This EMPA course is designed and offered as part of the Hertie School Policy Lab and provides an intensive, hands-on opportunity for master's students to explore the approaches and dynamics of building strategies for civil society organizations that take on large and evolving public policy mandates. The course focuses on the real-life challenge faced by ISEAL - the International Social and Environmental Accreditation and Labelling Alliance, a UK based but globally operating membership organization, that is the leading advocate for sustainability standards organizations to build a new strategy.
Throughout the course students will draft a proposal for how this new strategy should look like and in doing so delve deeply into not only the world of sustainability standards but also the intricacies of a membership organization dedicated to building and supporting it's members credibility and capability. Students will work to identify opportunities, analyze potential obstacles, and developing formats for thinking about the role of ISEAL as a meta-governance organization. This is no simulation but very much a real-life exercise, involving meetings and discussion with senior staff and leaders of ISEAL. They will be at the time we will hold the "Policy Sprint" right in the middle of their organization's strategy process, able to react to and take on, as appropriate, insights and proposals emerging from the class.
Instructor
- Monika Weber-Fahr , Adjunct Faculty