A volume in Research in Public Management Series Editor: Lawrence R. Jones, Naval Postgraduate School Governing Fables: Learning from Public Sector Narratives advocates the importance of narrative for public servants, exemplifies it with a rigorously selected and analyzed set of narratives, and imparts narrative skills politicians and public servants need in their careers. Governing Fables turns to narratology, the interdisciplinary study of narrative, for a conceptual framework that is applied to a set of narratives engaging life within public organizations, focusing on works produced during the last twenty-five years in the US and UK. The genres discussed include British government narratives inspired by and reacting to Yes Minister, British appeasement narratives, American political narratives, the Cuban Missile Crisis narrative, jury decision-making narratives, and heroic teacher narratives. In each genre lessons are presented regarding both effective management and essential narrative skills. Governing Fables is intended for public management and political science scholars and practitioners interested in leadership and management, as well as readers drawn to the political subject matter and to the genre of political films, novels, and television series.

This book challenges the widely-held belief that popular narratives about business are invariably critical. It develops a more nuanced analytic model of private sector narrative and applies it to 63 recent narrative texts (movies, histories, biographies) produced in the US dealing with three major industries: information technology, automobile manufacturing, and financial trading. It identifies recurring patterns to compare sectors and to analyze their implications. Negotiating Business Narratives appeals to academics and practitioners interested in business and society, strategic management, and contemporary literature and films about business.

Innovation provides five in-depth studies on the 'state' of innovation in government today. Jonathan Walters analyzes what he has learned from studying winners of the Ford Foundation/Kennedy School Innovations in Government awards program. Sandford Borins examines the five building blocks of innovation. Janet Vinzant Denhardt and Robert Denhardt tell us how Phoenix created a culture of innovation within city government. William Eimicke studied San Diego County, California to find out how innovative programs can be implemented in a large county government. Scott Tarry presents five case studies of metropolitan airport authorities and how they attempted to foster innovation. From these case studies, Mark A. Abramson and Ian D. Littman discuss what we know about innovation and what we have learned about fostering, implementing, and replicating it. They also discuss the relationship between the innovator and innovation.

A volume in Research in Public Management Series Editor: Lawrence R. Jones, Naval Postgraduate School Governing Fables: Learning from Public Sector Narratives advocates the importance of narrative for public servants, exemplifies it with a rigorously selected and analyzed set of narratives, and imparts narrative skills politicians and public servants need in their careers. Governing Fables turns to narratology, the interdisciplinary study of narrative, for a conceptual framework that is applied to a set of narratives engaging life within public organizations, focusing on works produced during the last twenty-five years in the US and UK. The genres discussed include British government narratives inspired by and reacting to Yes Minister, British appeasement narratives, American political narratives, the Cuban Missile Crisis narrative, jury decision-making narratives, and heroic teacher narratives. In each genre lessons are presented regarding both effective management and essential narrative skills. Governing Fables is intended for public management and political science scholars and practitioners interested in leadership and management, as well as readers drawn to the political subject matter and to the genre of political films, novels, and television series.

Allan Blakeney has been identified with Saskatchewan politics and government for forty years as a public servant, cabinet minister, premier, and leader of the opposition. A Rhodes scholar with an intellectual's perspective on governing, Blakeney brings a unique and valuable perspective to this study of political management.

Presented in the form of a dialogue between the authors, the book provides a thorough examination of the roles of politicians and public servants and techniques of management in Westminster systems. What emerges is a sophisticated philosophy of statecraft that recognizes both politics and management, and underlines the importance of balancing the two.

First published in 1992, Political Management in Canada is now available in a revised and updated edition. A new appendix shows how the book can complement the major political science and public administration texts currently in use in Canada.