Teaching complexity in public administration across the globe: an overview

Abstract

As the contributions in this special issue show, there are ample examples of teaching programs at the nexus of complexity and public administration and its sub-fields. However, the examples discussed in this issue do not give us an indication of the extent to which complexity theory or the complexity sciences are taught in curricula worldwide. This contribution presents the results of a thorough internet search to identify those academic programs in political science, public administration and business administration, where complexity sciences are taught in conjunction with all matters public. The search across 193 countries led to selection of 108 programs that corresponded to some or all the defined criteria. We will present characteristics of the selected programs regarding quality of fit, level of studies, field of studies, and type of information about the complexity science approach available on the programs’ websites.

Keywords

• teaching complexity
• global survey
• internet search