Institutional Design in Democratic Contexts

Abstract

I. TRANSCENDING EXISTING INSTITUTIONST his paper considers the design and redesign of political institutions.Speci®cally, it discusses how the signi®cance of design may be affected by key institutional features of contemporary democratic polities. The ®rst question is: To what degree do democratic contexts create a viable space for institutional designÐmaking design necessary, politically feasible and legitimate? The second question is: What kind of processes tend to make designers able to exploit the available space of design?The paper aims at going beyond the idea that design can best be understood as a process of problem-solving or power-struggle over policy-bene®ts in terms of prede®ned preferences and powers. It argues that design is more likely when designers exploit shifting political attention and the con¯uence of temporary, favorable circumstances; when they stabilize attention over extended periods; and when they trigger self-driving processes that make design independent of one-shot, grand decisions that change an institutional arrangement at once. Design is, furthermore, more likely when political actors evoke aspects other than an institution's instrumental valueÐin particular deontological concerns. Finally, design is more likely when political actors take into account how the working of institutions depends on properties of the citizens, not only rules and incentives; and when they take into account how institutions fashion, not only regulate, citizens. A. THEORETICAL ASPIRATIONSJohn Stuart Mill thought that a proper understanding of how political institutions are constituted, sustained and transformed would require reconciliation of two old traditions. One was interpreting change instrumentally, as a matter of social

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