The Palgrave Handbook of the Public Servant

The Palgrave Handbook of the Public Servant examines what it means to be a public servant in today's world(s) where globalisation and neoliberalism have proliferated the number of actors who contribute to the public purpose sector and created new spaces that public servants now operate in. It considers how different scholarly approaches can contribute to a better understanding of the identities, motivations, values, roles, skills, positions and futures for the public servant, and how scholarly knowledge can be informed by and translated into value for practice. The book combines academic contributions with those from practitioners so that key lessons may be synthesised and translated into the context of the public servant.

Helen Sullivan has been Director of the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University since 2016. She was formerly Professor and Director of the Melbourne School of Government, Australia, where she established the school after working as the Professor and Director of the Centre for Public Policy at Melbourne.
Helen Dickinson is Associate Professor Public Service Research and Director of the Public Service Research Group at the School of Business, University of New South Wales, Canberra, Australia. Her expertise is in public services, particularly in relation to topics such as governance, leadership, commissioning and priority setting and decision-making.