Democracy in the Administrative State

Democracy's prospects and possibilities in a society where important decisions affecting individuals are made or carried out through public administrative bodies are the subject of this wide-ranging inquiry. Professor Redford's objective is to initiate a discussion, rather than to offer an exhaustive analysis, and to seek new insights into those areas where democracy and ad ministration converge.
The author first sets forth the basic moral tenets of democracy and the kinds of quandaries that arise in their application. He then analyzes those features of the administrative state that tend to concentrate influence, or to disperse it. His considera tion of the process of participation in the American political-administrative system results in a model of multi-directional influences on administration, and a definition of three levels of operative politics. These are micropolitics, in which individuals, companies, and communities seek benefits for themselves; subsystem politics, in which related agencies, congressional committees, and external groups interact in special areas concerned with public policy; and macropolitics, in which leaders in the government and the community at large are involved. There is a separate survey of the problems of protecting persons as the subjects of administration, and as its employees.