In dit artikel wordt het evaluatieonderzoek van overheidsbeleid kritisch onder de loep genomen. De auteur bespreekt vier alternatieven: responsieve en multipele evaluatie, argumentatieve evaluatie, netwerkgericht evalueren en lerend evalueren. De bevindingen kunnen positief inwerken op het ‘leren van evalueren’ in organisaties.

This article is a critical review of four books: Bok, 2010 (‘The politics of happiness’); Van Campen, Bergsma, Boelhouwer, Boerefijn, & Bolier, 2012 (‘Sturen op geluk’); Diener, Lucas, Schimmack, & Helliwell, 2009 (‘Well-being for public policy’); Ott, 2012 (‘An eye on happiness’). Based on these works, we conclude that the quality of government is highly correlated with the happiness of citizens. In countries with high levels of freedom (economic, democracy, press), low levels of corruption and good public services, people appear to be the happiest. In this way governments can be seen as ‘happiness machines’. However, precise causal relationships need to be further clarified; which policies do improve happiness and which don’t? In this context, education is an important area in which government plays a role; people should leave school with the right set of competencies to be able to adequately cope with life. Governments cannot solve everybody’s unhappiness, though, but are important for creating the right circumstances.

In this article we aim to provide an insight in one of the specifics of the dynamic relationship between government and society; the delegation of public tasks to (civil) society. The concept ‘Big Society’ in the United Kingdom generated immense expectations in this respect. By making use of an explorative case study, we examine the origins, visions and best practices in successively the UK, Australia and Scandinavia in order to generate a better understanding of this dynamical relationship. The major insights following from this analysis relate to the economic and cultural background, the political reality and rhetoric, as well as to concrete practices to understand what civil society has to offer in the delegation of public tasks. Finally, as a first step towards theory development, we formulate five concrete lessons for the delegation of public tasks to the civil society.

‘Big Society’ has been one of those inspirational concepts that have recently swept through the public administration literature. With their appeal for a ‘Big Society’, the British Tories contrasted their policy program with Labours’ traditional ‘Big Government’ program. Upon closer inspection, however, it is revealed that the underlying analysis is not new at all, but reflects a specific analysis that can be traced back to Wilson’s famous essay on the study of public administration in 1887. Stripped from its details, the never-ending story claims that public administration now struggles with overwhelming complexity, which makes traditional bureaucratic methods obsolete and calls for innovative, new approaches. The fact that this story has remained fairly constant for over 125 years is cause for some concern. The article traces the historical genesis of this never-ending story and lands on a plea for more sophisticated attention for administrative history, more critical scrutiny of new ideas and more serious study of the nature and effects of complexity.