Political Experts, Expertise, and Expert Judgment

Abstract

Abstract The nature of expert judgment and the role of experts in society are core issues in political science. If policy makers want to make rational decisions about which of several policy options to implement, they will want to know which option is most likely to succeed in advancing the policy goal. But the answer is rarely plain. Moreover, there are a number of obstacles to assigning the role of policy adviser to experts as well as normative considerations about the interactions of these experts with policy makers. Before delving into the normative discussions, I discuss different definitions of the very notion of “expertise.” Next, I evaluate three ideal-typical models for the role of scientific experts in a democratic society, namely the decisionistic, technocratic, and pragmatistic model. I conclude that, for a democrat, the most defensible model of the role of experts in society is the decisionistic one.