A critical approach to our own, and others’ assumptions about policy, policy processes, and ‘bridging gaps’ between research and policy, forms an integral part of a process of learning-by-doing that PLAAS has embarked on.

So far, this process of learning-by-doing has fuelled a more a more critical, realistic approach to the research – policymaking nexus. Consequently, our understanding needs to be informed by an awareness of interests, values, ideologies, and other messy dimensions of human relationships, and how these shape the way research is done, how policy is made, and the relationships between these two realms. And this account needs to go beyond the ideal type of ‘researcher’ and ‘policymaker’ to include all the role players – the policy and research entrepreneurs, social change advocates, engaged scholars, research communicators and knowledge brokers who strive to make government more knowledgeable.

It aims to go beyond the simplistic assumptions of dominant understandings about ‘evidence based policymaking’. This notion, originally associated with the Blair government, is a limited and narrow approach based on notions about policy neutrally informing best practice. It is a highly technicist model for thinking about how policy can be shaped, and how judgements are made, and it must be used critically and cautiously.

PLAAS aims to critically reflect on and investigate, by learning consciously from its own practices and sharing these learnings with others in learning exchange forums, what other approaches are more or at least equally useful in understanding and improving our engagement with policy processes, influencing how people understand the nature of social reality, and make (policy) decisions that fit well with reality and people’s needs.