Marleen Brans (KU Leuven, Belgium)

Marleen Brans is Professor at the KU Leuven Public Governance Institute and the Academic Director of its Master in European Policies and Administration programme. She holds master degrees from KU Leuven and Hull University, and a PhD in Social and Political Sciences from the European University Institute in Florence. She has been teaching Policy Analysis, Comparative Public Policy, and Policy Advice and Evaluation at KU Leuven, and previously taught at Ceps Luxemburg, UCLouvain and Tallinn Technical University. Her research centers on the production and use of policy advice, and focuses on topics such as ministerial advisers, advisory bodies, the science–policy nexus, and evidence-informed policy-making. Marleen has led or supervised multiple doctoral projects on themes such as the careers of ministerial advisers, expert argumentation during crises, and the policy capacity of administrative systems. She has published extensively in leading international journals such as Public Administration, Policy and Society, JEP, Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis, and contributed numerous chapters to books on policy advice, political advisers, and policy advisory systems. She herself co-edited 7 volumes, including Rewards for High Public Office (with B. Guy Peters), Policy Analysis in Belgium (with David Aubin), and The Advisory Roles of Political Scientists (with Arco Timmermans). She was co-founding Vice-President of the International Public Policy Association and is currently IPPA’s President.

Course: Understanding Policy Advisory Systems: From Evidence to Influence

In today’s complex governance landscape, the process of making and shaping public policy has evolved far beyond the traditional boundaries of government. Policy advice is not confined to advisers within the bureaucracy. Instead, it emerges from a wide constellation of actors: academics, think tanks, advocacy groups, civil servants, international organisations, and other policy advisory actors in and outside government. Together, their diverse voices form a dynamic policy advisory system that generates, interprets, and advocates for problem definitions and policy solutions.

This course explores how policy advice is created, communicated, and used, and how expertise and evidence influence the policy process. Participants will examine how knowledge and power interact, how ideas travel between research and decision-making, and how advisory systems differ across contexts.

Alongside its theoretical focus, the course features a practical session on effective policy advising and policy briefing, offering hands-on experience in translating research into useful insights upon which policy-makers can act. Participants will learn to craft persuasive policy briefs, frame evidence for different audiences, and build trust and credibility as emerging policy experts.

By combining conceptual depth with practical skills, the course encourages early career researchers to reflect on their own potential as contributors to evidence-informed policy-making. It invites participants to move beyond observing how policy is made to engaging with how it can be influenced.

This course offers a unique opportunity to bridge the worlds of research and practice, advancing both the theory and craft of policy advice.