Showing papers by "Ben Williamson published in 2014"
TL;DR: A documentary analysis of Demos, the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts and the Innovation Unit as intermediary organisations in public sector reform is provided, exploring their promotion of modes of digital governance and their mobilisation of new software technologies as models for new kinds of governing practices.
Abstract: Discourses of public sector reform in the UK have been shaped in recent years by the participation of new kinds of hybrid cross-sector intermediaries such as think tanks, social enterprises and oth...
65 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine the participation of third-sector organisations in public education in England, which act as a cross-sectoral policy network made up of new kinds of policy experts: mediators and brokers with entrepreneurial careers in ideas.
Abstract: This article examines the participation of ‘third-sector’ organisations in public education in England. These organisations act as a cross-sectoral policy network made up of new kinds of policy experts: mediators and brokers with entrepreneurial careers in ideas. They have sought to make education reform thinkable, intelligible and practicable in terms of a computational discourse consisting of code, networks, interactivity and feedback, and related ideas of decentralisation, open methods and personalisation. What characterises this style of thinking is an ‘anti-political’ preoccupation with computer-coded systems and the idea of networks as a model for new political and educational forms.
19 citations