The Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences at the University of Potsdam calls for applications for its Research Training Group on “Wicked Problems, Contested Administrations: Knowledge, Coordination, Strategy” (WIPCAD). Wicked problems create conditions of high complexity, uncertainty, and ambiguity to which public organizations need to respond. The tensions emerging in this context can destabilize organizational structures and routines, and call traditional methods of administration into question. Contestation occurs in various areas of organizational activity, from knowledge use and transfer to internal and external coordination and strategy building. The Research Training Group carries out studies of the interrelationships between wicked policy problems and the contested development of administrative practices and organizational structures, both within public organizations and between civil society and the private sector.
The WIPCADresearch program is based on systematic interdisciplinary cooperation betweenpolitical and administrative sciences, organization studies, sociology and public management. It is underpinned by a qualification and gender equality concept that encourages junior scholars from both Germany and abroad to engage with neighboring disciplines, conduct theory-based research, acquire the necessary research skills, gain international experience, and prepare them for future careers in academia and in the public sector.