Books by "Thomas Blom Hansen"
2 books found
Why do top-down reforms to public services so often over-promise and under-deliver? Using five concepts from psychology, economics and organisational sociology, Thomas Elston addresses this pressing question of good governance. Rather than focusing on the challenge of implementation, Understanding and Improving Public Management Reforms reveals how flawed policy design is often the major contributor to reform failure. Cognitive bias, restrictive social institutions and inattention to ‘quiet costs’ during the policy-making process are essential to explaining the poor track record of reforms to date – and point the way towards better decision-making in future. Written for policy professionals, service managers, students and researchers alike, this concise, practical and multidisciplinary study draws on varied examples to help reconceive the perennial problem of public management reform – and to propose new solutions.
A 2023 Choice Reviews Outstanding Academic Title Nationalism is a globally resurgent phenomenon. From Britain to India to the United States of America, we find nations vociferously reasserting their own sovereignty, ethnic composition, and intrinsic superiority. Thomas J. Millay demonstrates how Kierkegaard’s ascetic voice speaks directly to our present crisis.Kierkegaard and the New Nationalism: A Contemporary Reinterpretation of the Attack upon Christendom analyzes the late writings of Kierkegaard in light of this new relevance, for Kierkegaard’s attack upon Christendom is also an attack upon nationalism. For Kierkegaard, taking on nationalism is not simply a matter of undermining false identity constructions. Attacking nationalism is a matter of renunciation: it requires ascetic discipline, such that the selfish motives at the core of one’s identity construction are uprooted and replaced by a self-giving love marked by the willingness to suffer.