Organizational Learning in the Global Context

Organizational learning is an area of study that focuses on models and theories about the way an organization learns and adapts. This volume investigates how various global and regional intergovernmental organizations, states and national bureaucracies, as well as nongovernmental organizations, exploit experience and knowledge to change their understanding of the world, their policies and their behaviours. Drawing upon and synthesizing organizational, social and individual-level learning theories, the cases explicate various learning processes, learning by illicit actors, and deterrents to organizational learning. The twelve case studies of this volume consider organizational learning associated with multiple issue areas including the United States embargo against Cuba, food security in the European Union, the Russian energy sector, Colombian drug trafficking, terrorist groups, the Catholic Church, and foreign aid agencies. Based entirely on original research, the volume is relevant to international relations, comparative politics, organizational sociology and policy studies.

About the Author

M. Leann Brown is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Florida, USA. She teaches International Political Economy, Politics of the European Union, and International Environmental Relations on the graduate and undergraduate levels. Michael Kenney is Assistant Professor of Public Policy in the School of Public Affairs at Pennsylvania State University, Capital College, USA. Immediately before assuming this post, he was a research fellow at the Center for International Studies at the University of Southern California. Michael Zarkin is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Westminster College in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. Between 2000-2003, he was Assistant Professor of Political Science at Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth, Texas.