Public policy education in the non-Western world: changing context and content

Abstract

Public policy education has mushroomed in the past two decades in non-Western countries, concomitant with governance models that provide an alternative to liberal Western democracies. Large part of the literature on policy sciences that forms a basis for classroom teaching and learning in the non-Western world emerged from a discussion of Western contexts and has been developed by western scholars. The transfer and applicability of policy concepts largely reflective of the context and perspectives outside of the West is unclear and less explored in literature. In an exploratory exercise to better understand the landscape of public policy education in the non-Western world, 46 public policy schools offering policy degrees are compared on various dimensions including degree offerings, institutional establishment and status, and mission. Through the analysis of selected policy schools, the chapter reflects on the future of policy sciences in the non-Western world in terms of a possible divergence from a Western school of thought, branching out from disciplinary foundations and emergence of public policy as a unique, independent field of inquiry and response of policy research and practice to new and emerging policy challenges like the COVID 19 pandemic. © Anis Ben Brik and Leslie A. Pal 2021.