The distribution of decision-making. The case of a flexible public transport system

Instead of explaining the outcomes of a policy process with reference to a rational planning logic, this paper scrutinises the circumstances in which decisions actually are taken. It follows issues when they displace between different decision-making settings. The approach is applied to a case of decision-making about a flexible public transport system in and around Hoogeveen, the Netherlands: a case in which the decision-making process was distributed over no less than fifteen settings. The main result of the analysis is a typology of five different displacements based on typical framing effects, which could form the basis of a theory with which complex, interactive and opportunistic decision-making processes can be understood in more general terms.