ABSTRACT
This chapter brings the volume to a close, highlighting the methods and findings used to bring theory and practice in public policy closer together through inclusion of a semiotic perspective. Considerations of the public sphere and lifeworld of Habermas, and the potential for realization of deliberative democracy in complex and troubled times, conclude the work. We are left with a public space defined by a need to portray achievement, with perspectives on public policy that seem more concerned with persuasion of the potential to fix a problem, than actually fixing it. The truth suffers and proof with it. There is a potential to refuse to further consent actively or passively to proxy development of views, and an absence of participation in an ersatz, hollowed-out public sphere. This might constitute a regaining of freedom already lost through atrophy. For now, we are far from creating a great and deliberative community.
