Abstract
The Introduction articulates how a poststructural approach to policy analysis provides an important vehicle for questioning how governing takes place. It begins by sketching the broad parameters of a poststructural approach as a form of critical analysis that allows a refreshing skepticism toward the full range of things commonly associated with policy: policy itself, the knowledges that support policy and policy proposals, as well as conventional forms of policy analysis. The implication of this form of critical analysis for policy work is explained—how a poststructural approach encourages policy workers to reflect on their own role in governing and to engage in the productive and political practices of interrogating, theorizing, and resisting. The Introduction also sets out the structure of the book.
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The use of scare quotes to signal contingency is particularly important for the treatment of “problems”, since the book is concerned to put in question the common assumption in many approaches to policy analysis that “problems” simply exist and that their meaning is clear and uncontentious (see Chapter 4). Scare quotes will be omitted only in those cases where it is evident that a specific theoretical stance approaches objects, subjects, places, and problems as unproblematized “entities”.
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Bacchi, C., Goodwin, S. (2016). Introduction. In: Poststructural Policy Analysis. Palgrave Pivot, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52546-8_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52546-8_1
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