Deliberative Policy Analysis: Understanding Governance in the Network Society (Theories of Institutional Design) [Paperback]

Maarten A. Hajer (Editor), Hendrik Wagenaar (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0521530709 | ISBN-13: 978-0521530705 | Publication Date: June 30, 2003

Large-scale social and political changes have revolutionized policy-making. Traditionally, policy analysis has been state-centered, based on the assumption that central government is self-evidently the locus of government. However, policy-making is often carried out today in loosely organized networks of public authorities, citizen associations and private enterprises. The contributors to this book argue that democratic governance now calls for a new deliberatively-oriented policy analysis. They provide examples from around the world to demonstrate how this would work in practice.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This collection is a landmark in post-positive policy studies that will help set the field's agenda for years to come. Pioneering linkages between deliberative democracy, critical policy analysis, and governance in the network society, Deliberative Policy Analysis is a key text for the interdisciplinary policy studies field." John S. Dryzek, Australian National University

"These striking essays rethink both the practice and the foundations of policy analysis in the face of conflict and complex networks, risk and uncertainty. For all those concerned with making governance work in the coming years, this collection makes a provocative and practical contribution. Policy analysts at last will say, 'Yes, that's what I have to do!'" John Forester, Cornell University

Book Description

Large-scale social and political changes have revolutionised policy-making. Traditionally, policy analysis has been state-centred, based on the assumption that central government is self-evidently the locus of government. Today policy-making is often carried out in loosely organized networks of public authorities, citizen associations and private enterprises. The contributors to this book argue that democratic governance now calls for a new deliberatively-oriented policy analysis. They provide examples from around the world to demonstrate how this would work in practice.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 324 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press (June 30, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521530709
• ISBN-13: 978-0521530705
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 9 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #806,724 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Turning the page, July 15, 2004

By 

Barbara Prainsack (Vienna, Austria) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Deliberative Policy Analysis: Understanding Governance in the Network Society (Theories of Institutional Design) (Paperback)

This book very plausibly shows that the recent boom of terms such as "governance", "networks", "trust", and "reflexivity" in political and policy science literature is more than just the outcome of renaming-games of bored policy scientist at times in which everything seems to have been said already. The chapters of the book, organized around the gravity center of new takes on policy discourses and participation, draw a nuanced picture of how the scenes and stages of contemporary policymaking are adapting to increasingly decentralized power structures and increasingly "networked" political realities. This adaption process, of course, does not always function smoothly. For policy analysts, the challenge in keeping up with these changing realities consists of not only "unlearn(ing) embedded intellectual reflexes" in the sense of rethinking "what politics and policymaking are about" (editors' introduction), but also of directing our gazes at the institutional and discoursive manifestations of these changes. These changes are difficult to discern if not at the level of practice - a point which the editors and contributors to the book do certainly not fail to emphasize.

"Deliberative Policy Analysis" turns the page to a post-positivist policy analysis which not only suggests that the landscape of policymaking has changed, but one that actually shows how these changes are taking place, and what the "new spaces of politics" are filled with (or how they remain unfilled). This latter aspect actually alludes to another mistake that the editors did not make: instead of formulating yet another theory of governance, they let theoretical insight raise from the bottom up. The theory underlying the book, although eloquently circumscribed in the introduction, appears as one that has accumulated from the different insights drawn from the particular case studies and chapters, and not as one that has been "authored" in the back rooms of academic institutions. It is not forcibly coherent, and through its closeness to practices of policy making and political identities, it achieves a level of complexity which comes close to the unorderly character of political reality. The book is therefore an equally useful tool for the work of students and scholars in political theory and policy analysis, policy makers, and those interested in the role of language in shaping reality.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Importance Reference Book to Deliberative Analysis, March 24, 2006

By 

Marisel Canales (Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico Puerto Rico) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Deliberative Policy Analysis: Understanding Governance in the Network Society (Theories of Institutional Design) (Paperback)

This book present the new approach to analysis of social policies with more participation of the all actors and the investigator. Present theoric approaches to deliberative analysis.