Reverse Planning as the Basis of Strategic Governance in Public Administration, Politics and International Relations

Abstract

This study introduces a scientific definition of strategic planning, which is largely missing. It is argued that the unique features of strategic planning in public management derive from the so-called Reverse Planning from the distant future back to the foreseeable and thus manageable future, opposite in logic and technique to traditional straight planning from the past to the foreseeable future. The sense of backward Reverse Planning is the formation of end goals, analogous to the goals the right planning also forms, only that these are goals that fulfill the mission of the strategizing entity, and not satisfy its current needs. Thus, the presented theory emancipates and purifies strategic management from the mistake of confusing it with elementary parametric or ideological thinking and action in public management.