Paquet engages with numerous foundationalist programs in the social sciences in order to show their inadequacy and suggests important and unexplored directions in policy areas as diverse as education, science, health, intergovernmental and foreign policy. He closes the work with a plea for experimentalism in academic research, policy development, and organization design.
Gilles Paquet is professor emeritus at the Telfer School of Management and is associated with the Centre on Governance and the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa. He has authored or edited over forty books and published a large number of papers on economics, public management, and governance.