The Level of Participation in Deliberative Arenas

Transcription

1 The Level of Participation in Deliberative Arenas Autoria: Leonardo Secchi, Fabrizio Plebani Abstract This paper ais to contribute to the discussion on levels of participation in collective decision-aking processes. We hypothesize that a higher or lower degree of participation depends on decision-specific factors (e.g., tie constraints, need for legitiacy, level of technicality) and participants factors (e.g., level of inforation and knowledge, otivation, participants collective decision costs). Soe of these eleents have a positive relationship with the level of participation and, as the group increases, these factors contribute to the potential quality of the decision. However, other factors have a negative relationship with the level of participation and, as the group increases, they har the decision-aking process in ters of costs (opportunity and transactional) and decision deadlocks. Bridging theoretical perspectives fro decision theory, organizational behavior and public choice, this paper suggests that the confrontation of costs and benefits of participation generates four basic norative streas that prescribe the level of participation. This paper also concludes that decision-akers should pay particular attention to an array of basic factors before choosing the level of participation of ebers in a deliberative arena. 1 Introduction Much has been written about contingent and non-contingent theories of participation in collective decision-aking (McGregor 1960, Vroo and Jago 1988). The non-contingent theories of participation assert that level of participation and leadership style are independent of environental aspects. In organizational theory, McGregor (1960) considers Theory Y, which has an optiistic view of huan nature and behavior, superior to its counterpart, Theory X (with a pessiistic view), and the results are an inclusive procedure in collective decision-aking processes. Norative-based understandings in political philosophy diverge in these aspects as well, soe streas preferring ore inclusive approaches and others prescribing ore autocratic ones. The non-contingent theories explicitly positively evaluate a deterined direction in what concerns inclusivity in collective decision-aking processes. The contingent theories of participation have a different perspective, and tell us that an ideal level of participation is dependent upon environental conditions. Soe exaples of these theories are Fiedler s contingency theory, Hersey and Blanchard s situational leadership, House s path-goal theory, Vroo-Yetton s odel of leadership style, and the Vroo-Jago revised odel of leadership style. All these odels rank the various factors differently, but all of the are contingent in the sense that the actions (Hersey and Blanchard, Vroo-Yetton, Vroo-Jago, House) or profiles of leaders (Fiedler) in decision-aking processes ust adapt to the perceived circustances. This paper attepts to contribute to the discussion about contingent theories on degrees of participation in deliberative processes. We understand deliberation as a collective discussion in which individuals speak and listen successively, seeking to reach a collective decision through an unbinding exchange of reasons and arguents (Curini 2006). Following this, our purpose is to better understand the ain factors that influence the suitability of an inclusive or an exclusive process of decision-aking in a deliberative arena. Our hypotheses have as points of departure the studies of Vroo-Jago (1988) for two reasons: firstly, because Vroo-Jago s odel captures several eleents and factors of other contingent odels (except Fiedler s focus on personality and profile of leaders) and overcoes soe of their shortcoings; and secondly, because our suppositions share several 1

2 eleents and influencing factors with the Vroo-Jago odel. The differences between our approach and those of the Vroo-Jago odel also will be discussed. Basically, the Vroo-Jago odel is a tool for anagers to decide the ost appropriate style of leadership or type of participation necessary in a proble-solving situation. Depending on twelve environental factors, the leader, in group proble situations, ust choose aong five options: 1) to decide on his own, using his own inforation, 2) to decide on his own, using inforation gathered fro his subordinates, 3) to decide on his own, sharing and discussing the proble and solutions with subordinates individually, 4) to decide on his own, discussing the proble and solutions with subordinates as a group, or 5) to decide collectively. The differences between our approach and Vroo-Jago odel are of crucial iportance. The first variation is that our propositions can only be applied to collective decision-aking processes in other words, to situations that are siilar to the 5 th option in the Vroo-Jago odel (1988, p. 33): You share the proble with your subordinates as a group. Together, you generate and evaluate alternatives and attept to reach agreeent (consensus) on a solution. Your role uch like that of a chairperson is to coordinate the discussion, keep it focused on the proble, and ake sure that the critical issues are discussed. What is iportant here is to understand the factors that influence participation level in deliberative processes, and not the type of participation or leadership style. Contrary to Vroo s and Jago s (1988, p. 54) assertion that each proble or decision is thought to represent a distinctive cobination of characteristics that ought to influence the leader s choice of leadership style, we propose that each collective proble or decision is thought to represent a distinctive cobination of characteristics (decision s specific and eber s specific) that ought to influence the level of participation. The type of participation in our odel is exogenous (a deliberative setting), and participation is understood as influence resulting fro a person s assuing an active role in a decision-aking process (Vroo and Jago 1988, p. 15). The second difference is that we recognize that the level of participation is a political outcoe. In the Vroo-Jago odel, it is a anagerial decision (unilateral). This difference obviously stes fro the type of organization that is considered. Vroo and Jago (1988) write their book for a anagerial public, ainly for private enterprises that are hierarchically settled, and in which the foral leader (or director) is expected to ake a decision. In our text, this kind of organization is considered, but also includes policy networks, citizen juries, consensus conferences, public and private councils, legislative coissions, and all kinds of foral and inforal organizations that use a deliberative process for a decision-aking. In our propositions, the group already exists; the proble is to define the aount or proportion of people that sit at the table. Consequently, we decline to use the ter subordinates (as do Vroo and Jago). We prefer the ter group ebers, not for aesthetic purposes, but rather for analytical differences. The relationship between ebers is not reduced to a leader follower setting and can include principal agent relations in which the principal is the group and the agents are soe ebers responsible for organizing eetings and facilitating the debate and other adinistrative tasks, elected or appointed by the whole group. The third difference is that we are not cofortable creating a tool for participatory decision-aking. In the Vroo and Jago odel, several assuptions lead the to construct a atheatical forula with each factor they consider relevant for deciding the style of leadership or type of participation. A anager can apply that forula in a range of decisionaking situations in order to calculate which type of participation is ost satisfactory. Our objective is ore odest in the sense that we try to explain how specific decision and participant factors can influence the level of participation, specifically in deliberative arenas. 2

3 Furtherore, in dealing with political decisions, a theory cannot prescribe the one best way to face the decision without aking soe risky assuptions such as efficiency is ore iportant than participant inclusion, or productivity outweighs legitiacy. Consequently, our propositions are less operational than the Vroo and Jago odel, but at the sae tie less siplistic. Other divergences with the Vroo and Jago odel concerning the properties of the factors (decision specific and participator s) will be discussed as the factors are presented. This paper s organization is described below. First, as a point of departure, we list several assuptions. Second, we describe all the relevant factors and their influence in collective decision-aking. Third, we attept to integrate these factors to predict their interrelations, using graphics and copared static analysis. Finally, we discuss the shortcoings of our propositions and indicate soe directions for future research. 2 Assuptions 1) Deliberative arenas have a center periphery relation that is, soe people assue greater roles, responsibilities, and status in the group than others. Legislative coissions have a president and executive secretaries; policy networks have facilitators and prooters; public and private councils have presidents, directors, and privileged council ebers. Understanding the oveent between lower and higher degrees of participation is iportant, priarily because, using this assuption, we avoid the chaos of who should assue responsibility in cases of autocratic decisionaking. In other words, at the very least, a iniu degree of hierarchy exists in deliberative arenas under this analysis. 2) In the analysis of decision-specific factors, the curve of contributions fro participants (inforation, knowledge) is the sae as the decision of the saple size in statistics. After a certain level, the contribution of a single additional participant becoes lower and lower. 3) In analyzing participant factors, the distribution of one s ability and willingness, behaves like a Gaussian curve (noral distribution). 4) In analyzing participant factors, the inclusion of ebers obeys the noral distribution, including first those who are ost capable and willing, and then others with successively lesser degrees of ability and willingness. 3 Decision specific factors The decision-specific factors are those that influence the participation level in deliberative arenas as they relate to the decision environent (e.g., tie constraints, need for legitiacy) and the type of decision (e.g., the iportance, the technicality). Soe of the have a positive relation with level of participation; others have a negative relation. 3.1 Technicality During the 1950s and 1960s, Herbert Sion founded the science of anageent decision, and fro that tie, the distinction between prograed and non-prograed decision-aking becae a referent in decision theory. Non-prograed decisions refer principally to novel and unstructured probles or issues, for which established procedures do not exist. As Sion (1960, pp ) argued, nonprograed decisions are predoinantly based on experience, insight and intuition. In these cases, participants creativity and inforation are essential for confronting a chaotic decision-aking process and to help frae the proble. On the other hand, prograed decisions refer principally to recurrent and technical probles, where useful inforation exists at the initial stages of the decision- 3

4 aking process. Prograed decision-aking uses standard procedures and personal or social habits in order to siplify the process. To narrow the dichotoy between prograed and nonprograed decisions in the participation trade-off, we assue that the ore prograed decision-aking becoes, the less need it has for ass participation. At one extree, a fully standardized decision-aking process will require only one person, or perhaps even none (autoatic decisions), to deal with it. At the other extree, a copletely chaotic decision-aking setting will require input fro a large nuber of people in order to fully understand the proble and propose alternative solutions. In short, when a collective faces a chaotic decision process, participant contributions tend to be high; when the decision process is highly structured, the benefits derived fro either higher or lower levels of participation tend to be the sae. Figure 1: Contribution in a nonprograed setting Figure 2: Contribution in a highly prograed setting Another factor influencing the level of technicality in a decision is the cost of participation in ters of coordination. Thorndike (apud Vroo and Jago 1988) akes an iportant contribution to these discussions involving the distinction between solving puzzles and constructing puzzles. We could nae construction of puzzles those situations where the objectives are not yet well defined, or in which the design of the work or proposal ust be highly coordinated and coherent. In solution of puzzles situations, the answer to the proble or the strategy for copleting an objective ust be built. Looking at experiental psychology studies, one ight conclude that groups are vastly superior to individuals in solving crossword puzzles and individuals are superior to groups in constructing the (Vroo and Jago 1988, pp ), because the efforts (or costs) of coordination in construction type situations are uch higher than in solution type situations. Naturally, this decision-specific factor is not only applied to puzzles, crosswords or Sudoku, but also to an aple array of collective decision-aking processes. The costs of coordination behave like a logarithic function (with iniu value for the y axis being zero) if the decision situation is construction type, as figure 3 below illustrates. In an ideal situation with no coordination costs, this factor would not influence the inclusivity dilea. Coordination costs Coordination costs Contribution Contribution 4

5 Figure 3: Coord. costs in a construction type setting Figure 4: Coord. costs in a solution type setting The relationship we can observe between these two eleents of technicality is that, when a decision is copletely non-prograed and the costs of coordination are null (other factors reaining the sae), a higher level of participation is ore likely. When the decision situation is extreely structured and the coordination costs are high (other factors reaining the sae), then the level of participation tends to be low. The interediate level of these two eleents of technicality prograability and costs of coordination naturally will iply unforeseen outcoes. Needless to say, a proble becoes increasingly structured through a learning process as it recurs ore often or as the decision-akers create tools to understand its liits and properties. For exaple, in a hospital, the deterination to pursue surgical intervention for the treatent of a recurring physical ailent is a solution-type decision, and at the sae tie, highly prograable. If the patient, however, exhibits extreely contradictory syptos or an unknown disease, the decisions involved in treatent are still solution type, but in this case, the proble is no longer prograable because of the novelty and lack of inforation necessary to solve it. In the first case, no participation (or a lower level of participation) is needed to justify the surgery decision the decision of one or ten physicians would be the sae in precision and quality. In the second case, leaving aside other factors such as eergency, the need for participation to understand the proble and propose a solution is relatively high for instance, in surveying the experiences of other edical experts and hospitals, and gathering inforation fro the literature. Through this line of thought, we can conclude that the need for coordination (solution type versus construction type) is not the sole deterinant of the level of participation. Neither will the level of structure of a proble or decision situation deterine the level of participation. An analysis of the interaction of these two technical factors is required in order to understand the influence on the level of participation. Vroo and Jago (1988) ention in their book the influence of the type of proble (solution or construction of puzzles), but they did not develop it in their odel, focusing only on the Sion distinction between prograable and nonprograable decisions, as concerns the technicality of a decision. We regard both eleents as crucial to the analysis of participation in deliberative processes, in which Sion s distinction plays a role in the analysis of potential contribution of participants and Thorndike s in the analysis of coordination costs. One point that we are setting aside in the technicality issue is the classical distinction in the anagerial sciences between operational, tactical and strategic decisions. At the first glance, one could say that the technicality level is directly related to the level of coplexity and far-reaching effects of a decision. Nonetheless, epirical research (Cray et al, 1994, Papadakis et al., 1998), finds that an array of strategic decisions exists that can be arrived at through prograed processes, eanwhile operational decisions can face an uninfored decision-aking process. 3.2 Urgency Tie is a precious resource priarily in eergency or crisis situations. In such situations, the tie becoes extreely valuable, and debating, elaborating individual positions, and reaching utual understanding tend to be particularly difficult. However, if the group has aple tie, the tie aspect does not factor into the participation decision, and other factors can ore greatly influence the participation dilea. Papadakis et al. (1998) prefer to call this factor pressure or tie pressure. Vroo and Jago (1988) call it tie constraint. 5

6 Ignoring other factors that can influence the participation dilea, the urgency factor negatively affects the level of participation, as the figure below illustrates. The blue line indicates the relationship between tie costs and the aount of participation in a situation of high urgency. The black line indicates the sae relationship when tie constraints are odest, and the red line indicates a situation in which tie is plentiful. high urgency Tie costs ediu urgency low urgency Figure 5: Tie costs and level of participation Iagine a situation in which, seconds before landing, an airplane suddenly encounters another aircraft directly in its flight path, and the pilot has a ere three seconds to alter the plane s route and avoid catastrophe. In this situation, the pilot is not able to consult co-pilots, check route aps, or get perissions fro the air traffic control tower. Tie in this scenario is a scarce resource, and indecision will exact high costs in lives and aterial loss. Conversely, if there were no tie constraint, the tie costs would be low and the level of participation would not be (or would be inially) affected by the urgency factor. 3.3 Need for legitiacy The need for legitiacy adds coplexity to the level of participation in a deliberative arena. Making decisions collectively can be a very coplex process. A crucial eleent to the legitiacy factor is that a decision s effect potentially could ipact people who were excluded fro the decision-aking process. For this reason, achieving the highest level of legitiacy possible is essential in soe decision-aking situations. Naturally, it depends on the particular traits of the issue at hand in particular, the presence or absence of a group hierarchy, the extent of the decision s effects on the population at large, the iportance of the decision, and the roles of the ipleentation process and of the actors involved. The presence of a clear and accepted hierarchy inside the group negatively affects the need for legitiacy. The presence of recognized leadership within a group is a delegation of powers, where power is priarily the power to decide. This delegation process can occur in any ways and through different ethods. The iportant point is that if a group lacks hierarchy, then the need for legitiacy, and consequently participation, tends to be high, whereas if soeone in a group is granted decision authority, participation will depend ore heavily upon other aspects of the issue. There are any types of decisions and any ways to classify the. One way to distinguish one decision fro another is suggested by the concept of Pareto efficiency (Capano and Giuliani, 1996). Collective decisions are those whose effects are felt beyond the liits of the decision-aking group. In this sense, there are two kinds of collective decisions in relation to their effects. 6

7 Given a group coposed by n individuals, decisions are ade that take the group fro a Situation A to a Situation B, in which every person s condition iproves. We say that State B is Pareto-superior to State A. For this kind of decision, legitiacy is less urgent since everyone would prefer state B, and no one suffers ill effects. For decisions that would ove the group fro Situation A to Situation B, where soe individuals would lose utility and others gain utility as a result, a higher degree of legitiacy is required. For exaple, the lack of legitiacy in regulatory activity within the European Union and the European Coission, in particular has been often justified in this way. Efficiency oriented policies (decisions) require, at best, a weak degree of deocratic control because they aspire to Pareto-efficient solutions that are in everyone s interests (Majone, 1993). The need for legitiacy positively affects participation level in the deliberative arena. This does not ean that the relationship between the need for legitiacy and level of participation is a deterinistic one; the higher the need for legitiacy, the ore we will find participation. As indicated earlier, the level of participation is a result of a strategic choice of decision akers. In the face of a Pareto-efficient decision, there is less need to increase the level of participation. In ters of the quality and results of a decision, the nuber of participants becoes less iportant than the level of inforation collected. In a Paretoinefficient decision, increasing the level of participation is only one of the choices available. Decisions in an organizational context can also be classified for their degree of iportance to the life of the organization. Soe decisions ight affect all organization ebers to a siilar extent, but they can also vary in their iportance. This feature is directly connected with the need for legitiacy. If the issue under discussion pertains to routine organizational atters, the need for legitiacy likely will not play a key role, and the level of participation will probably be low. If the issue on the table is critical to the orgainzation s existence, the need for legitiacy, coeteris paribus, should increase and with that, the level of participation. Public policy studies underlined the non-neutral role of bureaucracy in the ipleentation process (Lowi 1969, Lipsky 1980, McCubbins and Schwartz 1984). These studies showed how a decision ade in a political arena could be distorted during its ipleentation. The iplication is that bureaucratic preferences ust be weighed carefully so that decision-akers can see a decision through. This suggests that an increased level of participation would produce a better decision in ters of ipleentation. However, in certain cases, decision-akers are not interested in the ipleentation of their decision. Such is the case of sybolic policies. Sybolic policies are defined as particular types of collective decision, characterized by authorities who, though pronounce judgent, have no interest in its execution (Gustafsson, 1983). In the cases of sybolic decision, even if Pareto-inefficient, the level of participation is not required to increase and probably will reain low. Other factors aside, the need for legitiacy positively affects the level of participation. Need for legitiacy 7

8 Figure 6: The relation between need for legitiacy and level of participation In the figure above, we consider the need for legitiacy as a continuous variable, not a dichotoous one. With figure 6 we wish to point out that if we have two situations that are clearly siilar, respect all the other factors, but show different levels of need for legitiacy, we would expect to find a higher level of participation in the situation where the need for legitiacy is higher. One of the consequences, illustrated in the graphic below, is that the need for legitiacy portends soe costs if the necessity is not satisfied. The discussion above elaborated how the need for legitiacy should iprove the level of participation in a decision arena; however, we ust also exaine the other side of the coin. If a situation requires legitiacy, but the level of participation reains low, certain costs will be exacted fro the decision-akers. The costs will be higher or lower depending on the nuber of people involved in the decision-aking the higher the level of participation, the less the cost. It is iportant to ephasize that this relation is affected by the level of the need for legitiacy. If need for legitiacy can be considered as a continuous variable, we can see different levels of need in different arenas. This differentiation is not neutral for the relation between the costs of a non-legitiated decision and the level of participation. These considerations can be represented as follows: Levels of need for legitiacy Costs of a non-legitiated decision High Mediu Low Figure 7: The relation between the costs of a non-legitiated decision and level of participation in three different need for legitiacy situations As Figure 7 shows, the cost decreases when the level of participation increases. The value of the costs differs (within different level of need for legitiacy) only when we have low levels of participation. When levels of participation ove closer to encopassing the whole population, these costs disappear in all three situations. 4 Participant s factors Contributing to a deliberative process depends on potential participants readiness to becoe involved. As proposed by Hersey and Blanchard (1993), readiness can be understood as a cobination of ability and willingness. In this section, we deal with ability. Ability is the knowledge, experience, and skill that an individual or group brings to a particular task or activity (Hersey and Blanchard, 1993, p. 189). And willingness is the extent to which an individual or group has the confidence, coitent, and otivation to accoplish a specific task (p. 189). In our case, the specific task is participating in a deliberative process, which involves speaking and listening, scrutinizing a proble, proposing alternative solutions, and actively helping the group to deliberate. 8

9 Taking into consideration Hersey and Blanchard s contribution, in this section we will develop the discussion of three participant factors that can influence the level of participation: ability, collective decisions costs, and otivation (as the core eleent of willingness). 4.1 Ability Ability to participate includes availability of inforation, knowledge, experience, creativity, and group anageent capacities. The presence of different ental perspectives (Schön and Rein 1994) aong participants is iportant as well in order to handle the proble or the proposition of solutions in a ore diverse and creative way and to avoid groupthinking. Both eleents play an iportant role in the participation dilea. These eleents have a positive relationship with participation, and as the group increases, the higher the potential contribution fro participants for a quality decision. The iportant aspect of analysis when considering the ability to participate is the difference between the aounts of inforation, perspectives, creativity, etc., available when deciding ore centrally, and the aount of these resources when including ore group ebers in the deliberative process. It is not an absolute factor, but a relative one: the contribution fro the periphery (in ters of ability) in coparison to that available in the center. An iportant consideration ust be ade regarding the selection of participants. Naturally, individuals possess different levels of ability (variation of ability). If one of the objectives of the deliberative process were to iprove the quality of decisions, a crucial decision would be who to let in and who to keep out. An efficient based criterion would be to preferentially let sit at the table those individuals perceived to possess greater ability, and to keep out the others. Assuing that this variation in ability is distributed as a noral curve, the accuulated contribution fro participants could be illustrated as follows: Contribution Figure 8: Accuulated contribution of participant s ability Let s copare, for exaple, a software copany coposed by a half-dozen partners/co-workers and a classic taylorist autoobile copany in the 1930s (with hierarchical structure and specialization), in a crucial strategic decision-aking situation. The ability and willingness to analyze arket threats and opportunities and copany strengths and weaknesses tend to be uch ore positive aong individuals in the software copany case. Ideally, they all have ability in ters of good foration, technical inforation, general understanding of the copany s environent. They are expected to interact and exchange inforation as peers regarding day-to-day operations, providers, consuers, etc. They all exhibit willingness, in ters of being partners in the copany and deonstrating intense coitent and otivation to addressing strategic issues of the copany. A different understanding could be applied to the autoobile copany, in which contributions fro individuals at the lower and interediate levels of the bureaucracy are too few (in ters of 9

10 foration and general understanding) to justify the inclusion of everybody (or a large nuber of workers) in the strategic decision arena. 4.2 Level of participant s otivation The quality of a decision also depends on, aong other things, the willingness of group ebers to participate actively in a deliberative arena. One of the ain reasons for creating a participative arena is to reach all the interests that play a role in or suffer the consequences of the decision. In other words, with a high level of participation, the level of inforation ade available increases, and this provides better conditions under which to reach a good decision. In doing so, they expect that the quality and the effectiveness of the decision increase. Participants otivation is a decisive factor in this process, for two reasons. Firstly, because coprehending otivated participants in the arena eans to be able to axiize their contribution. Secondly, if participants are otivated, a real pluralistic arena can raise and all the opinions can coe up. If the collective proble is dealt with in a participative way, then otivated participants are needed; otherwise, that arena would uselessly increase the transaction costs of that decision (the only case in which this could be done is when constituting a participative arena is part of a sybolic policy). Public choice, but not only, can suggest soe considerations about the influence of participants otivation on the goals of level of participation. Assuing that otivated participants are essential, the ethods of selecting the participants play a non-neutral role in selecting otivated people (Regonini 2005). Participation can be spontaneous or not. If participation is spontaneous, then there are no selection criteria and the arena is copletely open to everybody. The risk is called high deanders or preference outliers (Regonini 2005). If participation is spontaneous, those who have fervent opinions about the issue will be over-represented in the arena, to the detrient of the plurality s opinions and preferences (Olson 1965). If participation is not spontaneous, things are ore coplicated. Public choice studies can help with deonstrating the effects of selection ethods on the ai of having otivated participants. In particular, Downs (1957) assues that non-participatation (abstention) is the result of a rational choice. Method of selection odifies this valuation creating incentives for participation. The risk here is adverse selection. The proble is that these incentives will probably be ore persuasive to people for who the costs of participation do not copete with other spheres of their lives; the risk is selecting eccentric people (Regonini 2005), ore otivated for the expressive benefits of participation than for the issue they will deal with. The second reason for getting otivated participants is directly related to the first. One of the reasons for eploying participation is to be able to hear the any different interests linked with the issue discussed. The objective is to stiulate a pluralistic arena. To reach this goal, participation through incentive is not enough. A pluralistic arena is an arena where different voices and different opinions coe up. The spiral of silence theory (Noelle- Neuann 1984) suggests that an arena coprised of people with differing opinions will not necessarily give rise to a pluralistic discussion. Following this theory, the expression of personal opinion regarding collective proble solving is an interactive choice. Furtherore, a person, before expressing his/her opinion, considers the proportion of opinions already expressed and decides, on that basis, to express the or not. Obviously, faced with the sae proportion of expressed opinions, not everyone will ake the sae decision. There s a kind of threshold that varies fro one person to another (Noelle-Neuann 1984). The value of this threshold depends on the level of otivation of the person. In the arena, otivated people will express their opinion even if no one shares it. Less-otivated people will not express their opinion unless at least a great portion of the arena shares it. It is clear that the presence of 10

11 otivated people will increase the level of pluralis; that is the ai for which deliberative arenas are introduced. The spiral of silence is treated like a property rising fro the interaction between individual beliefs (threshold) and observed behaviors. It is deonstrated (Curini 2006) through the application of agent-based odels on the spiral of silence theory, that reaching a pluralistic equilibriu (hearing different opinions and then, inforation) around a table is a very difficult goal. The third reason is suggested by Steiner (1972), who connects the size of a group with its ebers otivation. As Steiner (1972, p. 84) clais, any studies show that there is evidence suggesting that individuals are less willing to do their best when the group of which they are ebers is large than where it is sall. This evidence coes fro Shaw s studies (1960); for exaple, he copared the willingness of ebers of large and sall groups to work on behalf of their associates. Shaw (1960) stresses that people who are responsible for perforing a large share of the total task are ore strongly otivated to perfor well than are individuals who are responsible for a sall share. In other words, people s willingness depends on their contribution being decisive for the goal of the group. The sae suggestion arrives fro prisoner s dilea literature that deonstrates that the ore a person s contribution is decisive, the ore he or she is likely to participate in the production of the public good (Nagel 1987). In a sall group, if people find that their individual absence in participation would affect the consequence, they are likely take part in order to axiize their utilities. When individuals feel that their participation will ake little difference to the consequence, rational individuals tend not to take part. It is iportant to highlight that the level of participants otivation affects their level of participation. If participants otivation is high, the decision-aking effort will directly benefit fro their participation; the higher the otivation, the greater the benefits and, indirectly, the higher the level of participation. We can describe this relation as follows: Benefits fro participation Participants otivation Figure 9: The relation between the participant s otivation and the level of benefits fro participation We have showed how the level of otivation affects the benefits of participation. At the sae tie, we know how soe factors act on the level of otivation (in particular, the effects of selection s ethods and the size of the group). Now we want to illustrate the relation between the level of participation and the benefits of the participation in three different participants otivation situations. Levels of participants otivation Benefits fro participation High Mediu Low 11

12 Figure 10: Level of participation and the participation s benefit s in three levels of participants otivation Benefits fro participation are affected in a particular way by the level of participation. The for of this curve can be clearly understood by considering the prior discussion about participants otivation in relation to group size. In fact, beyond a given level of participation, otivation decreases and in doing so affects the participation s benefits. 4.3 Collective decision costs In this last section, we briefly describe the ain costs inherent in the collective process of decision-aking: opportunity costs and transaction costs. Collective decision costs are here considered participant s factors because they vary accordingly with the characteristics of group ebers. Opportunity costs in econoic sciences refer to the costs of giving up an alternative allocation of a specific resource. In our analysis of collective decision-aking, even though a group dedicates tie to the exchange of inforation, experience and fraes, it still has to consider that individual ebers could be involved otherwise in other tasks. Needless to say, soe groups and individuals suffer ore opportunity costs than others, but what is constant is that the inclusion of a larger nuber of group ebers in the deliberative arena will iply larger individual, and often collective, opportunity costs. Opportunity Costs Figure 11: The relation between opportunity costs and level of participation By transaction costs, we ean costs related to the task of gathering inforation, adinistrative costs of enabling a collective decision-aking process, and bargaining costs in seeking utual understandings aong participants. When building a deliberative arena, resources are invested in tasks such as calling or inviting participants, preparing the eeting, arranging physical space for the discussion, etc. If we consider the deliberative process like a transaction, as in Coase s ters (Coase 1960), the total cost involved in the organization of the exchange has to be considered. Even the geographical dispersion of group ebers, as pointed out by Vroo and Jago (1988), is relevant to the analysis of adinistrative costs involved in organizing a deliberative environent. Other eleents of transaction cost are the costs of gathering inforation (Coase 1960). As an exchange of views, a deliberative process spends resources (tie and other) aking individual contributions coe up, standardizing languages, analyzing and integrating point of views (Bartol and Martin 1991). An iportant eleent related to the creation of utual understanding and bargaining cost is the variation of preferences between participants. The greater the preference differential aong the participants, the ore the bargaining costs increase. 12

13 While inforation, knowledge, experience and the other ability-related eleents have a positive relation with level of participation, the sae cannot be said for variation of preferences. As discussed earlier, if the issue on the table is very coplex, reason dictates that different viewpoints and different ways of fraing the proble will be necessary. Such variety of opinion escalates the transaction costs, especially in ters of bargaining and consensus building. Soething siilar is highlighted by Steiner (1972, p. 107): Heterogeneity with respect to a given attribute (in our case, preferences) ay augent potential productivity but greatly increase the coplexity of the process that ust occur in order for the group to realize its full potential. In this sense, the level of participation will depend on how divided the whole population is on the issue at hand. The ore at odds the population is, the ore the transaction costs will increase as the level of participation increases. When the group is less divided on an issue, an increase in the nuber of participants causes relatively little increase in the transaction costs. Naturally, all these eleents of transaction costs behave separately, but all of the have a positive acceleration as the nuber of participants in the deliberative arena increases, and having a negative relation with level of participation. Variation of preferences High Transaction costs Mediu Low Figure 12: The relation between the level of participation and the transaction costs in three situations: High, ediu and low variation of preferences within the group 5 Factor s interaction Having defined the factors that influence the level of participation, we now provide a discursive exercise of coparative statistics that will show how various eleents can affect the level of participation. In a certain sense, the quality of a decision can be considered as a situational concept. There is no absolute concept of quality in decision-aking; the concept is, by definition, a relative one. Fro this point of view, it can be seen as a tentative definition of the conditions for a high-quality decision in various contexts, in relation to the level of participation. Each factor we entioned before affects participation level and the attept to reach a high-quality decision. These factors refer to decision-specific features and to participants characteristics. Soeties, their effects on participation level are not easy to recognize, because effects are ediated by other characteristics. The table below clarifies these relations: FACTORS EFFECT ON LEVEL OF PARTICIPATION Urgency Negative Decision specific Technicality Positive (for unprograed decisions) Negative (for construction type decisions) Need for legitiacy Positive 13

14 Ability Positive Motivation Positive Participant s Collective decision costs Negative Table 1: Factors and their effects on the level of participation These are the effects of single factors on the level of participation. When we look at the arenas in practice, we experience the effects of these factors all together, and the situation appears ore coplicated. Consider two situations in which the level of urgency is very different; other factors being equal, when degree of urgency is low, increased participation increases the quality of the decision, whereas when the level of urgency is high, a greater level of participation will not increase the quality of the decision. Soe results can be considered as paradoxes. Iagine a context where participants preferences vary greatly. Such a situation runs the risk of skewing decisions toward those who plead their cases ost vigorously. At the sae tie, however, such conditions negatively affect the increasing level of participants. Looking at differing values within the various factors changes the effect that participation level has on decision quality. Factors influencing participation level and usefulness soeties are not very clear. For exaple, in a situation where the need for legitiacy and urgency are both great, there ust be a trade-off between the two. In analyzing the relationships aong factors, trade-offs ust be recognized. Situations abound in which participation level s effect on the quality of a decision is not so obvious. The theoretical developents described in this paper indicate that the larger the nuber of participants sitting at the bargaining table, the greater will be the potential contribution (benefits) for exaple, with inforation and legitiacy. But at the sae tie, this anner of decision-aking increases an array of costs, including transactional and opportunity costs. The graphic below illustrates this collective decision dilea. The blue line indicates the aggregate benefits of participation. The red line indicates the aggregate costs of participation. Finally, the green line is the outcoe of the subtraction between the benefits and costs. Benefits and Costs on a c d Benefits (inforation, fraes, etc) Costs (opportunity, transactional, etc) Marginal Contribution of Participation b Figure 13: Marginal contribution of participation and norative streas Fro this analysis, we can better understand four ain norative streas in what concern level of participation. Two of these streas are non-contingencial, and the other two are contingencial. 14

15 The two non-contingencial streas ignore all the factors described in this paper. They only support their position based on ontological understandings and beliefs. At one end of the spectru is the position concerned solely with the decision itself, and an extreely negative perception of the potential contribution fro participants. Maxis like the shepherd has to guide the herd, or soe people are born to lead, others to follow are expressions of this position. McGregor s (1960) theory Y on style of leadership synthesizes this approach, which is indicated with point a in the graphic above. At the other end of the spectru are those who evaluate participation and social inclusion in the debates as an end to the process, not a eans. That is to say, this line of prescription does not consider the costs of participation, or at least has inial influence in the prescription of participation. In political philosophy, the deontological thought supports this type of prescription based on the value that no person should be sacrificed (in this case, let out of the debate) for an end (in this case, aking a decision). This line of thought is indicated by point b. Conversely, the contingencial streas of prescription will naturally consider any case at a tie, before indicating the level of participation. These streas consider that the contingencial factors are of a high iportance. Point c in the graphic is the target of the efficientist approach. This utilitaristic strea perceives participants as resource for a good decision. The objective is to enlarge the deliberative arena until the optial level of arginal contribution is reached; in other words, until the point in which the acceleration of the benefits curve is surpassed by the acceleration of costs curve. This line of thought was strongly developed by the anagerial theory in the second half of 20th century, and Vroo and Jago s (1988) odel is one expression of it. Finally, point d would be considered an appropriate prescription for the participativecontingencial strea. That norative base is asserts that participation has a value in itself. However, participation is not the only objective for constituting a deliberative arena, and the costs of participation are to be considered as well. The prescription in this case would be to include the axiu nuber of people in the discussion until a threshold is et, in which the aggregate contribution of participation is overcoe by the aggregate costs of participation. In this case, the highest level of participation is reached and, at the sae tie, decision deadlocks and treendous participation costs are avoided. Needless to say, aong these four iportant streas of prescription exists an infinite nuber of ideal positions. Nonetheless, we believe that these four can synthesize the ain lines of prescription that are present when evaluating the level of participation in deliberative arenas. 6 Conclusion The priary shortcoing of our proposition is that we did not include in the analysis the potential effects of externalities derived fro the process of participation in a deliberative arena. One could list positive externalities, such as individual and group developent, creation of stronger links between participants, etc. On the other hand, negative externalities could coe up as diffusion of secret inforation, or conflict with destructive effects caused by a radical disagreeent concerning key points of the discussion. Certainly the externalities, both positive and negative, have an influence in the level of participation. However, as we are not able to predict the negative or positive externalities without knowing the idiosyncrasy of the arena (psychological traits of group ebers, cultural traits of the group, history of interactions within that group, etc), we focused on factors (decision specific s and participant s) that have inherent positive or negative relationships with level of participation. The goal of a high-quality decision requires, as any scholars state, a high level of participation. This is why, any ties, decision akers decide to increase the nuber of 15

16 participants in decision-aking. Are there soe situations in which a high-quality decision can be produced with a low level of participation? Our response is yes. Even when we consider the quality of decision concept outside of the decision arena (then coprehending the ipleentation process), there are soe circustances in which a high level of participants could be detriental. Do situations exist in which a low level of participation can provoke enorous costs (legitiacy, for exaple)? Our answer again is yes. The factors and their interaction play a key role in sizing up the arena. In our opinion, the level of participation is a political outcoe and this outcoe is linked with soe participant factors and soe decision-specific factors. The list of factors we provide here is a tool that could generate a wide range of hypotheses on where and when a high (or low) level of participation in decision-aking is liable to occur. This set of hypotheses should be tested epirically as the next step. 7 References BARTOL, Kathryn M, MARTIN, David C. (1991) Manageent. New York: McGraw-Hill. CAPANO, Giliberto, GIULIANI, Marco (a cura di). Dizionario di politiche pubbliche, La Nuova Italia Scientifica, Roa, 1996 COASE, Ronald (1960). The Proble of Social Cost, in Journal of Law and Econoics, v. 3, no. 1, pp CRAY, David, HAINES JR., Georg H., MALLORY, Geoffrey R. (1994) Prograed Strategic Decision Making: The View Fro Mintzberg's Window. British Journal of Manageent. Vol. 5, pp CURINI, Luigi (2006). Vox populi vox Dei? (alcuni) liiti e (alcuni) paradossi della pratica deliberativa. Rivista Italiana di Scienze Politiche (forthcoing) DOWNS Anthony (1957). An econoic theory of deocracy, New York: Harper and Row. GUSTAFSSON, Gunnel (1983). Sybolic and pseudo policies as responses to diffusion of power, Policy sciences, n. 15. HERSEY, Paul, BLANCHARD, Kenneth H. (1993) Manageent of organizational behavior. 6. ed. Englewood Cliffs : Prentice-Hall. LIPSKY, Michael (1980) Street-level bureaucracy: dileas of the individual in public services. New York, Russell Sage Foundation. LOWI, Theodore (1969) The end of liberalis. New York: Norton. MAJONE, Giandoenico (1993). The European Counity between social policy and social regulation, Journal of coon arket studies, Vol. 32 n.2. McCUBBINS, Mathew D., SCHWARTZ, Thoas (1984) Congressional oversight overlooked: police patrols versus fire alars. Aerican Journal of Political Science 28 (1): McGREGOR, Douglas (1960). The huan side of enterprise. New York: McGraw-Hill. NAGEL, Jack H. (1987). Participation. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. OLSON, Mancur (1965). The logic of collective action, Cabridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. PAPADAKIS, Vassilis M., LIOUKAS, Spyros, CHAMBERS, David. (1998) Strategic decision-aking processes: the role of anageent and context. Strategic Manageent Journal, vol. 19, pp REGONINI Gloria (2005), Paradossi della deocrazia deliberativa, Stato e Mercato n. 1, SCHÖN, Donald.A., REIN, M. (1994), Frae Reflection: Toward the resolution of intractable policy controversies, New York: Basic Books. SHAW, David M, (1960). Size of share in task and otivation in work groups. Socioetry, n