Manufacturing Civil Society ― Principles, Practices and Effects

Faced with declining social cohesion, more and more governments are trying to revitalise society by attempting to reconstruct local communities, civil society and citizenship. One way to do this is to share public responsibilities with organized citizens and third sector organisations. As a result, relationships with citizens, communities and third sector organisations are increasingly brought within the realm of public management, subject to accountability procedures, embedded in hierarchical structures, included in arenas for competition and contracting. This volume examines the emergence of this new type of governance, exploring the dynamics, effectiveness and appropriateness of this governmental response to the fragmentation of modern social life.

Taco Brandsen is Professor of Comparative Public Administration at Radboud University Nijmegen, the Netherlands. His latest work includes New Public Governance, the Third Sector and Co-Production (2012, with Bram Verschuere and Victor Pestoff) and Civicness in the Governance and Delivery of Social Services (2010, with Adalbert Evers and Paul Dekker).

Bram Verschuere is Assistant Professor of Public Management at Ghent University, Belgium. His latest work includes New Public Governance, the Third Sector and Co-Production (2012, with Taco Brandsen and Victor Pestoff) as well as having published numerous articles in journals including Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, Public Management Review and Voluntas.

Willem Trommel is Professor of Public Policy and Governance at the VU University Amsterdam, the Netherlands. As a sociologist by training he aims to study reforms in public governance through the lens of major transitions in society. His latest work addresses the 'localisation of social policy'. He co-edited Crafting Local Welfare States (2013) together with Duco Bannink and Hans Bosselaar.