Book Review: Emerging Pedagogies for Policy Education: Insights from Asia NairSVarmaN (eds) (2022) Emerging pedagogies for policy education: insights from asia. Palgrave Macmillan, 267 pp., ISBN 978-981-16-5863-1.
Year: 2025
Type: book-review
Abstract: In an era defined by disruptionfrom technological revolutions to pandemics and climate crisesthe field of public policy education faces the challenge of how to adapt and remain relevant.Sreeja Nair and Navarun Varma's edited volume, Emerging Pedagogies for Policy Education: Insights from Asia, is a timely contribution to this conversation.It serves as both a survey of the shifting landscape and a sourcebook of teaching strategies, making it a useful read for public policy and public administration teachers.The book argues that to prepare the next generation of policymakers, educators should consider moving beyond traditional methods to embrace more adaptive, cross-disciplinary, and experiential approaches.The volume is organized into two parts.Part I, 'Key Trends in the Policy Education Landscape', diagnoses contemporary challenges and opportunities facing the field.The opening chapters set the stage for this discussion.Gleason and Pan Algarra argue that the 'new normal' of disruption, driven by the Fourth Industrial Revolution, climate change, and COVID-19, calls for a new kind of 'bureaucratic thinker' who is creative and cognitively agile.This theme is reinforced by chapters from Goyal et al. and Permadi and Eka Putri, which highlight a 'research-pedagogy gap' whereby, while big data and social media analytics are changing policy research and practice, their integration into policy curricula appears to be lagging.This first section makes it clear that what it means to teach public policy in Asia, but also globally, is changing rapidly along with the core skills and literacies required of practitioners.At the same time, Part I explores innovations in the delivery of this content.Victor Valentine provides a nuanced analysis of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), acknowledging their potential for access while examining the pedagogical design flaws that can lead to high attrition rates.Wasson offers a reflective piece on the challenges of translating scientific evidence into policy, advocating for scientists to become 'honest brokers'.Rounding out the section, Yong and Samavedham present a case for embedding Systems Thinking and System Dynamics Modeling into undergraduate education as a way of equipping future leaders with the tools to navigate complexity.Collectively, these chapters paint a picture of a field in flux, grappling with new technologies and the enduring problem of bridging theory and practice.
Source: Teaching Public Administration
Author: Emily St. Denny
Institution: University of Copenhagen
Language: English
Subfield: Education
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W4416959940