Responsibilities are increasingly shared between government and other actors and also the nature of intra- and inter-organisational relations changes. In response to that, a large number of new ideas on governance and organisation emerge in the public administration and organisation literature, including e.g. Osborne’s New Public Governance. We also see a strong proliferation of these themes in Dutch universities. In the course, we will be discussing the relation between social changes and changes in governance and organisation. The ideas on these transformations of the public sector are not without debate, however. Jessop, e.g., considers them rather naïve and Byrkjeflot and Du Gay consider them undesirable. We will also be discussing the debate that occurs in the literature.

During this course, you prepare presentations and conduct debates on the literature and its application.

The test consists of two parts, a literature exam and a paper in which the literature is applied to a social change you select yourself.