Politics of the Public Encounter

Edited by Peter Hupe, Visiting Professor, KU Leuven Public Governance Institute, Belgium

• Contents:Preface xvAcknowledgements xviINTRODUCTION1 The public encounter as object of scholarly inquiry 2Peter Hupe2 The politics of the public encounter 19Peter HupePART I WHAT HAPPENS WHERE STATE AND CITIZEN MEET3 The politics of street-level bureaucracy 40B. Guy Peters4 The public encounter and the role of citizens 57Carola van Eijk and Trui Steen5 Discretion and accountability: Notes on perspective andavoidance 78Keith HawkinsPART II THE DYNAMICS OF PUBLIC ENCOUNTERS6 Nobody’s agent: Discretion as individualistic accountability 107Nadine Raaphorst, Peter Hupe and Maaike Breedveld7 Behind public encounters: Uncertainty absorption inasylum decisions 126Tone Liodden8 Professional routines in and around public encounters 149Mirko Noordegraaf and Marlot Kuiper9 Tensions within the public encounter: Balancing individualand population health risks 170Matthew McKenna and Nicola Gale10 Public encounters and the role of citizens’ impressionmanagement 189Lieke Oldenhof and Eline LinthorstPART III PUBLIC ENCOUNTERS IN CONTEXT11 Going viral: Public encounters and digitalization 211Peter Hupe12 The public encounter as object of delegation 235Federica Infantino13 Reform and the inspection encounter: How micro-practicescompromise meso-policies 251Peter Mascini and Karin van Wingerde14 Inspection encounters during a crisis: Suppositions fromthe Covid-19 pandemic 270Kim Loyens and Carina Schott15 Public encounters and public achievements 289Peter HupePART IV ETHICS AND THE PUBLIC ENCOUNTER16 Modern citizenship as civil disobedience 3.0 316Gijs van Oenen17 The public encounter and the ethics of public office 333Kirstine Zinck PedersenCONCLUSION18 The state of the citizen 354Peter HupeAuthor index 365Subject index 370

‘The “politics” in the title of this collection of essays understates its breadth. It is not just about the struggle for power when state and citizen meet, but highlights factors such as uncertainty absorption, impression management, risk work, co-creation and digitalization. Thereby scholarship on the topic gets a good boost ahead.’