The importance of ideas in the government and the public administration in our times

Abstract

This paper is an invitation to discuss res pública from a Unitarian perspective, which integrates thinking, acting and valuing. Its origin is the debatable premise that managing (as including paperwork and red tape) is the interpretive key of all governmental and administrative power and capacities, which also operates as a normative vector for a diverse and fragmented citizenry to appraise the performance of public agents. In this context, it seems reasonable to ask: do ideas still matter; do they still keep their primitive power and suggestion? Or have they became just a reflection of the inconsequential disposition of agents in the public domain, where images and other nonverbal triggers to action better stimulate said disposition, if not the reflexive conscience of expectant citizens (or spectators)?