Searching for Sufficient Legitimacy to Make Public Policy Choices

As a practical matter, the normative standard of objective knowability in defining and pursuing public value is impossible to meet. The path forward for those who hope to create public value working from positions in government depends critically on those individuals giving greater respect—in thought, speech, and action—to what are often regarded as “mere” procedural rights in making, implementing, and evaluating authoritative public policy decisions. The reason is that procedural rights are grounded in the desire to create a substantive human experience of individual dignity, autonomy, and equality in political, social, and economic realms. Legitimating the public choices that use the authority of the state to create more prosperous, free, secure, tolerant, and just societies depends critically on public leaders who use the guidance that comes from procedural rights to enact and advance a commitment to protect and enhance not just the material conditions, but also the economic, social, and political relationships that characterize the societies they govern.