European Policy Analysis Volume 2, Number 1, Spring 2016 | Page 141

European Policy Analysis

In terms of skills, policy workers
as problematizers need excellent ethical
awareness and sensitivity; skills in
productively dealing with or boundary
work between multi- and interdisciplinary
dimensions of scientific contributions
to policymaking (Hoppe 2014); and
simultaneous possession of analytical
acumen to judge the quality and/or the
bias or distortion in policy arguments,
and the rhetorical persuasiveness to bring
crucial ethical, scientific, and instrumental
messages across in a nonexpert like way
to differently socialized and unequally
educated audiences (Forester 1989).
Leadership skills like emotion control,
self-confidence, resilience, and patience
are also desirable qualities in policymakers
as problematizers and sense makers.

In terms of recognizable roles in
actual policymaking, one could think
of mediation specialists or consensus
builders in public disputes (Forester 1989;
2013; Susskind 2006). What sets mediators
apart from hard-bargaining negotiators
(mentioned in the previous section)
is that the former care deeply about
the relationship, trust, and credibility
with stakeholders or the broader public
once disputes are settled. According to
Landwehr (2014, 86–87) they not only
guard rules of procedure and moderate
the debate between stakeholder groups
with vested interests, but summarize
opinions and discussion results by
highlighting areas of (dis)agreement
and possible shared ground for solution.
Other discernable roles for policy workers
in problematizing practices deal with the
initiation, management, and results of
so-called deliberative mini-public policy
exercises. Next to the already discussed
role of a mediator, Landwehr (2014,
85–89) distinguishes between two more

possible roles for policy workers. The
“moderator” role is required in discussions
where all listeners may also be speakers,
and where the goal is establishing rational,
justified premises for policymaking, and
where passionate speaking or rhetoric is
considered inappropriate. An even more
demanding role is that of the “facilitator”,
which is to help a deliberative group
reach its own goals of achieving collective
action through inclusive but plurivocal
coordinated policy designs. No doubt,
given the variety of forms and goals of
deliberative policy exercises, more policy
worker roles could be distinguished and
will be discovered through systematic
research into deliberative democratic
practices.
In
science–policy
advisory
interaction, too, problematizing and
sense-making policy work is to be found,
for example, the role of honest broker
as depicted by Pielke (2007). Under the
almost “new normal” conditions where
policy disputes pivot around value
disagreements that cannot be resolved
by reduction of scientific uncertainties,
policy advisors—whether scientists or
not—are particularly hard-pressed to
make sense of the problematic situation.
In these conditions they have a choice to
become an “issue advocate”, who openly
and publicly sides with a particular policy
agenda or option proposed by one or a
coalition of stakeholders. Together with
the role of a “stealth advocate”— an issue
advocate who cloaks himself in the role of
a pure scientist—the “issue advocate” role
fits the set of policy workers’ roles under
the previously discussed label of taking
sides in the political struggle and strife.
But, moving over to the problematizing
and sense-making set of roles, the policy
worker may alternatively opt for the role

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