The importance and art of articulating thanks: Lessons from non-governmental organisations (NGOs)

Thanking helps organisations to build relationships. In particular, charities need to thank as they build up coalitions of interest around issues, and as, in many cases, they raise income. So what can be learned from some professional thankers, and scholars, in the NGO sector? You’ll learn: • The importance of thanks in interpersonal communications and NGO communications • What we can learn from NGO sector best practice and guidance • A framework for thanking built on NGO researc

Think tanks in ‘hard times’ – the Global Financial Crisis and economic advice

The Global Financial Crisis of 2008 and the Great Recession that ensued had reverberations that were not only social, political and economic. The crises also led to increased doubt in the value and usefulness of policy expertise and in its producers. This ‘epistemic crisis’ is the starting point of this thematic issue dedicated to think tanks in the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis and Great Recession. The Introduction to the issue has four objectives. First, it gives a high-level overview of the challenges and opportunities think tanks have faced in the wake of these crises, given the paradox of growing demand for policy expertise precisely at the moment when such expertise and its makers became suspect for many. Second, the Introduction gives an overview of the research literature on think tanks and their role in the policy-making process and the public debate. Third, the articles comprising this thematic issue are introduced, and connections between them established. Fourth, the introduction gauges the effects of Global Financial Crisis and Great Recession, but also crises more generally, on think tanks and the environment they operate in, and speculates about the future of the think tank industry

Young people and employability

The logic of employability corresponds to the perspective according to which a worker, or an aspirant worker, is deemed responsible for making himself or herself desirable in the labor market in the eyes of an employer or potential employer in the profession or trade to which he or she aspires. Enhancing young people’s ability to be employed – i.e., their “employability” – has been a focus of media and scholarly attention for the last 20 years or so. Inserted into the context of considerable changes in the labor market and higher education, a discourse of employability has become dominant in higher education policy and has encompassed a more specific focus on the school-to-work transition. Young people spend longer periods of time obtaining their educations, and as a result, they are better qualified than were previous generations. However, despite their increased qualifications, young people now earn less compared to adult workers than they did 25 years ago, and in many ways they remain at the argins, as failing to obtain a proper job is also, in many ways, failing to become an independent adult. In seeking to address social exclusion by helping young people obtain paid employment, the policy emphasis has been on giving advice and training to help young people become more “employable.” In other words, policy has focused on the supply of youth labor and, in particular, on the perceived deficits and failings of unemployed people as potential employees. The logic of the discourse of employability is to “capture” young people inside a mainstream discourse of integration and poses as an objective to engage or reengage young people with the labor market. Despite its diffusion, employability has primarily remained a policy concept which has perhaps not found a theoretical assessment. This chapter seeks to provide a definition of employability and critically identify the main issues related to its diffusion. This allows us to highlight the assumptions that are encompassed through its use and, more importantly, what implications it has for young people who are navigating the agitated sea of insecure employment