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Democracy and the Policy Sciences
Author(s) -
DeLeon Peter
Publication year - 1994
Publication title -
policy studies journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.773
H-Index - 69
eISSN - 1541-0072
pISSN - 0190-292X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1541-0072.1994.tb01463.x
Subject(s) - positivism , criticism , democracy , citizen journalism , policy sciences , political science , public administration , participatory democracy , policy analysis , sociology , epistemology , positive economics , economics , law , politics , philosophy
The policy sciences approach has recently came under sustained criticism for being insensitive to the values and preferences of the ordinary citizen. This paper attempts to address these problems by outlining a post‐positivist approach, drawing upon the works of Jürgen Habermas. The paper proposes a “participatory policy analysis” that utilizes a sampling of affected citizens to create a “policy forum” to inform the policymaker of citizens' positions on important policy issues.