Suchergebnisse

This article addresses the question of how governments can set up and manage, in an increasingly complex policy environment, processes of public consultation that lead to good outcomes. Drawing upon insights of democratic theory and literature on network and interactive governance, the article discusses the organization and outcomes of public consultation processes. The analysis of four Belgian cases shows that the absence of open process rules does not prevent good outcomes. Second, the level of managerial autonomy is positively correlated with the intensity of process design and management. Third, cases with intensive process design and management have better overall results. These findings question some normative assumptions in the literature, positing the need for open process rules regarding entrance, scope of discussion, and interaction. Intensive process design and management with rules properly accommodating the policy situation is possibly a better means of achieving good results than rule openness. These findings challenge the need for legislation stipulating in detail who needs to be consulted, about what, and how.

In this chapter we look into the growth of diverse types of public inquiries and public consultation arrangements in policy-making. These arrangements bring to the table individual members of the public who otherwise have no direct policy – advisory – role, given the predominance of neo-corporatist style advisory bodies in Belgium (Van Damme and Brans, 2013). In some of these new public consultation and participation forms, citizens are not at the end of the delivery process, but are actively engaged in framing policy problems, and selecting and evaluating policy solutions. The chapter explains what public consultation is, its links with policymaking and the political regimes. The chapter also provides a Framework for analysis. It is applied to the diverse experiences of participatory democracy in Belgium.

Policy-making in Flanders (Belgium) is traditionally characterized by a dense advisory system with a high number of advisory councils, firmly integrated into the policy-making process. Recently, the Flemish government has reshaped its strategic advisory council system, responding to concerns over growing advice competition. This reorganization was part of a broader reform aimed at increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of policies. In this article, we analyze the defining aspects of this new advisory council system, and explore members' satisfaction about the advisory process and the use of advice by policy-makers. The latter can be considered a prerequisite for advice to contribute to policy-making. Our analysis is based on a 2009 survey with the members of the new strategic advisory councils (response 72.4%). The results show that reorganizing the advisory council system has not led to uniformity regarding council size, budget or membership constitution. And although satisfaction with the advisory process is generally high, the influence of the advice is perceived as low, which poses a challenge to neo-corporatist policy-making in Flanders.

This unique book presents the first systematic overview of policy analysis activities in Belgium. Contributors from both sides of the Dutch-French language border (from research institutes in Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia) use original empirical data, through surveys and interviews with key players both within and outside government, to provide a comprehensive study of policy analysis in a multi-level polity. By the very nature of the Belgian experience, the volume is comparative, drawing conclusions on divergence and convergence of policy analysis, making it an important resource for both national and international scholars