New Governance and New Knowledge Brokers: Think Tanks and Universities as Boundary Organizations

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Notes

1 According to Haas (2007), there are three kinds of think tanks: contract (e.g., Rand), academic (often university-affiliated, e.g., Hoover), and advocacy (e.g., Heritage). Some advocacy think tanks are more credible academically than others (e.g., more peer-reviewed reports, Ph.D. researchers, etc.), and the term “think tank,” while at one time more neutral, has acquired a more ideological connotation. For the purpose of this article we refer to think tanks that are independent of universities and focus on policy advocacy, regardless of ideological affiliation.

2 We are not arguing here that university-based research is “objective” or “neutral,” particularly as it is increasingly “sponsored,” but that its institutional legitimacy depends on this perception.

3 Some education researchers have entered the economic field through becoming vendors of textbooks, consultancies, evaluation models, etc. While impacting practice (for good or ill), the most ambitious efforts have been standardized in the process of “scaling up” and profit-seeking (e.g., EdTPA, Success for All, Balanced Literacy, etc.; Anderson & Herr, 2011).

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Notes on contributors

Gary Anderson

Gary Anderson is Professor in the Educational Leadership program at New York University. A former high school teacher and principal, he has published on topics such as critical ethnography, participatory action research, school micro-politics, education policy, and educational leadership. His most recent books are Advocacy Leadership: Toward a Post-Reform Agenda (2009, Routledge) and The Action Research Dissertation: A Guide for Students and Faculty, Second Edition (2014, Sage).

Pedro De La Cruz

Pedro De La Cruz is in New York University's Educational Leadership program. He has served in the NYC Department of Education, as teacher, principal, and central office administrator. He studies how policies have an impact on traditionally marginalized students.

Andrea López

Andrea López is a doctoral candidate in Educational Leadership at New York University. Andrea participated in educational support programs for Chilean public schools, and her interests include citizenship education and social justice art education.