Responses to Hugh Heclo’s On Thinking Institutionally Robert C. Fennell, Atlantic School of Theology Richard S. Ascough, Queen’s University at Kingston Tat-siong Benny Liew, Pacific School of Religion/Graduate Theological Union Michael McLain, Rhodes College Nancy Lynne Westfield, Drew Theological School Abstract. Hugh Heclo’s recent book On Thinking Institutionally (Paradigm Publishers, 2008) analyzes changes that have taken place in the past half century in how North Americans tend to think and act in institutions. The volume is receiving particular atten- tion as it can be applied to higher education and to religious denominations, and so deserves consideration by those who teach in theology and religious studies. At an October 2009 conference, The Wabash Center hosted a lively discussion of Heclo’s volume among invited religion and theology scholars, which resulted in the present compilation of four short responses to the book. What was and is clear from these responses is that while Heclo has identified a crucial issue, his analysis and prescription leave important theoretical and practical questions untouched. Indeed part of the energy around the discussion of the book flowed from the ways in which his lack of attention to social class, gender, race, and age circumscribed his ability to robustly describe and diagnose the challenge that gave rise to his book. In order to orient readers to the volume and discussion of it, the “Conversation” begins with a descriptive review of the book. Robert C. Fennell Review of Hugh Heclo, On Thinking Institutionally (Boulder, Co.: Paradigm Publishers, 2008). Hugh Heclo’s broad-ranging inquiry takes us deeply into the realities we call institu- tions. While the book’s title might sound a little dusty, Heclo’s treatment is insightful and his prose easy to read. In Chapter One, Heclo notes that thinking institutionally attends to the ethos and spirit of our social arrangements. It is to think “from inside” these historic, patterned norms of social behavior. However, today there is an “absence” of institutional thinking that “undermine[s] social trust” (7). Because we know what an institution ought to be, we are offended by those whose actions and attitudes spurn the greater good by “neglecting and dishonoring . . . longer-term values” (7). Heclo’s task is to address this neglect, and its impact, by reclaiming the institution as a form worthy of our respect and care, and to equip us with an appropriate vocabulary for examining it. Chapter Two reviews a range of public failures that result in “not so much an active rejection” of institutions, but a “prevailing disposition” of distrust (11). IN THE CLASSROOM Conversation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd Teaching Theology and Religion, Volume 13, Issue 3, July 2010 272