Abstract
In the past 15 years a scholarly debate has developed in the United States over the question "Who controls the bureaucracy?" Some have argued that Congress has a dominant influence on the bureaucracy, some that the president plays the major role in managing the bureaucracy, and others have emphasized the role of legal constraints on the bureaucracy, as enforced by the courts. Still others have asserted that the bureaucracy has a substantial amount of autonomy from the president, Congress, and courts. This article presents a formal model of multi-institutional policy-making that illuminates several key aspects of this debate. The model shows that there are conditions under which an agency will have considerable autonomy and conditions under which it will have virtually none. The model also shows that when an agency lacks autonomy, control of the agency usually cannot be attributed to just one institution. Finally, the model has some important implications for empirical tests of hypotheses about who controls the bureaucracy; among them is the fact that the empirical literature on control of the bureaucracy is based on a logic that gives a seriously incomplete picture of how the bureaucracy is controlled and who controls it.
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The Journal of Law, Economics & Organization is an interdisciplinary exercise. It seeks to promote an understanding of many complex phenomena by examining such matters from a combined law, economics, and organization perspective [or a two-way combination thereof]. In this connection, we use the term organization broadly - to include scholarship drawing on political science, psychology and sociology, among other fields. It also holds the study of institutions - especially economic, legal, and political institutions - to be specifically important and greatly in need of careful analytic study.
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journal article
The Dynamics of Political Control of the BureaucracyThe American Political Science Review
Vol. 85, No. 3 [Sep., 1991]
, pp. 801-828 [28 pages]
Published By: American Political Science Association
//doi.org/10.2307/1963851
//www.jstor.org/stable/1963851
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Abstract
A new paradigm of political-bureaucratic relations emerged through the 1980s holding that U.S. democratic institutions continuously shape nonelective public bureaucracies. Several empirical studies support the paradigm with evidence suggestive of political manipulation but none reveals the scope or specific mechanisms of political control. We explore the dynamics of political control of the bureaucracy explicitly to determine the scope and mechanisms. We examine output time series from seven different public bureaucracies for responsiveness to political tools applied in the late Carter and early Reagan administrations. We find responsiveness in all seven cases. The evidence also shows that political appointments--a shared power of the president and Congress--is the most important instrument of political control; changing budgets, legislation, congressional signals, and administrative reorganizations are less important. These findings confirm intuitive assertions by institutional scholars and suggest a method of @'policy monitoring@' that could enhance future democratic control of the bureaucracy.
Journal Information
The American Political Science Review [APSR] is the longest running publication of the American Political Science Association [APSA]. APSR, first published in November 1906 and appearing quarterly, is the preeminent political science journal in the United States and internationally. APSR features research from all fields of political science and contains an extensive book review section of the discipline. In its earlier days, APSR also covered the personal and personnel items of the profession as had its predecessor, the Proceedings of the APSA.
Publisher Information
Founded in 1903, the American Political Science Association is the major professional society for individuals engaged in the study of politics and government. APSA brings together political scientists from all fields of inquiry, regions, and occupational endeavors. While most APSA members are scholars who teach and conduct research in colleges and universities in the U.S. and abroad, one-fourth work outside academe in government, research, organizations, consulting firms, the news media, and private enterprise. For more information about the APSA, its publications and programs, please see the APSA website.
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American Political Science Review © 1991 American Political Science Association
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