Communicative Action

Christopher M. Tucker

Communicative action refers to a type of interaction between individual or collective actors (e.g., governments and nongovernmental organizations), characterized by a deliberative or argumentative exchange. Communicative action has entered governance debates as a means to explain dynamics and outcomes that contradict expectations of actors, who are commonly assumed to be predominantly oriented toward maximizing their egocentric interests. A core hypothesis is that communicative action can foster collective learning processes that can ultimately transform conflicting interpretations of an issue into areas of mutual understanding. Thus, research on this subject may determine whether the problem-solving capacity and legitimacy of governance systems may be increased. Communication action refers to communication oriented toward establishing a consensual understanding, ...

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