Peter Ribbins
Biographic Data
| ID | 3423788 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Peter Ribbins |
| GIVEN NAMES | Peter |
| FAMILY NAME | Ribbins |
| SIGNATURE | RIBBINS P |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Birmingham |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 17 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 26 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 17 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1977 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Tales of a model permanent secretary; Sir David Normington
Portrait of an ‘outsider’ as permanent secretary in Whitehall
This paper reports a study of permanent secretaries who served at the Department for Education (DfE) from 1975 to 2011. Located within a context of theories that explain how government bureaucracies operate, it focuses on Michael Bichard. Appointed in July 1995 when attempts were being made to open Whitehall to non-career civil servants, he retired in May 2001 having served 21 months with a Conservative and 48 months with a Labour Secretary of St…
Biography in the study of public administration
This paper reports on part of an on-going interview-based study of the eight permanent secretaries who served at the Department for Education from 1976 to 2012. Following a discussion of the relevance of biography to the study of public sector administrators, it presents a portrait of Sir Tim Lankester. Based on his own account and that of relevant others it draws on a four-stage career model to describe his life before and during his time as a c…
Centrism and the mandarin class
The role of permanent secretary represents the apogee of a career in the Whitehall bureaucracy. Even so it is under-researched and, with exceptions, notably Dunleavy et al. on bureau shaping, under-theorised. Emanating from a longitudinal survey of eight successive permanent secretaries at the Ministry of Education from 1976 to 2011, this paper identifies them as members of a meta-political class who, whilst influencing the policy decisions of po…
Reforming the Civil Service and revising the role of the mandarin in Britain
This article summarises some problems currently faced by the Civil Service and considers how the June 2012 Reform Plan would address them. It focuses on what the Plan might mean for permanent secretaries and their future role in policy making. It seeks to supplement the research on which this aspect of the Plan and its recommendations can be reviewed. For this purpose it draws on a longitudinal study of the eight permanent secretaries at the Depa…
The permanent secretary as policy-maker, shaper, taker, sharer, and resister in education – reflections on Sir James Hamilton as a centralising outsider
Given that elevation to permanent secretary is widely recognised as the apotheosis of a career in the Whitehall bureaucracy, it is remarkable that so few have been the subject of sustained biographical research and that this key role remains largely un-theorised. As such, this paper reports on aspects of a longitudinal study which set out to examine, evaluate, and categorise to what extent, and how, permanent secretaries influence policy. Based o…
Professor Meredydd Hughes, 1922-2010
History and the Study of Administration and Leadership in Education
It is the underlying thesis of this Special Issue that the possibilities of history have been seriously and damagingly undervalued in the study of educational administration and leadership. This introduction explains why this matters and outlines a framework within which the papers of the contributors might be set. It then examines the concepts of educational administration and leadership and considers them as fields of practice. In the context o…
The role of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the making of educational policy
The role of Chancellors of the Exchequer in the making of policy is education has attracted the attention of few researchers, and little has been published that seeks systematically and comprehensively to examine this issue. This is remarkable given that, for most of the last 25 years, this office has been filled by four unusually powerful and long‐serving figures. In this paper, the authors, drawing on their interview‐based studies of the Secret…
The Field of Educational Leadership
The field of educational leadership is multi-site, in which those who study and practice leadership are located within networks which connect across institutions and sectors. Charting the growth of this dynamic field is the central purpose of this paper and six interconnected typologies of knowledge production are presented: Producers, Positions, Provinces, Practices, Processes and Perspectives. We argue that these typologies enable those involve…
Educational Management
Preface - Tony Bush et al Introduction - Tony Bush Setting the Scene PART ONE: SCHOOLS AND SELF-MANAGEMENT - Ron Glatter Modern Headship for the Rationally Managed School - Rosalind Levacic et al Combining Cerebral and Insightful Approaches Decentralization and Deregulation in Europe - Peter Karstanje Towards a Conceptual Framework Continuities and Changes in Primary Headship - Geoff Southworth Primary Schools and the Nature of the Education Mark…
Improving Education
Pastoral Care in Education (Inaugural Issue)
Pastoral Care
Policy Making in English Local Government
Pastoral Care
Pastoral care
Educational Management
Preface - Tony Bush et al Introduction - Tony Bush Setting the Scene PART ONE: SCHOOLS AND SELF-MANAGEMENT - Ron Glatter Modern Headship for the Rationally Managed School - Rosalind Levacic et al Combining Cerebral and Insightful Approaches Decentralization and Deregulation in Europe - Peter Karstanje Towards a Conceptual Framework Continuities and Changes in Primary Headship - Geoff Southworth Primary Schools and the Nature of the Education Mark…
The permanent secretary as policy-maker, shaper, taker, sharer, and resister in education – reflections on Sir James Hamilton as a centralising outsider
Given that elevation to permanent secretary is widely recognised as the apotheosis of a career in the Whitehall bureaucracy, it is remarkable that so few have been the subject of sustained biographical research and that this key role remains largely un-theorised. As such, this paper reports on aspects of a longitudinal study which set out to examine, evaluate, and categorise to what extent, and how, permanent secretaries influence policy. Based o…
The Field of Educational Leadership
The field of educational leadership is multi-site, in which those who study and practice leadership are located within networks which connect across institutions and sectors. Charting the growth of this dynamic field is the central purpose of this paper and six interconnected typologies of knowledge production are presented: Producers, Positions, Provinces, Practices, Processes and Perspectives. We argue that these typologies enable those involve…
Centrism and the mandarin class
The role of permanent secretary represents the apogee of a career in the Whitehall bureaucracy. Even so it is under-researched and, with exceptions, notably Dunleavy et al. on bureau shaping, under-theorised. Emanating from a longitudinal survey of eight successive permanent secretaries at the Ministry of Education from 1976 to 2011, this paper identifies them as members of a meta-political class who, whilst influencing the policy decisions of po…
Reforming the Civil Service and revising the role of the mandarin in Britain
This article summarises some problems currently faced by the Civil Service and considers how the June 2012 Reform Plan would address them. It focuses on what the Plan might mean for permanent secretaries and their future role in policy making. It seeks to supplement the research on which this aspect of the Plan and its recommendations can be reviewed. For this purpose it draws on a longitudinal study of the eight permanent secretaries at the Depa…
The role of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the making of educational policy
The role of Chancellors of the Exchequer in the making of policy is education has attracted the attention of few researchers, and little has been published that seeks systematically and comprehensively to examine this issue. This is remarkable given that, for most of the last 25 years, this office has been filled by four unusually powerful and long‐serving figures. In this paper, the authors, drawing on their interview‐based studies of the Secret…
Policy Making in English Local Government
Pastoral Care
Pastoral care
Pastoral Care
Policy Making in English Local Government
Pastoral Care in Education (Inaugural Issue)
Improving Education
Educational Management
Preface - Tony Bush et al Introduction - Tony Bush Setting the Scene PART ONE: SCHOOLS AND SELF-MANAGEMENT - Ron Glatter Modern Headship for the Rationally Managed School - Rosalind Levacic et al Combining Cerebral and Insightful Approaches Decentralization and Deregulation in Europe - Peter Karstanje Towards a Conceptual Framework Continuities and Changes in Primary Headship - Geoff Southworth Primary Schools and the Nature of the Education Mark…
The Field of Educational Leadership
The field of educational leadership is multi-site, in which those who study and practice leadership are located within networks which connect across institutions and sectors. Charting the growth of this dynamic field is the central purpose of this paper and six interconnected typologies of knowledge production are presented: Producers, Positions, Provinces, Practices, Processes and Perspectives. We argue that these typologies enable those involve…
The role of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the making of educational policy
The role of Chancellors of the Exchequer in the making of policy is education has attracted the attention of few researchers, and little has been published that seeks systematically and comprehensively to examine this issue. This is remarkable given that, for most of the last 25 years, this office has been filled by four unusually powerful and long‐serving figures. In this paper, the authors, drawing on their interview‐based studies of the Secret…
History and the Study of Administration and Leadership in Education
It is the underlying thesis of this Special Issue that the possibilities of history have been seriously and damagingly undervalued in the study of educational administration and leadership. This introduction explains why this matters and outlines a framework within which the papers of the contributors might be set. It then examines the concepts of educational administration and leadership and considers them as fields of practice. In the context o…
Professor Meredydd Hughes, 1922-2010
The permanent secretary as policy-maker, shaper, taker, sharer, and resister in education – reflections on Sir James Hamilton as a centralising outsider
Given that elevation to permanent secretary is widely recognised as the apotheosis of a career in the Whitehall bureaucracy, it is remarkable that so few have been the subject of sustained biographical research and that this key role remains largely un-theorised. As such, this paper reports on aspects of a longitudinal study which set out to examine, evaluate, and categorise to what extent, and how, permanent secretaries influence policy. Based o…
Reforming the Civil Service and revising the role of the mandarin in Britain
This article summarises some problems currently faced by the Civil Service and considers how the June 2012 Reform Plan would address them. It focuses on what the Plan might mean for permanent secretaries and their future role in policy making. It seeks to supplement the research on which this aspect of the Plan and its recommendations can be reviewed. For this purpose it draws on a longitudinal study of the eight permanent secretaries at the Depa…
Centrism and the mandarin class
The role of permanent secretary represents the apogee of a career in the Whitehall bureaucracy. Even so it is under-researched and, with exceptions, notably Dunleavy et al. on bureau shaping, under-theorised. Emanating from a longitudinal survey of eight successive permanent secretaries at the Ministry of Education from 1976 to 2011, this paper identifies them as members of a meta-political class who, whilst influencing the policy decisions of po…
Biography in the study of public administration
This paper reports on part of an on-going interview-based study of the eight permanent secretaries who served at the Department for Education from 1976 to 2012. Following a discussion of the relevance of biography to the study of public sector administrators, it presents a portrait of Sir Tim Lankester. Based on his own account and that of relevant others it draws on a four-stage career model to describe his life before and during his time as a c…
Portrait of an ‘outsider’ as permanent secretary in Whitehall
This paper reports a study of permanent secretaries who served at the Department for Education (DfE) from 1975 to 2011. Located within a context of theories that explain how government bureaucracies operate, it focuses on Michael Bichard. Appointed in July 1995 when attempts were being made to open Whitehall to non-career civil servants, he retired in May 2001 having served 21 months with a Conservative and 48 months with a Labour Secretary of St…
Tales of a model permanent secretary; Sir David Normington
Sociology (14 works) · Political science (12 works) · Law (8 works) · Public Administration (7 works) · Politics (6 works) · Law (5 works) · Mandarin Chinese (5 works) · Pedagogy (5 works) · Public Administration (5 works) · Public Policy and Administration Research (5 works)