What happens when transparency meets blame-avoidance?

Abstract

This article explores what happens when the much-discussed doctrine of transparency as a key to good governance meets the widely observed behavioural tendency of blame-avoidance in politics and public administration. It begins by discussing transparency as an idea and distinguishing different strains of the doctrine, proceeds to discuss blame-avoidance and to identify three common types of blame-avoidance strategy, and then explores what can happen when a widely advocated governance doctrine meets a commonly observed type of behaviour. The article identifies ways in which that conjunction can produce nil effects, side-effects and reverse-effects in the pursuit of transparency. It concludes that the tension between the pursuit of transparency and the avoidance of blame is at the heart of some commonly observed problems in public management, and suggests that something other than the ‘bureaucratic’ strain of transparency may be called for when those problems are serious.