Communication

Communication, as the transmission, interpretation, and management of information, is one of the key concepts in the field of governance. Communication implies not only the meaning contained within ideas and language, but how these ideas are shaped, shared, organized, and altered throughout society. Communication is not limited to language, but also includes the actions and movements that communicate ideas. The French sociologist Emile Durkheim argued [Page 121]that the most important feature of all social and political interaction is communication. For Durkheim, communication is both the transmission of information, as well as the forms of coordination, conflict, and cooperation between individuals. Most importantly, communication is about creating a consensus for how society is to be understood and organized.

The German political theorist Jürgen Habermas deepened and specified this definition of communication. He argues that communicative action is a type of political action that is oriented toward reaching common understanding. In an ideal, democratic political environment, communication is the means to achieve consensus. It operates through dialogic discussions that aim for resolution of a particular problem or conflict. This form of communication, one that is free from political coercion, will allow the best, or most rational, argument to triumph and produce agreement in the public sphere.

Scholars of governance, while agreeing that communication is a key foundation of political life, do not assume that communication will produce consensus about how society should be organized or agree on how conflict should be resolved. In governance, communication is not only about information and persuasion, but also about processing, managing, producing, and organizing information. Theories of communication in governance examine how changes in social and political life alter more traditional forms of political communication. These theories argue that power in contemporary society is shifting from institutional structures to fluctuating codes of information, and now includes the ability to manage and organize information. Communication becomes less of a medium for transmitting information than a mode of operation in which communication itself transforms and produces information. Therefore, communication is constitutive of the contemporary network society, in which information is the main resource of governance. Communication has itself become management and regulation and is now the form, as well as the medium, of contemporary governance.

Governance scholars disagree on whether communication networks operate through human agency or system structure. Scholars using structural theories of governance argue that governance operates through organizational structures of communication, which include bureaucratic networks of information sharing, lines of hierarchical authority (or lack thereof), decision-making procedures, and functional roles of individuals within governance. Communication operates through these various networks that define and shape the nature of governance.

Scholars examining the human, as opposed to structural, side of governance, argue that people, not formal structures, are central to the process of communication. Personal influence and informal processes of information sharing are more crucial to the workings of governance than formal structures or bureaucratic procedures. These scholars find that shared interests, conflict, negotiation, personal relationships, power, and influence are the main forms through which communication networks operate in the area of governance.

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