What Is ‘Public Interest’?: A Case Study

As the chapter on the public good argues (and using the terms synonymously), ‘public interest’ is a central concept in public administration. In an important and basic sense, we understand effective governance as that which contributes to the public interest. Key features of civil society that protect the public interest can be taken for granted in established democracies. However, in many contexts we cannot assume a tradition of citizenship, or stable government, or rule of law, or basic infrastructure. Examining what is in the public interest in developing countries can be useful to identify these taken-for-granted assumptions, and to re-examine this ubiquitous and enduring concept. This chapter does this through a case study of land rights reform in post-conflict Nicaragua which draws together themes from organization, society and politics. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.