COLLEEN M. GROGAN,
University of Chicago
MICHAEL K. GUSMANO, Columbia University
Deliberative
Democracy in Theory and Practice: Connecticut’s Medicaid Managed
Care Council
Despite calls for greater deliberation
among citizens on public policy, we have little information about how existing
deliberation is structured or how well it works. We examine Connecticut’s
effort to put public deliberation to work in Medicaid policymaking.
Findings from our participant-observation study and in-person interviews
with 100 participants in this process suggest some important qualifications
to literature
on public deliberation. Greater inclusion of diverse social groups from
the
target population is important, but this should not replace the inclusion
of professional
advocates since the latter are often more willing than citizen representatives
to challenge policy experts on technical issues. Incorporating public deliberation
into the process at an early stage is ideal, but deliberation during the
later stages of
policymaking (including during implementation) can still produce useful
results.
Finally, the style and purpose of deliberation can shape the range of topics
on the
agenda, so it is important to understand how the structure of a deliberative
forum
can affect the style and purpose of deliberation.
The essence of democracy itself is now widely taken to be deliberation,
as
opposed to voting, interest aggregation, constitutional rights, or even
selfgovernment.
(Dryzek 2000, 1).
|
|
