In this article, I demonstrate how working with complexity looks like in the practice of public administration, based on the procurement of the Mobility Transport Service in Rotterdam. This narrative shows that working with complexity asks for the design of policy systems that are richly constrained: practices that are sufficiently complex, but also sufficiently bounded. In the Mobility Transport Service, this has led to innovative results, but also tensions with the bureaucratic and political-administrative logics. Working with complexity ‘outside’ is clearly also working with logics ‘inside’ that leave less room for complexity.

Public Administration as an academic study makes use of many disciplines, but there is usually a lack of explicit attention to the emotional and unconscious dynamics that develop during collaborative work on social issues. This essay contributes to and focuses on the nature of intergroup dynamics whilst working on complex issues and specifically how a systems-psychodynamic perspective is helpful in understanding and dealing with conflict and discomfort inherent in working across boundaries. Concepts about conscious and unconscious ‘in-between’ dynamics are introduced and applied. From there, the Tussentafel (‘in-between table’), a new bounded space, is presented: a tool for working with uncertainties and tensions in complex issues. The Tussentafel offers a transitional space where difference (the gap) is being recognised, embraced and reflected upon (mindful), as a basis for developing a new perspective.

This article brings forward ‘improvisation’ as an action perspective on governance in complexity. Building on studies that compare jazz and theater improvisation with Public Administration, we take modern dance as a starting point. Dance improvisation consists of a multitude of non-intentional, individual movements that develop into a collective, harmonious consistency, through the efforts of participating dancers. To be able to do this, dancers need high cognitive awareness and strong powers of observation, in addition to physical technique. In this article we describe several skills dancers are being taught in order to become good improvisors: kinesthesia, embodiment, cuing, and attunement. With examples from practices of city making and urban development, we illustrate how improvisation in Public Administration can be understood as a harmoniously developing collective.

Complex issues are often about uncomfortable existential experiences. Public Administration has paid little attention to this existential dimension. This article is an exploration of this existential dimension in governance and policy. Doing right by this dimension implies a relativization of social engineering. Strengthening the role of emotions, practical wisdom, and professional identity is necessary. A different way of dealing with time is also important, so that room for deceleration is created to do right by existential experiences. These aspects are part of public craftsmanship.

Public Administration scholars are often asked by governments to advice about complex issues and their solutions. However, being such an applied science is also a responsibility. In this essay we present four principles for the ‘boundary work’ between science and practice in Public Administration: (1) embedded research, (2) mutual learning processes, (3) expressions and imaginations based on data and multiple perspectives, and (4) empathic confrontation by critical questioning the system. In this way, Public Administration scholars could contribute to deal with complexity in practice.

There is a long tradition of citizen participation in which citizens participate in policymaking or the co-production of public services. Recently, a new form citizen participation is on the rise in cities: the urban lab. Urban labs are new forms of collaboration between state, market en civil society that deal with urban challenges with an experimental approach. The expectation is that the ‘in-between’ character of labs can lead to innovative experiments and solutions for urban challenges, such as the liveability in deprived neighbourhoods or the energy transition. At the same time, the experimental approach can pose risks for public values, such as legitimate decision-making and accountability.
Because urban labs are a new phenomenon, it is unknown how stakeholders deal with such dilemmas in daily practice. By zooming in on the empirical case of urban labs in the Dutch city of Rotterdam we ask: which value trade-offs are made in the liminal space of urban labs and which new institutional rules emerge in order to deal with these trade-offs? On the basis of a qualitative analysis, we identify the following trade-offs: (1) professionalism versus inclusivity, (2) pragmatism versus activism, (3) financial versus societal capital, (4) experimentation versus accountability. New institutional rules for dealing with these trade-offs can potentially address the lack of legitimacy in decision-making yet may also hamper the open-ended and experimental nature of urban labs.

Current public administration research on networks in healthcare focuses on technical-rational aspects to find the ‘right’ constellation of structures and processes to perform optimally. Increasingly, this approach is criticized due to a lack of attention to versatile factors related to social and institutional practices inherent to collaboration. As a result, taking a normative stance towards healthcare networks is difficult. We argue that a social practice approach provides additional value about the interplay of these factors when assessing healthcare networks. Next to structuration of collaboration, we also need knowledge and insights about social and institutional practices to develop a better understanding about why collaboration is often problematic, and how this affects practice and policy. We illustrate the added value of this approach with the example of integrated birth care in the Netherlands.