This article contains a critical reflection on eXplainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI): the idea that AI based decision-making using AI should be transparent to people faced with these decisions. We discuss the main objections to XAI. XAI focuses on a variety of explainees, with different expectations and values; XAI is not a neutral activity, but very value-sensitive; AI is dynamic and so XAI quickly becomes obsolete; many problems are ‘wicked’, which further complicates XAI. In addition, the context of XAI matters – a high level of politicization and a high perceived impact of AI-based decisions, will often result in much criticism of AI and will limit the opportunities of XAI. We also discuss a number of alternative or additional strategies – more attention to negotiated algorithms; to competing algorithms; or to value-sensitive algorithms, which may contribute to more trust in AI-based decision-making.

Over the past four decades of its existence, Dutch public administration has developed into a science which mainly produces knowledge that either caters to a very specific scientific niche or aims to optimize policy processes in an instrumental fashion. This type of knowledge is not well equipped to provide answers or improve understanding of the challenges of our time. We argue that public administration needs to shift its focus more towards producing reflexive knowledge in the form of what we would call critical public administration. Based on the contributions in this special issue, this article outlines what the contribution of such a critical public administration could be. The article shows that, even though it is theory driven, critical public administration is close to policy practice and can fuel a productive public debate by imagining alternative futures.

If the stakes are high, policy researchers can find themselves under strong pressures from politicians or policy makers to compromise on issues like scope of a research project, research methodology, reporting, framing and interpretation of results, and timing of publication. Research organizations experiment with various formal and informal arrangements to cope with such pressures and guard their independence.
This article describes six coping strategies that are being explored by the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL). These are: i) taking control in determining the project scope and the research questions; ii) making responsibilities explicit and guarding respective roles; iii) installing a broad based societal project advisory group; iv) having some researchers in a project that interact with stakeholders, while keeping others at a distance; v) having a differentiated communications strategy; vi) being fully transparent as to hypotheses and uncertainties regarding data and models.
Safeguarding independence in research through formal rules and provisions is generally insufficient to protect research from undue stakeholder influence. Also changes in labor routines, relationship management and organizational cultures are needed, not only on the researcher side, but on the stakeholder side as well. This calls for dialogue and joint learning processes.

In his inaugural lecture entitled ‘From Pillars to Bubbles: The future of consensus governance in a globalized society’, Caspar van den Berg examines the consequences of economic and cultural globalization for the model of consensus governance that defined Dutch public administration for most of the 20th century. In doing so he presents an expansion and refinement of the Lijphartian model of consociationalism, and indicates which four factors supported consensus governance in the pillarized period, and how each of them has suffered erosion as globalization proceeded. It has become increasingly visible that globalization has differentiated effects for different groups in society, but also for different types of regions: booming regions benefit greatly from globalization, shrinking regions face major challenges. By combining recent insights from public administration, sociology, political science, economics and social geography, a new social order emerges, consisting of bubbles that are distinguished along socio-economic and territorial lines. These developments cause friction with regard to representation and decision-making at national, regional and local level. These are the themes on which the research within the Chair of Global and Local Governance will focus in the coming years.

Policy decisions taken now can determine the room for manoeuvre of future generations for a very long term. Politicians and civil servants often only seem to be interested in short-term implications, however. A major focus on the short term does not provide sufficient stability and impetus for long-term structural measures. This is primarily an institutional issue. In this article, the authors discuss how to instil a long-term focus in day-to-day processes of policymaking.

Societal and technological developments (such as the digital and energy revolutions) move faster than existing institutions can keep up with. The developments may lead to a metaphorical institutional void, which brings questions about the nature of the void, the changing rules, practices and responsibilities, and about the strategies to deal with the void. The concept has been around for a while but (again) seems relevant to understand current socio-technological innovations and challenges, that also allow us to further conceptualise the institutional void. In this introduction to the issue, we discuss the concept of an institutional void and explore how it is used in various domains of study, including public administration. We argue for how the concept is relevant today and therein also introduce the topics that are discussed in this special issue.

Infrastructure and adjacent areas represent extensive social value. However, infrastructure and areas are still often developed sectoral and independent. In the Netherlands, national spatial policies strive for combining infrastructure and area as one integrated approach as this is expected to result in more spatial quality. Taking this perspective, this article discusses trendy concepts in current Dutch planning, such as: adaptive planning, public and private cooperation and challenge-oriented approaches (‘opgave-gericht werken’ which focuses less on realising a project but more on the current and future issues and challenges in an area). This article argues that these concepts are closely related. Adaptive planning defines the rules of the game and the playing field, within which cooperation may develop. Cooperation is a means for creating spatial quality in interaction within this playing field. After all, generated quality can be considered as a contribution to the specific objectives and interest of the various partners. A challenge-oriented approach is the process for generating spatial quality from synergies in combined infrastructure and spatial development. This article aims to explore the relationships between adaptive planning, public and private cooperation and challenge-oriented approaches and to provide starting points for further research and discussion.

Policy evaluation has two main functions: it should lead to policy oriented learning and facilitate accountability. Rendering account is considered an important democratic duty but is not very popular with politicians and, hence, public officials. Learning is popular, but in practice it is often difficult to organize or, indeed, witness.
This contribution addresses the question how, in both functions, policy evaluation could be better utilized. As a starting point we the tension between scientific and political rationality and the barriers associated with these different worlds to the development of knowledge.
As indispensable for sound and productive knowledge management in government the article outlines the importance of societal values, policy effectiveness as a research angle, and the independence of researchers at major evaluations. In addition, relevant research questions, high methodological quality, responsiveness, good timing, and clear and accessible reporting are indispensable. It is argued that these are by no means abstract notions but can be brought into real day-to-day practice.
The conclusion is that a knowledge agenda for policy evaluation that is based on the search for effective policy interventions and societal values can help to bridge politics and science.

How far should governments go to keep their citizens safe? Not an easy question to answer, but the three books reviewed in this essay provide food for thought on this matter. Power (2004) describes how risk management could become such a dominant feature in today’s society while warning for the danger of risk management being misused to save one’s reputation if things do go wrong. Boutellier (2013) paints a picture of Dutch societal uncertainty and explains how crime became a part of Dutch risk society. According to Boutellier, Dutch government tries to deal with this complexity in an improvising manner. Van Duin, Wijkhuijs, and Jong (2013) present an edited volume of crises and incidents which happened in 2012. Lessons are drawn and warnings given, including the warning that it is impossible to prepare for all possible incidents, let alone plan everything ahead and distil those plans in rules and regulations.

Within the past two years, hydraulic fracturing for shale gas became a highly contested technology in the Netherlands. Possible negative environmental impacts are at strained terms with possible economic, energy and geo-political benefits. In addition, there are many scientific uncertainties about, for example water contamination, methane emissions, the amounts of gas to extract and the risk of earth quakes. Societal conflict and scientific uncertainties make fracking for shale gas a wicked problem for decision makers. This article demonstrates that the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs has implemented several instruments for deliberation, such as a consultation round with stakeholders and a sound board for an independent research. These failed to lead to the desired support for fracking. In this contribution, I demonstrate that these instruments led to reason giving but not to structuring of the problem. They were used by governmental actors and protest groups as a political platform that was fuel for the political conflict.

This article presents an analysis of the introduction of the HPV vaccine into the National Vaccination Program in the Netherlands. This introduction resulted in public debate and resistance and eventually a low turn-out (45% while 85% was expected). The question is what we can learn from this specific case about trust of citizens in scientific advice and political decision-making around medical issues. Our qualitative empirical research highlights that trust in scientific advice was undermined by a combination of criticism from peers, a critical approach in the mass media and a strong campaign through social media. Our analysis shows that these factors can be understood as partly resulting from a transition to a network society. We conclude that the network society demands a more open approach of scientific advice both in terms of who they discuss issues with and what kinds of arguments are permitted in the debate.

Climate change is often referred to as exemplary for ‘wicked’ problems. Wicked problems are referred to in literature as being inherently political problems without a clear definition or solution for which top-down steering using scientific knowledge is not fitting. Paradoxically, international climate change policy is organized in a quite top down manner in which scientific findings have a prominent role. In this paper we explore the effects of a deliberative approach to knowledge generation. We discuss two cases: an assessment of the credibility of the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports and the organization of a scientific dialogue on internet.

Concerns about mobile phone masts are often put down as unfounded fears of health risks. However, our ethnographic study of mast siting controversies shows that citizens mostly want to be democratically involved in the siting decisions. There is no room for such engagement in the national antenna policy, thus, citizens shift their attention to the possibility of health risks. The national government responds to this with more research and risk communication. However, the centrality of science leads to a shift in the discussion towards the credibility of science. Even a Klankbordgroep (Sounding Board) with all stakeholders fails to change the focus. This article shows that local conflicts are not so much the result of individual concerns, which is the subject of many social sciences studies, but are the outcome of a dynamic interaction between governments, citizens and scientists. Governments should not frame a local issue only in terms of a scientific problem.

This special issue focusses on deliberative elements in deciding over wicked problems. We present four case studies in which some form of deliberation was organized: the placement of mobile phone masts, hydraulic fracturing for shale gas, the failed HPV vaccination campaign and climate dialogues organized to enhance deliberative knowledge production over climate change. The case studies demonstrate how each of the deliberative processes has become politicized and that deliberative governance runs the risk of turning into a technocratic policy approach.

Dramatic incidents, such as the 1986 Challenger Disaster, induce the instalment of a Commission to investigate the process that lead to the incident. The Commission attempts to reconstruct the many smaller and larger steps towards the one or several decisions and actions that turned out to be vital – and sometimes fatal. Most Commissions serve a dual purpose; the want to learn lessons and avert similar incidents to occur again, but they are also part of a process to allocate responsibilities and – sometimes – to point the blame. An analysis of Commission-reports reveals two dominant patterns in the narratives Commissions produce. One is relatively simple and identifies the decision or action that caused the incidents; it shows the mistakes that were made, when and by who, The lessons is often to not make the same mistake again. The second pattern is more complicated and produces less ‘crisp’ explanations for the incident. Decisions, actions take place in ambiguous, complex and inherently uncertain contexts. Actors acts amidst such complexity, are subject to all sorts of dynamics and pressures and in the process do things that look awkward or wrong in hindsight. Mistakes happen, not because actors are not smart enough or do the wrong things, but because they are an inherent element of complex decision making. The lesson that follows from that is for organizations that make important decisions under complex conditions to organize checks and balances and look for heterogeneity in their processes. That produces a difficult dilemma, given the ambivalent role of commissions. The second line of reasoning produces much richer lessons for policy, but is very ‘soft’ in casting blame. The first line of reasoning is clearer about responsibility and blame, but oversimplifies the lessons. That draws attention to a crucial – and yet unanswered – question for researchers, practitioners and also the general public; do we see them as platforms for learning or tools for sanctioning?

In this contribution we analyze the content of the Veerman Commission’s report that in 2007/2008 advised the Dutch government on the necessity of measures to protect the coast against future rising waters and other climatological and environmental changes and challenges. We conclude that the content of the report is in itself an expression of the ongoing social and governmental debate and process that tries to create a sense of urgency since there is no real immediate crisis to facilitate changes. Thus the report is not only the result of the work of the commission (though its firm statements on the necessity of measures were clearly heard), but at the same time the reflection of an ongoing debate which also creates a new challenge for stakeholders in the water domain. The organizational recommendations of the commission to place the protection against rising waters as far away from day to day politics as possible have all been put into action, which is a noteworthy result. Still, it is the ongoing process between stakeholders that will determine the actual measures to be taken by the government water related bodies.

Problems with the rivers were the incentive to change Dutch flood safety policy in 2000. ‘A different approach to water’ became the new policy slogan. Government presumes that public engagement in decision-making on flood safety will lead to more water awareness and risk aware behaviour. ‘No or hardly any negative side-effects’ are expected from this strategy. However, our research shows that public engagement in flood safety decision-making leads to fierce policy contestation, since proposed solutions do not meet the safety perception of local citizens. ‘A different approach to water’ strategy does not resonate in Dutch society because most people are convinced that government guarantees water safety. In this article we explain that this so-called ‘myth of water safety’ is based on a deep frame of risk control. We argue that flood safety needs to be reframed and that a new frame should be based on acceptance of vulnerability instead of risk control.