In Chapter 11, John Patty draws on recent developments in behavioral economics to consider how political overseers, such as congressional oversight committees or agency heads, can deal with the extraordinary complexity of their job. Modern political organizations are composed of a hoard of individuals making innumerable choices, so how can overseers make sense of it? Patty introduces the concept of bracketing – how principals and agents group choices to compare among them when contemplating actions. Bracketing can affect how principals such as congressional members evaluate the consequences of bureaucratic behavior, the flow of evaluative information available to such principals, and the incentives for government officials to allocate or misallocate their efforts. Patty discusses how bracketing may influence features of institutional design, centralization of authority, and specialization. Additionally, bracketing has implications for policy evaluation and planning.

In a short outline, Ranke’s dictum is being used to question a chronological historiography of a positivst nature. Instead, the book suggests a retrospective cautioning against an apologetic writing of Christian origins. None of the authors of the first millennium intended to write history in the modern sense of ’Ranke’, very few of them made use of the canonical New Testament for making historical claims - quite contrary to our modern and contemporary text books. And it is questionable whether they were ever written and collected to produce such modern narratives. Instead, when authors of the first millennium used sources for evidence, they mainly relied on Jewish authors or non-canonical writings that are rather neglected or disregarded and understudied today, despite the continuous rise of research in these over the past decades.

A conceptual foundation for a process approach in psychology is provided, including the characteristics of a ‘process’ and a process ontology (or metaphysics) and its philosophical roots. We describe how this approach contrasts substantialism and a substance ontology. Here, we introduce what our envisioned process-approach implies for realism, where we discuss the stance that the construal of reality is constructed. With this, we position ourselves as critical realists.

A conceptual foundation for a process approach in psychology is provided, including the characteristics of a ‘process’ and a process ontology (or metaphysics) and its philosophical roots. We describe how this approach contrasts substantialism and a substance ontology. Here, we introduce what our envisioned process-approach implies for realism, where we discuss the stance that the construal of reality is constructed. With this, we position ourselves as critical realists.