Interpretive Workshop
Posted in News | No Comments »We ran the first Interpretive Political Science Workshop post-Covid-19 on 26-28 October 2022. Here are the course members in all their glory!
Core Executives
Posted in News | No Comments »I have just published three chapters in: Kristoffer Kolltveit and Richard Shaw (Eds.) Core Executives in a Comparative Perspective: Governing in Complex Times. Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.
Worldwide Analysis of Political Scientists Announced!
Posted in News | No Comments »Good news. A worldwide analysis of political scientists has ranked me #11 in the UK and #84 in the world.
You can see the full world ranking at: https://research.com/scientists-rankings/law-and-political-science
UK ranking at: https://research.com/scientists-rankings/law-and-political-science/gb
35 Years On
Posted in Home, News | No Comments »In 1987, I published Beyond Westminster and Whitehall. It has never been out of print, although it has been through the hands of several publishers. The Federal Trust interviewed me about its longevity and influence.
Check out our video interview here….
Comparing Cabinets: Dilemmas of Collective Government
Posted in News | No Comments »Patrick Weller, Dennis Grube and R.A.W. Rhodes
Why is cabinet government so resilient? Despite many obituaries, why does it continue to be the vehicle for governing across most parliamentary systems? This book answers these questions by examining the structure and performance of cabinet government in five democracies: the United Kingdom, Denmark, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Australia. The book is organized around the dilemmas that cabinet governments must solve: how to develop the formal rules and practices that can bring predictability to the daily business and allow consistent decision making; how to balance good policy with good politics; how to ensure cohesion between the factions and parties that constitute the cabinet while allowing levels of self-interest to be advanced; how leaders can balance persuasion and command; and how to maintain support through accountability at the same time as being able to make unpopular decisions. All these dilemmas are continuing challenges to cabinet government, never solvable, and constantly reappearing in different forms. We ask how traditions, beliefs, and practices shape the answers. The different practices between the democracies examined show there can be no single definition of cabinet government. This comparative approach provides analysis and insights into the process of cabinet government that cannot be achieved in the study of any single political system. We better understand the pressures on each system by appreciating the options that are elsewhere accepted as common beliefs.
Book publication – Narrative Policy Analysis: cases in decentred policy
Posted in News | No Comments »Title: Narrative Policy Analysis: cases in decentred policy
Editor: R. A. W. Rhodes
Summary
The main aim of this book is to show how decentred analysis contributes to the study of public policy, both theoretically and practically. We seek to substantiate the claim that it offers novel theory and methods with a clear practical application. However, the book has two subsidiary purposes.
First, it displays research by the Centre for Political Ethnography at the University of Southampton. All the contributors are based at Southampton or they are colleagues at other universities who are working with us.
Second, the book is part of the ‘Understanding Governance’ series published by Springer-Macmillan. The first book came out in 1997 so this volume commemorates 20 years of publishing. We have published 25 books with 2 in the pipeline, and counting. There is no danger that any of the books will enter The Times bestseller list but we persist, and many an author is in print because we do. Here’s to our silver wedding anniversary.
Narratives or storytelling are a feature of the everyday life of all who work in government. They tell each other stories about the origins, aims and effects of policies to make sense of their world. These stories form the collective memory of a government department; a retelling of yesterday to make sense of today. This book examine polices through the eyes of the practitioners, both top-down and bottom-up; it decentres policies and policymaking. To decentre is to unpack practices as the contingent beliefs and actions of individuals. Decentred analysis produces detailed studies of people’s beliefs and practices. It challenges the idea that inexorable or impersonal forces drive politics, focusing instead on the relevant meanings, the beliefs and preferences of the people involved.
This book presents ten case studies, covering penal policy, zero-carbon homes, parliamentary scrutiny, children’s rights, obesity, pension reform, public service reform, evidence-based policing, and local economic knowledge. It introduces a different angle of vision on the policy process; it looks at it through the eyes of individual actors, not institutions. In other words, it looks at policies from the other end of the telescope. It concludes there is much to learn from a decentred approach. It delivers edification because it offers a novel alliance of interpretive theory with an ethnographic toolkit to explore policy and policymaking from the bottom-up.
The book’s decentred approach provides an alternative to the dominant evidence–based policy nostrums of the day.
Interpretive Political Science
Posted in News | No Comments »The Centre of Political Ethnography has organised a three day course on Interpretive Political Science on the 9th-11th May at the University of Southampton to introduce approaches and analytical tools on the subject. Attendees where very happy with the event and the knowledge they managed to obscure.
Essays commemorating Bevir & Rhodes, Interpreting British Governance
Posted in News | No Comments »Use the flyer below to purchase the book containing the essays commemorating Bevir & Rhodes, Interpreting British Governance with a 20% discount. Download the flyer here.
Centre in Political Ethnography (CPE)
Posted in News | No Comments »Director: Professor R A W Rhodes
Ethnography reaches the parts of politics that other methods cannot reach. It captures the lived experience of politics; the everyday life of political elites and street level bureaucrats. CPE collects and analyses data on the beliefs and practices of these actors. Also, it seeks to demonstrate the relevance of the ethnographic toolkit to political and administrative analysis. CPE comprises members of Law, Criminology and Sociology as well as Political Science. Currently, the Centre has five funded research projects underway with support from the AHRC, the Australian Research Council, the Nuffield Foundation, and the Australia and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG). It takes the lead in an international network of like-minded researchers; the AHRC’s seminar series on ‘Blurring Genres: Recovering the Humanities for Political Science and Area.
For further information contact: r.a.w.rhodes@soton.ac.uk
ECPR Lifetime Achievement Award
Posted in News | No Comments »ECPR Lifetime Achievement Award
The recipient of the 2015 Lifetime Achievement Award was R.A.W Rhodes, Professor of Government (Research) at the University of Southampton and at Griffith University and Emeritus Professor of Politics at the University of Newcastle. The Jury was composed of Rudy Andeweg, Martin Bull, Manuel Sanchez de Dios and Jonas Tallberg, Chaired by Simona Piattoni.
The Jury noted that it was impressed with Professor Rhodes’ ‘exceptional record in the many areas of the profession: from teaching and publishing to advising and disseminating.’ Going on to say that ‘Few have taught in so many universities, visited at least as many research institutions, collaborated in so many research projects on both sides of the globe and produced so many veritably ‘paradigm-shifting’ authored and edited volumes. The impact of [his] work on the discipline of political science is easily ‘measured’ both by the by now conventional bibliographic indicators and, more impressionistically but equally clearly, by the impact on the work of many of us.’
Professor Rhodes is life Vice-President and former Chair and President of the Political Studies Association of the United Kingdom; a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia; and an Academician of the Academy of Social Sciences (UK). He has also been a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, editor of Public Administration from 1986 to 2011, and Treasurer of the Australian Political Studies Association, 1994–2011.
The Prize will be presented to Professor Rhodes at the General Conference in Montreal on 27th August 2015.