Identifying Facets of Democratic Administration

Abstract

DialogueThis article takes on the difficult task of trying to ascertain the practicality of discourse as a means toward establishing a more democratic public administration. Of concern are the methods currently used to evaluate the authenticity of such endeavors, particularly Fox and Miller's warrants for discourse, which have something of a reliability problem. This particular work suggests the use of more systematic ways to examine discursive behavior, either in lieu of or in conjunction with the warrants. These are called empirical referents, and are inclusion, self-regulation, and policy outputs. Use of these empirical referents is intended to help provide us with a clearer focus for our discourse about the process of policy implementation and the attainment of tenable results.Within the field of public administration, there is an emerging paradigm that advocates greater responsiveness and multichanneled communication in an effort to create a more effective administration, both for the public it serves and for those who are employed within the government. Wamsley and Wolf (1996) refer to this as a refounding of democratic

Pragmatic Discourse and Administrative Legitimacy

“…Published with Hansen's (1998) article were responses by Miller (1998) and White (1998). White was concerned that Hansen's empiricism leads back to failed attempts of the past to get citizens to participate in governance without changing the system itself, so that true discourse, as a transformative process, never takes place.…”

“…Interestingly, White viewed Fox and Miller's (1995) warrants as barely avoiding sliding down the slippery slope of traditional empiricism that claimed Hansen. Miller (1998) critiqued Hansen's (1998) choices of empirical referents, noting that the election of leaders could as easily degrade substantive discussion of issues as it could produce greater democracy and, contra Hansen's claim that valid discourse must produce policy outcomes, "sometimes, preventing action would be the better indication that democracy had taken place" (Miller, 1998, p. 463). But, Miller's primary point of disagreement was that Hansen had set up supposedly objective criteria of measurement for situations that might successfully be described as they happen but cannot be predicted and controlled if they are to succeed.…”

“…Miller (1998) noted that Hansen (1998) erred by moving deductively to supposedly objective measures, skipping over the subjective, inductive human content that constitutes discourse. White (1998) described the problem as believing "that differences in perception can be resolved definitively by the device of objective indicators grounded in compelling evidence" (p. 472).…”

“…The question of epistemology is as sensitive as that of normative orientation. Kenneth Hansen (1998) suggested that Fox and Miller's (1995) warrants for discourse are subject to the "eye of the beholder" problem; that is, they are a matter of subjective interpretation and so do not help identify when discourse settings are working properly. To correct this problem, Hansen suggested instead three "empirical referents of discourse": inclusion (coalition building, the acceptance of outsiders, and community outreach activities), self-regulation (empowerment by election of leaders; the negotiation of operating norms, rules, and procedures; and techniques such as roundtables instead of podiums or the availability of toll-free numbers or e-mail addresses that encourage multidirectional instead of monological communication), and policy outputs (the development of organizations to take action, adequate funding, completed strategic plans, and evidence of implementation).…”

“…They also might think that action toward that ideal requires attention to the daily reality of people's lives and what is needed to give them an opportunity to engage in authentic discourse. To adapt the metaphor Miller (1998) used in his reply to Hansen (1998), for the tail of discourse to wag the dog of public governance, it may need to acknowledge the gritty nature of the dog's environment.…”