Organization Theory and Management

Lynch

• Editore: Routledge
• Anno: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000146370
• Edizione: 1
• Argomento: Economics
• Categoria: Econometrics

This book reviews the evolution of organization theory literature and explains other theories of organization and the implicit wisdom of the instructor's favorite theory. It helps the reader to understand the relevance of organization theory to the problems of administering public organizations.

1

Citizen Participation

Terry L. Cooper School of Public Administration, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California

Participation of the citizenry in governing, above and beyond the periodic visit to the voting booth, is no longer left solely to the whims of the public official, or to the exigencies of popular inclination in a particular situation. During the last 35 years, citizen participation has become a mandated activity with respect to an increasing number of public programs. Since the Administrative Procedures Act was adopted in 1946, establishing a policy for the involvement of citizens in the federal arena, legislative requirements have multiplied at all levels of government.

At the federal level, these range from very broad freedom of information and government in the sunshine legislation to specific participation requirements in particular pieces of legislation such as the Coastal Zone Management Act of 1972, the Housing and Community Development Act of 1974, and the 1976 extension of the General Revenue Sharing Act of 1972. The Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (ACIR) has found that by the end of 1978 citizen participation requirements were included in 155 separate federal programs which involved over 80 percent of all grant funds at that level¹.

These developments have been paralleled by the actions of state governments. The ACIR indicates that all 50 states have some form of open meeting laws, 47 have freedom of information legislation, 48 have administrative procedures acts with varying provisions for citizen involvement, and 32 have state offices of volunteerism. Hawaii, Iowa, and Nebraska also have ombudsman offices to provide assistance to citizens who have complaints against state governments.

Local governments manifest a similar trend with provisions for public hearings on the budget, zoning variances, and other significant legislative actions. Also, a considerable amount of citizen participation is mandated at the local level by state and federal legislation concerning environmental impacts, urban redevelopment, and the use of federal block grant funds.

The result of these proliferating requirements is that most public administrators are confronted with the necessity for planning, managing, reviewing, or assisting in citizen participation processes at some point in their work. Whether this involves conducting an extensive series of public planning workshops, employing survey research to gauge public opinion on the quality of some public service, working with an advisory committee, or appearing occasionally at public hearings, it is important to have a grasp of this obligation of the modern public administrator. Understanding one’s responsibility for working with the citizenry involves some comprehension of the theoretical foundation of citizen participation in democratic society, as well as its practical implications. The first step in exploring participation theory is to address the definitional problems: What specifically do we mean by “citizen participation”?

DEFINING CITIZEN PARTICIPATION

While it may appear at first glance that “citizen participation” is a simple, straightforward term, it soon becomes apparent that it is not. For example, one distinction frequently encountered is between direct and indirect participation. Citizens may participate indirectly in government by electing others to represent them in the legislative, executive, and judicial branches. In this case, participation is confined to the periodic election of local, state, and federal officials. Those elected are then left to their own devices with perhaps an occasional letter or telegram from the citizen to focus and specify his or her concerns about a particular issue.

Another form of indirect participation might be through responding to public opinion surveys conducted either by government or private polling firms. This information might be utilized in planning programs, strategizing in election campaigns, or evaluating public services, but its use is controlled and directed by someone other than the citizen who responds.

One might also participate indirectly by contributing to the financial support of organizations with professional staffs that deal directly with government. Organizations such as Common Cause, the National Rifle Association, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Moral Majority, the Sierra Club, the American Automobile Association, and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People seek to influence government policies and programs through professional lobbyists. Citizens who help support these organizations are indirectly participating in that process.

On the other hand, one may mean by “citizen participation” the direct involvement of members of the public in the business of governing. This might include membership on advisory committees, appointment to local government commissions, presentations at public hearings, participation in planning workshops, involvement in interest groups such as political action committees or neighborhood organizations that are lobbying for certain policies and programs, and participation in social service agencies that contract with government to deliver public services. All of these examples represent varying degrees of direct influence over government action. This kind of ongoing citizen participation is often contrasted with the indirect role of the voter who simply indicates a preference for an individual who will, if elected, assume the task of directly influencing government on a regular day-to-day basis.

Another distinction, closely related to that between direct and indirect participation, concerns whether citizens exercise real power by participating. Sherry Arnstein’s well-known “A Ladder of Citizen Participation” addresses this distinction². Arnstein argues that unless citizens are able to exercise power in actually determining public decisions by involving themselves in a particular activity with government their participation is a sham. It may, in reality, serve the purpose of “therapy” (making citizens feel good even though nothing has been done to meet their needs) or “placation” (defusing their anger about governmental activities). Arnstein identifies eight rungs on her ladder which correspond to levels of influence and control. From her point of view, citizen participation is real only at the upper levels of “citizen control,” “delegated power,” and “partnership,” where the public is not manipulated, and is not totally dependent upon officials for determination of outcomes. Anything else amounts to the kind of symbolic action discussed by Murray Edelman. It is form without substance; ritual without impact.³

A third distinction has to do with who initiates participation. Since the growth in mandatory citizen participation, there is a tendency to view activities initiated by public officials as legitimate and those that emerge from the initiative of citizens as less so. Official participation programs are rooted in law and, therefore, are licensed by the political system. However, when citizens act on their own, without the sanction of particular statutory mandates, to secure signatures on a petition, or hold a community meeting with officials, or prepare recommendations for inclusion in a plan, their efforts may be viewed as unworthy of the same seriousness⁴.

In addition to these three distinctions among approaches to citizen participation, there is an enormously complex divergence of viewpoints about the purposes to be served. Some argue that the participation of the citizenry in public decisions is necessary for the fulfillment of their rights as members of a democratic polity. Other purposes may be served as well, but the fundamental reason for their participation is that they have a right to do so. To the extent that citizens are not involved in shaping and influencing their government, it becomes, according to this perspective, something other than a democracy.

A second purpose associated with citizen participation concerns the maintenance and stability of the political system. From a systems perspective, such as that held by David Easton, it is essential to maintain regular and accurate feedback from the environment if a political system is to be responsive or adaptive⁵. Without the ability to sense and adapt to changes in its environment, a government would eventually confront demands to which it could not respond and would, therefore, be susceptible to social unrest, political upheavals, revolution, or even conquest by another government. Citizen participation, from this point of view, provides the necessary feedback to maintain a stable, viable system.

The achievement of better policies and programs is another purpose for citizen participation which is frequently advanced. This argument is based on assumptions about organizational intelligence⁶. If significant information is held by citizens concerning any given public decision or program, then it is essential for the responsible organization or official to acquire that information as part of its intelligence gathering activity. Information available from citizens may include such things as needs and preferences, varying conditions under which programs must operate, anticipated impacts, political sensitivities, acceptable cost levels, and alternatives for accomplishing the stated goals. With more complete information, it is presumed that government will be able to do a more effective job of delivering public goods and services.

A fourth purpose of citizen participation is that of citizenship education and development⁷. The argument here is that participation in the affairs of government is one of the requisite activities for complete human fulfillment. People do not fully realize their talents and abilities apart from the experience of sharing in governing. The responsibilities of citizenship broaden one’s perspective and deepen one’s social identity; individual needs and interests are placed in a larger perspective. Also, citizens acquire the social and political skills necessary for the maintenance of democratic government; they learn how to cooperate, as well as how to manage conflict. The development of these perspectives and skills through participation, in turn, enhances the quality of future participation, including choosing among candidates for office in the electoral process.

These four commonly espoused purposes of citizen participation are held singly and in various combinations. They are not mutually exclusive; one may logically advance any or all of them. However, the critical point, if more than one purpose is advanced, is to know which one is primary. What will the case finally rest on? For example, if I argue both for the political right of citizens to participate and for the likelihood that the quality of policies and programs will be improved, what if it is found in a particular case that the quality is not enhanced? Will I then be inclined to abrogate the rights of citizens to be involved because the process is not worth the costs if it does not issue in a better product? Or is the right to participate so fundamental that it is an adequate reason in itself for continuing a participatory process? Sorting through questions of this kind is crucial because the answers one gives reflect how one is likely to act in practical situations.

One should think through what one means by citizen participation and why it is undertaken in order to anticipate these implications for practice. The three conceptual distinctions outlined earlier, together with the four purposes to be served by citizen participation just discussed, are often muddled both in the thinking of public administrators and in the way programs are designed, justified, and implemented. Often it is next to impossible to discern why a particular participation effort is being undertaken and why it is being conducted in a particular way. In these cases, mixed signals are communicated to members of the organizations and to the public which, in turn, lead to misunderstanding, confusion, frustration, and conflict.

In the next section of this chapter, we turn to a review of the theoretical roots of the problem of defining what we mean by “citizen participation.” How did these various perspectives emerge? Who has advocated them? How have they evolved to the preset?

CITIZEN PARTICIPATION AND DEMOCRATIC THEORY

In comprehending the development of theories of participation, three major bodies of literature are reviewed which represent the changing emphasis in democratic thought, beginning in the fourth century B.C. and continuing to the present. First, we will consider those who are generally termed “classical theorists,” followed by a group of scholars who began to challenge and revise classical theory during the mid-twentieth century. Finally, in this section, we will deal with egalitarian theorists of the last three decades who have taken issue with their revisionist colleagues.

Classical Theorists

Sometimes the label “classical” hides a multitude of differences when applied to scholars of a previous era. It can be an all too convenient device for lumping together figures from the past in order to sharpen the contrast between what was believed previously and some proposal for a supposedly new departure in theory. Carole Pateman has argued that democratic participation theory has been subjected to this kind of distortion⁷. She insists that “the notion of a ‘classical theory of democracy’ is a myth.” When one actually looks at the work of particular “classical” authors, according to Pateman, two distinct streams of thought can be discerned. On the one hand, there are writers who emphasized the organizational utility and material efficiency of democratic participation, while on the other hand are those who stress the citizen development and educational benefits. These two perspectives generally reflect the third and fourth purposes discussed in the previous section of this chapter. They also reflect the distinction between direct and indirect participation, or more precisely, between participatory and representative democracy.

One might well argue that the creation of two lumps of classical theory does only slightly less violence to the subleties that actually exist among the authors than treating them as one. However, it does provide important texture which helps in understanding significant strands of current thought. Therefore, we will accept Pateman’s argument for our purposes and examine six theorists as they relate to the two “classical” traditions.

Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)

Written during the latter half of the fourth century B.C., Aristotle’s Politics assumed the small civic republic in which citizens could ...

Indice dei contenuti

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Preface
• Contributors
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• 1. Citizen Participation
• 2. Decision Making
• 3. Structure
• 4. Coordination
• 5. Organizational Change
• 6. Line and Staff
• 7. Professional Ethics
• Appendix: Study Questions
• Index