Locating the modernist state. On whether or not modernist principles govern contemporary policy practice

Abstract

Modernism is the belief in a world that can be understood in objective terms and controlled as such. Even though it is commonly understood to be a naïve worldview, public administration theorists believe it to still aptly describe the modus operandi of modern states—albeit in more subtle forms. This raises the question whether that makes civil servants naïve modernists, or whether theories of the modernist state are oversimplifying government practice. This study explores this question by means of interviews with civil servants involved in decision making processes on infrastructure investments. It finds that modernist norms do not describe an actual practice, but reflect the language used to legitimize a practice in which policy makers are driven by a desire to act rather than objective knowledge about the world. Consequently, the study argues that the question we should be asking ourselves is not why states still operate according to modernist principles, but why civil servants legitimize their practice with a set of norms that does not seem to describe it.