Democracy Administration

In this publication is summarized our knowledge of democracy administration and democracy policy based on questionnaires and desk research done within the framework of the EPACE project.

The authors state that there seems to be a need for both policy and administrative support for a democracy renewal process stemming from the administrative logic of the state apparatus within democratic society. Political concerns can only effectively be transformed into government action when there is collective action at the government level to further promote finding answers to these particular concerns. It seems that the first step for a government would be to recognize the problem and to create an ad hoc policy to address the issues, then, after a pilot phase, governments would opt to provide the issue with stable administrative support.

The publication distinguishes four models of how the issues have been addressed by various countries. There is also provided an analytical summary of the main topics of democracy policy and the main functions of de- mocracy administration.The authors conclude that for too long our societies have been content with innovations in the private sector and have neglected the opportunities presented to us in the quest for better participatory democracy.The authors hope that this publication will encourage more and more serious, but at the same time very practical, thinking about how we can improve our democracies.