EU4C9      One Unit
Policy Incubator

This information is for the 2025/26 session.

Course Convenor

Availability

Students will undertake a group project (in teams usually of 3 to 5 people) relating to a policy problem faced by an external organisation. Such organisations might be public sector bodies, companies operating in the public management or public policy sector, international organisations, think tanks and NGOs.

1 hours of seminars and 1.5 hours of seminars in the Autumn Term.
2 hours of seminars in the Winter Term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Autumn and Winter Term.

This course is delivered through a combination of workshops and help sessions totalling a minimum of 4.5 hours across both the Autumn and Winter Terms. Some or all of this teaching will be delivered through a combination of in-person and/or group virtual help sessions with an assigned Policy Incubator Supervisor, and student group presentations. This course includes a reading week in Week 6 of the Autumn and Winter Terms.

Presentation

During the WT, students will present their project and policy proposals in a group presentation to a jury of policy incubator supervisors and institutions' representatives. Relevant alumni, members of faculty and/or visiting fellows will also be invited to attend for the purposes of providing feedback. Each group presentation will be followed by questions and comments from the jury.

Useful preliminary reading:

• Charles E. Lindblom and David K. Cohen, Social Science and Social Problem Solving (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979);
• Martha S. Feldman, Order Without Design: Information Production and Policy-making (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1989);
• Ray Pawson, Evidence-based Policy: A Realist Perspective (London: Sage, 2006);
• Common Causes of Project Failure (London: OGC, 2004);
• Howard White, Theory-based Impact Evaluation: Principles and Practice (3ie, 2011);
• Curtis Cook, Just Enough Project Management (McGraw-Hill, 2004);
• J. E. McGrath and F. Tschan, 'Dynamics in Groups and Teams: Groups as Complex Action Systems',
• chapter three in M. S. Poole and A. H. Van de Ven (eds) Handbook of Organizational Change and Innovation (Oxford University Press, 2004).

Policy brief (30%, 3000 words)

Policy paper / report (70%, 7000 words)

Students are asked to present a group report in the form of a policy advocacy brief (3000 words, 30%). They will then, individually, submit a full policy report in which they discuss alternative policy options and evaluate their suggested policy solutions (7000 words, 70%).