Public deliberation and democracy: Low-level radioactive waste disposal facility siting policy in Germany, Canada, and the United States

This dissertation examines the role of public deliberation in the implementation of German, Canadian, and US low-level radioactive waste disposal facility siting policies. An analysis employing criteria derived from the theory of deliberative democracy exposes these siting attempts as imperfect examples of deliberative democracy. However, the analysis also shows that the Canadian and US cases feature some important elements of deliberative democracy, while the German case falls far short of this ideal. While Canadian and US policymakers adopted voluntary siting methods, their German counterparts followed the Decide, Announce, and Defend model of facility siting.; Voluntary siting promises to achieve effective citizen participation in public policymaking. It is only in the context of an open process of discussion and decision-making that local residents and communities can hope to assert a measure of democratic control over siting decisions. However, implementing voluntary siting principles is no easy task. Insofar as the voluntary siting model forces administrators to relinquish control over policy outcomes, the results of administrative procedures become less predictable. Yet unlike their German counterparts, Canadian and American administrators were prepared to exchange some predictability for more openness.; These contrasting approaches to public participation are explained in terms of these countries' state traditions. The participatory norms of bureaucratic agencies in pluralist political systems are more readily compatible with public deliberation than are those of corporatist countries. Efforts to make bureaucratic organizations more consistent with public deliberation will have to take these nationally specific conditions into account. I conclude that deliberatively democratic reforms may not significantly enhance democratic control over policy decisions where such reforms cannot be successfully linked to political institutions because the latters' values and standard operating procedures are incompatible with deliberative democracy.