The worth of policy knowledge in younger democracies: reflections and perspectives
The worth of policy knowledge in younger democracies: reflections and perspectives

Summary/Abstract: Knowledge is supposed to be one of the most important values of our life. When speaking about it we have to be aware of its complexity and integrity. Knowledge is in a way omnipresent in all fields of our every-day living, and this fact makes it a necessary condition for the quality of well-being. In a way we can claim that no single field of our existence can get by without knowledge. In this article the central interest is oriented towards understanding the role of knowledge in the field of policy science and the worth of policy knowledge in and for democratic policy-making. A very special emphasis is in this regard placed on the conditions of policy knowledge in the younger democracies that have evolved from democratisation processes, reaching their zenith in the late 1980s in the territories of ex-socialist systems in Central and Eastern Europe. The article is in this regard seeking answers to the timeless dilemmas of the worth of policy knowledge, and of policy scientists, focusing on selected characteristics of policy-making practices in the case of post-socialist systems. In doing so, the article, which is more or less an academic- -descriptive policy-analytical debate, has two main aims – first, to discuss and further define the understanding of policy knowledge through selected theoretical aspects; and second, to disclose the main characteristics of democratic policy and its knowledge in the context of post-socialist experiences of think tanks. As expected, it is revealed that, in the case of think tanks making, the role of policy knowledge in post-socialist systems is peculiar despite its universal meaning. According to its characteristics, it reflects the specifics of democratic development of the broader post-socialist political system. The ‘facade’ of democratic policy praxis often conceals a tight connectedness to the state and foreign-aid structures, political advocacy, as well as the apparent maturity of civil society.

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