Parents, Power and Public Participation: Sure Start, an Experiment in New Labour Governance

This paper examines parent participation in local Sure Start partnerships within the broader context of public involvement in policy‐making processes. Public participation is set against a background where an emphasis on participatory democracy is seen as a solution to shortcomings identified with policy‐making and implementation. However, the meaning of public participation is by no means straightforward and gives rise to problems at several levels. Many of these problems emanate from concerns with power and legitimation. While these concerns highlight important aspects of public participation in public and social administration, this paper, drawing on Foucault's concept of “pastoral power”, examines whether public participation is better viewed as a predictable part of governance in modern Western democracies where subjects need to be recruited to exercise power over themselves.