Public administration and management research has long drawn most of its ideas from Western, industrialised democracies. Yet Asia and the Global South have become major sites of administrative change, with large-scale reforms, fast-moving technology and some of the most inventive experiments in governance. Research from these regions has grown accordingly, but it is still often used to illustrate or apply theories made elsewhere, rather than to produce new ones.
This special issue of Public Management Review aims to change that. It invites authors to treat practice in Asia and the Global South as a starting point for theory: to test, question or extend established approaches, and to propose new concepts and explanations. It does not look for a single theory of these regions, which are far too diverse for that, but for context-sensitive contributions that also say something useful for policy and practice.
The questions the special issue asks
Submissions should engage with at least one of three broad questions:
What new concepts, mechanisms or logics emerge when administrative and management practice in Asia and the Global South is the starting point for theory?
How do patterns found in these contexts extend, qualify or reshape mainstream approaches, such as NPM and post-NPM, collaborative governance, public service logic, strategic management, digital-era governance or behavioural public administration?
When can insights travel between contexts (South-South, South-North, within a region), and how can we compare without ignoring informality, differences between regimes and institutional instability?
What the editors expect
Papers must make a clear theoretical contribution: testing, developing, qualifying or expanding theory. They should also discuss what this means for policy or practice. Both conceptual and empirical papers are welcome, from established and early-career researchers. Literature reviews are accepted only if they help build theory rather than just describe it.
Illustrative topics
Value co-creation, co-production and public service ecosystems
Collaboration and collaborative governance, including power asymmetries and the “dark side” of collaboration
Strategic management in public organisations
Social equity, inclusion and justice
Technology, data and AI in governance
New theoretical frameworks (bounded rationality, nudging and ethics, street-level bureaucracy)
Crisis and disaster governance, resilience and sustainability
Performance management and service improvement
Human resource management in non-Western settings
The list is indicative only. Other topics are welcome if they offer a clear theoretical contribution grounded in Asia or the Global South.
Key dates
1 November 2026: call opens
8 February 2027: abstracts due (maximum 500 words)
8 March 2027: authors notified of the selection
6 September 2027: full papers due
6 December 2027: reviews returned to authors
14 February 2028: final revised papers due
3 April 2028: target date for submitting the special issue to Routledge
How to take part
Send your abstract, covering focus, approach and expected contribution, to the corresponding editor, Rui Mu (ruimu@dlut.edu.cn). The editors will select twelve to fourteen papers to develop in full. Selected papers are submitted through the Public Management Review web portal, follow the journal’s guidelines, undergo double-blind peer review and must not be under consideration elsewhere. The editors’ decision is final. Papers that pass review but do not fit in the special issue may be considered for regular issues of the journal.
Guest editors: Rui Mu (Dalian University of Technology), Ricardo Gomes (FGV EAESP), Stephen Osborne (University of Edinburgh), Yaamina Salman (University of the Punjab).
