Secret Government

The Pathologies of Publicity

Brian Kogelmann author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Cambridge University Press

Published:26th Oct '23

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Secret Government cover

Offers a comprehensive philosophical analysis of transparency in government.

Political philosophers and theorists spend their time analysing political institutions, but thus far have ignored transparency. This book offers a comprehensive philosophical analysis of transparency in government, examining both abstract normative defences of transparency and transparency's role in the theory of institutional design.Among politicians and policy-makers it is almost universally assumed that more transparency in government is better. Until now, philosophers have almost completely ignored the topic of transparency, and when it is discussed there seems to be an assumption (shared with politicians and policy-makers) that increased transparency is a good thing, which results in no serious attempt to justify it. In this book Brian Kogelmann shows that the standard narrative is false and that many arguments in defence of transparency are weak. He offers a comprehensive philosophical analysis of transparency in government, examining both abstract normative defences of transparency, and transparency's role in the theory of institutional design. His book shows that even when the arguments in favour of transparency are compelling, the costs associated with it are just as forceful as the original arguments themselves, and that strong arguments can be made in defence of more opaque institutions.

'… Secret Government impressively and provocatively decenters publicity as a democratic value.' Mark Fenster, The Review of Politics

ISBN: 9781108978248

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: unknown

256 pages