"We hope that this volume will contribute to the quality of public debate during the consideration of the Green Paper on the European Transparency Initiative. Whatever the outcome of this Initiative, the issue of Transparency will be with us as a recurring challenge. The essays in this collection bring together a number of respected professionals, observers and academics who offer a range of perspectives on the way forward. Not all of the book makes for happy reading for a function under pressure. But as Arnold Toynbee points out, such pressures can bring forth new creativity and new opportunities."
From the Preface by Tom Spencer and Conor McGrath

For more information view the Challenge and Response page.

"Leaders... need to pick their way through a minefield of competing realities and belief systems that echo each other. Belief is to the twenty-first century what ideology was to the twentieth... public affairs practitioners need to be sensitive to the dilemmas of political power as they manoeuvre their own organisations through rough waters. Public affairs in this century is not so much about 'stepping into the same river twice', it is about staying convincingly afloat in a torrent of change."
From the Preface by Tom Spencer

For more information view the Everything Flows page.

On leaving the European Parliament in 1999, former MEP and founder of the European Centre for Public Affairs, Tom Spencer, determined that he should take the opportunity to write. The 15 essays contained in this book are part of the result. They have been written on the boundaries between academic consideration and practitioner reality, and between public affairs and politics. If journalism is “the first draft of history”, these essays live on the time boundary between journalism and research; identifying trends, challenges and questions facing the world of public affairs. As such, this inspiring book is essential reading for all practitioners and students of public affairs, as well as for policy-makers, business and the media.

For more information view the Public Affairs & Power page.

These books are available directly from Landmarks publishing.