World-leading public administration scholar joins IIPP

Professor Geert Bouckaert has joined the UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (IIPP) as honorary professor.

Geert Bouckaert is professor at the KU Leuven Public Governance Institute, globally one of the leading institutes of its kind. As past-president of the International Institute of Administrative Sciences, and of the European Group for Public Administration and current Vice-Chair of the Committee of Experts of Public Administration of ECOSOC, United Nations, he is a highly influential thought-leader in public administration.

Professor Bouckaert is one of the globally-leading public administration scholars, his research profile is wide-ranging and covers topics that are of vital interest to IIPP’s development, for instance his research on public sector reforms in the OECD countries and his focus on performance management. He is a highly cited scholar and his book, Public management reform: A comparative analysis (co-authored with Christopher Pollitt), is in its 4th edition and already belongs to the canon of classic works in public administration.

Teaching on public sector performance management in our MPA in Innovation, Public Policy and Public Value, Professor Bouckaert focuses on how governments connect performance to management and governance. Public sector performance is fundamental to ensuring that the public sector remains relevant and part of the solution to societal problems. Legitimacy and trust in the public sector is increasingly linked to the capacity to demonstrate a well performing public sector for its service delivery and its policies.

Our MPA aims to train a new generation of purpose-driven leaders to confront the grand challenges of the 21st century. They will be taught the skills to drive organisations to become mission-led; welcoming and managing the explorative and risk-taking processes that structural change, innovation, and socio-economic transformation require. Key to this is rethinking how to create, nurture and evaluate public and societal value.

Speaking about the announcement, Deputy Director Rainer Kattel said,

I am extremely glad Geert is joining IIPP, I have admired his scholarship and academic leadership over the past 15 years. One of the ambitious goals IIPP has is to rewrite public administration textbooks to teach capacities and capabilities for 21st century civil servants to deliver public value. Geert will be invaluable in helping to deliver on this agenda.

Professor Bouckaert said,

It is with great pleasure that I look forward to contribute to IIPP at UCL, an Institute which is a lighthouse for innovation and which contributes to make ‘public purpose’ an enhanced reality.

Learn more about our MPA

---