ABSTRACT
Senior bureaucrats want to talk in part because their political legitimacy, in an era of “populist” unrest, is very much in question. Bureaucracies often seem distant from the people they ostensibly serve, and therefore distant from democratic authority. As discussed, experts are unsure of themselves, the structure of their knowledge in some doubt, doubted not least by the experts themselves. This lack of confidence, or worse, bluster, hardly encourages the people to trust their governors. Perhaps a chat would help?
