The Art of Public Strategy: Mobilizing Power and Knowledge for the Common Good

by Geoff Mulgan

Overview

The strategies adopted by our governments and public officials can lead to significant change in citizens' lives —smoking bans, carbon markets, even the reunification of a country like Germany. Equally, strategic failure can result in highly visible disasters, such as the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.

This book is about how strategies take shape, and how money, people, technologies, and public commitment can be mobilized to achieve important goals. It considers the common mistakes made, and how these can be avoided.

Written by Geoff Mulgan, a former head of policy for the UK prime minister, and advisor to governments round the world, it is packed with examples and shaped by the author's practical experience. The author's central point is that we as citizens deserve governments that pay more attention to the long-term, rather than to tomorrow's opinion poll or newspaper editorial. The evidence shows that those governments that have learned how to be strategic have helped to make their citizens healthier, richer and happier.

The book is essential reading for anyone involved in running public organizations—from hospitals and schools to national government departments and local councils—but also for anyone interested in how government really works.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199593453
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	09/01/2010
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Geoff Mulgan CBE is director of the Young Foundation, an organization specialising in social innovation that in the past helped give birth to organizations such as the Open University and Which. He has held various roles in government in the UK, including director of the government's Strategy Unit and head of policy in the Prime Minister's office. He has lectured and advised governments in countries all over the world, from China and the USA to Australia and India. He is a visiting professor at LSE, UCL, and Melbourne University. His most recent book is Good and Bad Power: The Ideals and Betrayals of Government (Allen Lane, 2006). He is on the editorial board of Political Quarterly; a trustee of the Work Foundation and the Design Council; chair of Involve and of the Carnegie Inquiry into the Future of Civil Society in the UK and Ireland.

Table of Contents

List of Figures ix

List of Tables xi

List of Boxes xii

Abbreviations xiii

Note on the Author xiv

1 Introduction From Tangled Knots to Virtuous Circles 1

Part I 17

2 What is Public Strategy 19

3 Publlic Action: The Dynamics of Supply and Demand 37

4 A Framework for Adaptive Strategy 75

Part II 115

5 Locating Strategy Structures, Processes, and Cultures 117

6 Knowledge: How Can Governments Know Enough to Govern? 125

7 Implementation: Moving from Words to Action 135

8 Positive Risks: Taking Innovation in the public Sector Seriously 148

9 Nagative Risk: Strategies for Resilience 171

10 Joined up Government 182

11 Changing Minds and Behaviour 197

12 Winning (and Losing) public Trust 218

13 Metrics: Measuring Social and public Value 228

14 Persistent Leadership 242

Part III 253

15 Separating the Urgent and the Important: Strategy as a Public Good 255

Notes 268

Index 285