Providing authoritative, high-quality journalism to the civil service and national politicians, our print title is the only independent professional publication available to every senior civil servant in the UK.
The brand’s success is based both on our unique access to top Whitehall officials, and the trust we’ve built up across government. For more than a decade, we’ve worked to keep civil servants informed about what’s happening across government: the people, agendas, policies and reforms that – for good or ill – affect your working life. Both magazine and website are produced by Total Politics, the specialist political publishing house.
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Meet the editorial team
Jess Bowie & Suzannah Brecknell, Editor (job share)
Jess Bowie and Suzannah Brecknell became joint Editor in October 2018.
Suzannah joined Civil Service World in 2010, and has worked in a number of roles across the title. Over the years Suzannah has developed a particular interest in questions of accountability and civil service reform, as well as leading on several data-based investigations and Special Reports. Suzannah previously edited schools title Education Executive, and healthcare publication Practice Business, and has also covered plastics, biofuels and the restaurant industry for various trade publications.
Jess became editor of Civil Service World in December 2014. She joined CSW’s parent company Dods in 2012 as a writer and sub-editor, and went on to become content editor of The House magazine and subsequently deputy editor of Total Politics. Before Dods, Jess worked for a variety of publications, including environmental lifestyle magazine National Geographic Green and Japanese newswire, Jiji Press.
csw.editor@totalpolitics.com
020 7593 5608
The CSW story
In February 2004, political publisher Dods launched Whitehall & Westminster World. A sister title to parliamentarians’ magazine The House, this fortnightly newspaper gave top civil servants an unprecedented ability to speak to their peers across government – piercing the departmental boundaries which obstruct communication in Whitehall. Buoyed by the government’s drives for cross-departmental working and greater transparency, WWW persuaded permanent secretaries and agency chief executives to step out of the shadows and get their messages across in this trusted, level-headed publication.
Five years later, we changed the publication’s name to Civil Service World – reflecting its mission to serve agencies and NDPBs as well as core departments, and civil servants based outside London as well as those in the capital. This coincided with CSW taking a more objective and independent line in its news and features coverage: having won the trust of the very top ranks of the civil service, the aim was to expand our readership by offering more realistic, intelligent reporting on the tricky organisational and policy issues facing departments and agencies. In 2013, Dods relaunched www.civilserviceworld.com as a straightforward, accessible news website, with a refreshed monthly magazine focusing on in-depth features, interviews and analysis.