The article notes the contradictions between conceptual approaches to the study of the process of public decision-making and relevant theoretical schemes. In this regard, disclosed are the bases of this type of cognitive conflicts, grounded are the principles of selection of the most rational approaches which, on the one hand, enable to reduce the uncertainty in the process of formulating public goals, and on the other hand, to explain the essence of multivariance of theoretical interpretations in this process. The author, in the framework of this paradigm, discloses specific features of the state as a decision-making actor and as a special, internally segmented space which produces various schemes and combinations for the development and implementation of political goals.