Between the system and lifeworld: despite adopting social media tools, public administrators remain in a legitimacy dilemma

Social media platforms theoretically align with many aspects of Habermas’ ideal of “authentic communication”. However, Claire Knox writes that this does not make them automatically applicable to public participation in governance structures. For example, while we see evidence of “cautious experimentation” among public administrators, there remains a lack of “institutional imagination” to maximise the democratic potential of social media tools.