Public Administration in Contested Societies

240 Pages·2014·2.708 MB·English

by  Karl O’Connor (auth.)

Public Administration in Contested Societies
Public Administration in
Contested Societies
Karl O’Connor
School of Criminology, Politics and Social Policy,
University of Ulster, Northern Ireland
© Karl O’Connor 2014
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2014 978-1-137-29814-0
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Contents
List of Tables and Figures viii
Preface ix
Outline of the Book xii
Acknowledgements xv
List of Acronyms xviii
1 Representative Bureaucracy in Plural Societies 1
2 Researching in Contested Cities: Belfast and Brussels 39
3 Belfast: Everyday Policy-making in a Contested Environment 64
4 Brussels: Power-sharing at the Lowest Common Denominator 87
5 The Merit Principle in a Representative Bureaucracy: Belfast 113
6 Active Representation Within the Power-sharing Society: 126
The Values Guiding Administrative Decision-making in
Belfast and Brussels
7 Concluding Remarks: Bureaucrats and Conflict Management 151
Appendix 171
Notes 202
Bibliography 209
Index 221
vii
List of Tables and Figures
Tables
Table 3.1 Summary of Chapter Findings 83
Table 5.1 Overview of the Descriptive Data, 2009 118
Table 5.2 Baseline, Stratified and Aggregate Measure Ratios, 119
2009
Table 5.3 Stratified Measure Ratios: Nationality, 2009 120
Table 6.1 Correlation Factor Scores: Belfast 129
Table 6.2 Correlation Factor Scores: Brussels 129
Table 6.3 Key Agreement Statements for Factor One 131
Table 6.4 Key Agreement Statements for Factor Two 133
Table 6.5 Key Agreement Statements for Factor Three 136
Table 6.6 Key Agreement Statements for Factor Four 139
Table 6.7 Key Agreement Statements for Factor Five 141
Figures
Figure 1.1 Representation Continuum I 31
Figure 1.2 Representation Continuum II 34
Figure 1.3 Representation Network 36
Figure 1.4 Core Governance Beliefs 37
Figure 2.1 Conflict–Stability Continuum 47
Figure 2.2 The Regions of Belgium 59
Figure 2.3 The Regional Governments and Linguistic 60
Communities of Belgium
Figure 2.4 The Relationship Between the Regions/ 61
Communities and Their Governments
Figure 2.5 The Political Organisation of Brussels 62
Figure 5.1 Representativeness Ratios 117
viii
Preface
The management of conflict has long been of concern to social scien-
tists, urban planners and community-minded citizens. While differing
mechanisms of managing ethnonational or ethnolinguistic tensions
exist, few studies advance our understanding of how conflicts are actu-
ally managed – in other words, the study of ethnic peace. In this study
I draw upon the experiences of two differing examples of ethnic peace:
Belfast and Brussels. It is hoped that other contested cities considering
power-sharing as a form of governance may learn from what have been
categorised as sites of successful power-sharing. While there are few
studies of ethnic peace, fewer studies again seek to understand the role
of the elite level bureaucrat in sustaining this peace. This research fills
this gap in the literature, investigating the politician-bureaucrat rela-
tionship within the contested urban environment of two different
mechanisms of consociationalism. The book ascertains the extent of
discretion available to the bureaucratic elite and further, through deter-
mining core beliefs of interviewees, establishes how this discretion is
employed. Methodologically, the research draws on a multi-method
approach, consisting of semi-structured interviews and a method well
established in psychology but relatively new to political science:
Q methodology. The empirical findings show that the bureaucratic
elite influence the conflict management process. While bureaucrats are
found to share a number of core governance beliefs, a number of cate-
gories of association can also be identified. These categories are not
based on a primary identity, but on a secondary learned identity. The
findings therefore also propose that a professional or societal attach-
ment can supersede a primary identity within the public administra-
tion of a contested society. In a number of instances, bureaucrats are
found to actively represent these secondary learned attachments over
their primary identities.
The research speaks to both practitioners and researchers in two
fields: firstly to those interested in conflict management research
within the contested state and secondly to those interested in public
administration research. The project to which this work is attributed,
Conflict in Cities and the Contested State, seeks to better understand
the ways heavily contested cities may become viable for all inhab-
itants. A team of researchers from three UK universities: Cambridge,
ix
x Preface
Exeter and Queen’s Belfast, investigate the common subject of conflict
management from a variety of different perspectives. The multi-
disciplinary initiative includes: architecture, urban studies, politics,
geography and sociology. These lenses are used to try and understand
conflict management in a number of European and Middle Eastern
cities: Jerusalem, Belfast, Brussels, Berlin, Mostar, Nicosia, Berlin,
Beirut, Tripoli and Kirkuk. More specifically, the project seeks to under-
stand how urban structures and institutions may strengthen cities to
withstand state struggles, and establish the extent to which cities may
be transformed into effective and equitable sites for human settlement.
In other words, the project is concerned with mechanisms for the con-
frontation and absorption of conflict as opposed to conflict resolution
or solution.1This book contributes directly to these objectives, disre-
garding the nature of the policies to be implemented but focusing
instead on the policy implementation and design mechanisms and
more importantly, the policy implementers and designers. Who are
they and what guides them in their decision-making processes? The
research contributes to an understudied aspect of conflict management
research – the politician-bureaucrat relationship. The research exam-
ines this relationship from the perspective of the elite level bureaucrat.
Much of the normative literature in conflict management focuses on
what policies would best suit particular cases. Much of this literature
also points to the public administration as one of the primary obstacles
to effective public policy development. This research provides an
opportunity for bureaucrats themselves to contribute to the debate,
outlining their role perceptions within the contested city. Further, I
respond to research calls by Stanfield (1996) and Varshney (2002) that
in order to manage ethnic conflict we must first understand instances
of ethnic peace. Of the cities under investigation within our research
project, Belfast and Brussels have adopted two different forms of conso-
ciationalism and provide an opportunity to learn from ethnic peace.
For more on the individual cases and case selection, see Chapter 2.
The second contribution of this book is to public administration and
committee governance research. While this is a secondary contribu-
tion, I believe it to be of equal significance. As identified above, I
compare two systems of public administration within two mechanisms
of consociationalism. To compare these bureaucracies I use the theoret-
ical lens of representative bureaucracy. To date, representative bureau-
cracy has not been extensively applied to European committee
governance research (see Anne Stevens’ [2009] examination of the
European Commission as an exception). European governance research
Preface xi
seeks to understand the decision-making mechanisms of the European
Union, and other bodies such as the Council of Europe and the
Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe. While there are
many theoretical approaches to investigating the subject from multi-
level governance, to intergovernmentalism to neo-functionalism, a
large majority of empirical works emanating from these frameworks
rely on the belief that norms, beliefs and values guide behaviour.
Smith (2003) submits that the sociology of European Commissioners
(political level) matters at the EU level, investigating the causal rela-
tionship between previous career, national identity and portfolio and
role perceptions. At the bureaucratic level, Egeberg (1999) analyses the
role conceptions of national bureaucrats operating at the EU level.
Checkel (2003) seeks to determine the mindset of bureaucrats on
Council Committees, investigating the changing nature of their loyalties.
Hooghe (2005) probes the norms, beliefs and values of permanent
officials within the European Commission. In her literature review she
submits that most research on socialisation examines states or govern-
ments, but that along with Checkel (2003) and Johnston (2001) her
research focuses on the individual. There are also other more recent
examples of such research (Gornitzka and Sverdrup, 2008; Trondal and
Jeppesen, 2008; Lewis, 2005; Fouilleux et al, 2005; Radaelli and
O’Connor, 2009, among others). Thus it can be surmised that within
European governance research, the motivations and role perceptions of
the bureaucrat are viewed by a significant proportion of the literature
as being central to the subsequent actions of the bureaucrat. Within
this research I assume a similar relationship. However, while much of
this European governance research has adopted theoretical approaches
from psychology, or used a psychological lens to view existing theories
of European integration (Checkel, 2003 and Hooghe, 2005 to name but
two), research has rarely adopted methods from outside the realm of
political science. While the ideas and concepts have travelled from psy-
chology to political science, the research methodologies, in general,
have not. Within this research I draw on a methodology introduced to
political science from psychology by researchers such as Selden et al
(1999) known as Q methodology. While European governance research
seeks to determine norms, beliefs and values of interviewees, its inter-
views are largely based on degrees of attachment surveys and semi-
structured interviews, techniques designed to ascertain information. In
this research I suggest that Q methodology could be more helpful in
ascertaining individual norms, beliefs and values.