The Subtle Art of Reforming Governance. The Case of Estonian State Reform

There is an ongoing search for balanced and sustainable governance approaches both on theoretical and practical level. Turbulent times and different crises only accelerate the discussion over what and how needs to be reformed in order to improve governance capacity. Renewing the institutional setting and operational aspects of governance increasingly happen at the intersection of democratic demands as well as technological advancements, data-driven and expert-led politics that makes it increasingly important to balance technocratic and performance-driven changes with political and more inclusive democratic approaches. These rationalities are tightly intertwined but based on different underlying logics. Major policy changes like reforming governance frame and pave the way for several policy changes to follow. That makes it highly important that governance renewals are built on thorough understanding and sound argumentation concerning governance problems, aims and respective solution proposals. The article sets out to offer empirical insight by discussing the case of Estonian state reform. Estonian state reform provides a unique opportunity and data for analysing wide-scale governance change from all the different relevant angles. Diving into the reasoning and logic of argumentation in thorough concept papers, explanatory acts and interviews with different parties - governmental, parliamentary, third sector, experts and scientists - enables to identify some patterns of how a major change in governance succeeds or stalls in different aspects. The choice of arguments and the logic of presenting these arguments helps us to go beyond single policy issues and analyse the prevailing ideas, rationales and justifications in contemporary governance. The overall directions in the Estonian case as well as the main underlying problems and solution-seeking are similar to many of the contemporary states, therefore the paper provides wider input for discussion on governance reforms, and policy design more generally.