Government Organizations

This entry is concerned with demonstrating the increasingly important interface between government organization and communication. Government organization can be approached in terms of state centrism, where the emphasis is on government organization understood as state authority and power, with clearly defined boundaries between the public and private; and in terms of polycentrism, where power and authority are seen as dispersed among state and nonstate organizations, including business and civil society organizations. Globalization and new media technologies imply changes in the relationship between power, communication, and organizational forms, and suggest the usefulness of viewing government organization in terms of polycentrism, highlighting communication and organizing processes in a wider perspective. The entry focuses particularly on two major strands of literature: deliberative democracy and the public sphere; and discourse approaches to studying the intersections of government, organizational change, and information and communication technology.