Dr.Colleen Casey

This is a very hard choice to make, as there are so many influential and significant works. But, recalling back to my days of graduate school, Development as Freedom is the one book that kept me awake at night—pondering at 2:00 in the morning its implications for public service leaders. Sen’s conceptualization of freedom, as not only the opportunity to pursue one’s capability but as the interaction of individual initiative and social effectiveness, has great significance for our public service leaders of today. To me, the connection between the individual and the social speaks directly to the important role public service leaders play in creating communities, organizations and institutions that allow opportunities for individual capability realization, but do so in a manner informed and representative of the collective’s values.