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seventeen - Media discourses on the economy in Ireland: framing the policy possibilities
- Edited by John Hogan, Technological University Dublin, Mary P. Murphy, National University of Ireland Maynooth School of Modern Languages, Literatures and Cultures
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- Book:
- Policy Analysis in Ireland
- Published by:
- Bristol University Press
- Published online:
- 18 December 2021
- Print publication:
- 05 March 2021, pp 249-262
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Summary
Introduction
Ireland suffered a lot economically in the Great Recession following the 2008 global financial crisis, yet its policies continued on a neoliberal trajectory, making Irish neoliberalism less a Zombie and more like a reinvigorated Frankenstein's monster, with ordoliberal transplants from Germany grafted on to an Anglo-American neoliberal composite body. Yet, along with these continuities came much change. There was political change in party strengths and personnel. There was change in the Irish state's capacity for policy analysis (MacCarthaigh, 2017), an increase in the number of policy analysts and their specialisms, and an increased stress on evidence-based policy making (see Chapters Four and Eight, this volume). How can a discursive approach help explain these continuities and changes in policy making? Perhaps, more importantly, how do we respond to make Irish policy discourse better?
This chapter first argues that a discursive approach can add much to our understanding of what has been happening in policy analysis in Ireland. The concept of hyper-specialisation is then introduced as it is both an important feature of the context in which policy discourse takes place, and because it shows the complexities of what discourses face as they travel across societies. Next, the chapter examines policy-relevant discourses of media and actors within the media, and unpacks recent developments to ascertain what they mean for Irish public policy discourse. It then examines how internationalisation affects such policy discourses and the impact of that complication on participation in policy debates. Further complexities are introduced in the following section, which considers the effects of technocratisation, and particularly economisation, on how policy is discussed. The final section of the chapter draws some conclusions from the earlier exploration of the rather daunting features of our policy discourses.
A more discursive view: beyond pure ideas to interactions and material affordances
Along with individuals, interests and institutions, ideas have long been understood as important in shaping policy. Studies informed by discursive institutionalism (Schmidt, 2008) on the discourse of social science experts and analysis of media coverage of the economy (Rieder and Theine, 2019) make clear that such ideas do not enter the policy arena as individually considered and evaluated atomic units. Such work has shown that the view of ideas being mixed and matched until the best possible outcome emerges from a well-functioning marketplace of ideas is just not how this process works.
11 - A Systemic View of Meetings
- from Macro Meeting Context
- Edited by Joseph A. Allen, University of Nebraska, Omaha, Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, Steven G. Rogelberg, University of North Carolina, Charlotte
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- Book:
- The Cambridge Handbook of Meeting Science
- Published online:
- 05 August 2015
- Print publication:
- 15 July 2015, pp 223-244
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Summary
Abstract Treating meetings collectively as a unit of analysis enables a holistic view of their theoretical foundations, their practical operation, and potential contribution to organizations. We draw on concepts from systems and process thinking, sensemaking and sensegiving, and organizational collective mind to inform a systemic conceptualization of organizational meetings. A systemic conceptualization of organizational meetings sees meetings as interconnected elements in an ongoing process of organizational sensemaking, rather than as discrete or isolated events. Using data from more than 60 meetings in one organization, we develop a systemic meetings model incorporating retrospective and prehensive sensemaking as the principal categories of connections between past, present, and future meetings. A systemic perspective on meetings views them not only as an integrated whole but also as a process of connected events unfolding in time. The emergent organizational process is termed “collective minding,” requiring greater mindfulness of how meetings are deployed and increased heedfulness of how they are interconnected in practice. Collective minding accounts for how meetings systemically manifest, contribute to, and sustain collective mind over time in organizations.