Think tanks

academia | policy | research careers | United Kingdom policy and politics | United States policy and politics

80,000 Hours rates working at a think tank highly in terms of impact potential, career capital and job satisfaction, and recommendrecommends this path for candidates early in their careers and suited for it.

In general, there is great diversity in the think tank ecosystem and experts often note that there is no such thing as a prototypical think tank: these organizations differ amongfrom one another across a number ofseveral important dimensions, such as "in how they are funded, the roles that they play, their attitudes toward 'neutral expertise', their recruitment of staff, and their 'product lines.'"^[1] Moreover, the boundaries between think tanks and other types of entities with a mandate to supply policy advice, such as pressure groups, private foundations, academic institutes, policy schools, government agencies, and non-government organizations are sometimes blurry.

By contrast, research think tanks (sometimes called "ink tanks") are not antecedently committed—at least not explicitly—to policy proposals with a particular ideological bent and are mostly focusedfocus primarily on generating novel policy insights. A subset of these think tanks resemble academic institutions in many respects, and are as such sometimes referred to as "universities without students": organizations such as the Brookings Institution, the Russell Sage Foundation, and the Peterson Institute for International Economics, to name some examples, are mostly staffed mainly by researchers holding doctoral degrees and publish their research in scholarly books or monographs, although these think tanks are usually  (but not always) organizationally independent of academia and have a much closer contact with policy activists and a heavier emphasis on practical applicability. Other research think tanks, by contrast, operate in a manner more similar to consultancies: most work by the RAND Corporation, for instance, is focused on program evaluations requested and funded by government agencies.

Think tanks do not only differ greatlysignificantly in their structure; there is also great diversity in the type and extent of their impact. Andrew Rich and Kent Weaver summarize:^[2]

Open Philanthropy has given grants to a number ofseveral think tanks working in a variety of areas, including the Center for Security and Emerging Technology (artificial intelligence), the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security (biosecurity and pandemic preparedness), Dezernat Zukunft (macroeconomic policy), the Center for Global Development (immigration reform), the Good Food Institute (animal product alternatives), Nuclear Threat Initiative (biosecurity and global catastrophic biological risks), the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (macroeconomic policy), and the Sightline Institute (land use reform).

In general, there is great diversity in the think tank ecosystem and experts often note that there is no such thing as a prototypical think tank: these organizations differ among one another across a number of important dimensions, such as "in how they are funded, the roles that they play, their attitudes toward 'neutral expertise', their recruitment of staff, and their 'product lines.'" (Rich & Weaver 2012)^[1] Moreover, the boundaries between think tanks and other types of entities with a mandate to supply policy advice, such as pressure groups, private foundations, academic institutes, policy schools, government agencies, and non-government organizations are sometimes blurry.

A stylized distinction may be drawn between "advocacy" and "research" think tanks, depending on whether the primary goal is to provide "ammunition" or "enlightenment" (Rich & Weaver 2012),^[1] although these are probably best regarded as two limit cases in opposite ends of a continuum. Advocacy think tanks (sometimes called "ideological tanks" or "think and do tanks") often self-identify with a specific political ideology and offer their services to clients in a relatively well-defined range of the political spectrum. Examples include the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute (conservative), the Center for American Progress and the Economic Policy Institute (liberal), and Cato Institute and the Reason Foundation (libertarian).

Think tanks do not only differ greatly in their structure; there is also great diversity in the type and extent of their impact. Andrew Rich and Kent Weaver summarize (Rich & Weaver 2012: 364):summarize:^[2]

In the United Kingdom, a think tank often cited as having had a major—though not necessarily positive—impact is the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), described by an author as "arguably [the] most influential think tank in British history" (Plehwe 2011: 173)^[3] and frequently discussed as having played a significant role in the rise of "neoliberal" ideas in the 1970s and 1980s (Vaughan 2016).1980s.^[4] Some have even claimed that IEA was causally implicated in key geopolitical developments beyond British borders: Sir Oliver Letwin, a conservative MP, once wrote: "without the IEA and its clones, no Thatcher and quite possibly no Reagan; without Reagan, no Star Wars; without Star Wars, no economic collapse of the Soviet Union." (Letwin 1994)^[5]

A comprehensive report focused on American think tanks by a pseudonymous group of authors with familiarity and personal experience in the Washington D.C. think tank ecosystem summarizes: "Whereas the potential for impact is widely accepted, the average level of think tank impact is far more uncertain." (Locke_USA 2021)^[6]

The report cited in the previous section considers working at a think tank to be usually more valuable for its career capital—in particular, for growing one's professional network, improving one's understanding of the policy world, gaining policy-relevant skills, and becoming a recognized domain expert—than for its direct impact (Locke_USA...

In the United Kingdom, a think tank often cited as having had a major—though not necessarily positive—impact is the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), described by an author as "arguably [the] most influential think tank in British history" (Plehwe 2011: 173) and frequently discussed as having played a significant role in the rise of "neoliberal" ideas in the 1970s and 1980s (Vaughan 2016). Some have even claimed that IEA was causally responsible forimplicated in key geopolitical developments beyond British borders: Sir Oliver Letwin, a conservative MP, once wrote: "without the IEA and its clones, no Thatcher and quite possibly no Reagan; without Reagan, no Star Wars; without Star Wars, no economic collapse of the Soviet Union." (Letwin 1994)