Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-mkpzs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T10:03:50.099Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Political Dynamics of Bureaucratic Turnover

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 September 2017

Carl Dahlström  and
Mikael Holmgren
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This Research Note explores the political dynamics of bureaucratic turnover. It argues that changes in a government’s policy objectives can shift both political screening strategies and bureaucratic selection strategies, which produces turnover of agency personnel. To buttress this conjecture, it analyzes a unique dataset tracing the careers of all agency heads in the Swedish executive bureaucracy between 1960 and 2014. It shows that, despite serving on fixed terms and with constitutionally protected decision-making powers, Swedish agency heads are considerably more likely to leave their posts following partisan shifts in government. The note concludes that, even in institutional systems seemingly designed to insulate bureaucratic expertise from political control, partisan politics can shape the composition of agency personnel.

Keywords

bureaucracypolicy conflictpolitical appointmentsparliamentary democracy
Type
Articles
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 49 , Issue 3 , July 2019 , pp. 823 - 836
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg (email: carl.dahlstrom@pol.gu.se); Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg (email: mikael.holmgren@gu.se). Support for this research was provided by the Swedish Research Council (as part of the ‘Politics of administrative design: partisan conflict and bureaucratic discretion in Sweden 1960–2010’ project). We thank Christian Björkdahl and Pär Åberg for their excellent research assistance, and Julia Fleischer, Oliver James, David Lewis, Johannes Lindvall, Martin Lodge, Birgitta Niklasson, Jon Pierre, Jon Polk, Marina Povitkina, Anders Sundell, the editor, three anonymous reviewers, and many others for their help and comments on earlier drafts of the manuscript. Finally, we owe special thanks to the Quality of Government Institute at the Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg. Data replication sets are available in Harvard Dataverse at: https://dx.doi.org/10.7910/DVN/JOSCG1 and online appendices are available at https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123417000230.

References

Ahlbäck Öberg, Shirin, and Wockelberg, Helena. 2015. The Public Sector and the Courts. In The Oxford Handbook of Swedish Politics, edited by Jon Pierre, 130–146. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Bawn, Kathleen. 1995. Political Control versus Expertise: Congressional Choices about Administrative Procedures. American Political Science Review 89 (1):62–73.10.2307/2083075Google Scholar
Bendor, Jonathan, Glazer, Ami, and Hammond, Thomas. 2001. Theories of Delegation. Annual Review of Political Science 4:477–496.10.1146/annurev.polisci.4.1.235Google Scholar
Bergman, Torbjörn. 2003. Sweden: From Separation of Powers to Parliamentary Supremacy – and Back Again? In Delegation and Accountability in Parliamentary Democracies, edited by Kaare, Strøm, Wolfgang Müller and Torbjörn Bergman, 594–619. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/019829784X.003.0020Google Scholar
Bergman, Torbjörn, Müller, Wolfgang, Strøm, Kaare, and Blomgren, Magnus. 2003. Democratic Delegation and Accountability: Cross-national Patterns. In Delegation and Accountability in Parliamentary Democracies, edited by Kaare, Strøm, Wolfgang Müller and Torbjörn Bergman, 109–220. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/019829784X.003.0004Google Scholar
Bertelli, Anthony, and Lewis, David. 2012. Policy Influence, Agency-Specific Expertise, and Exits in the Federal Service. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory 23 (2):223–245.10.1093/jopart/mus044Google Scholar
Box-Steffensmeier, Janet, and Jones, Bradford. 2004. Event History Modeling: A Guide for Social Scientists. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511790874Google Scholar
Boyne, George, James, Oliver, John, Peter, and Petrovsky, Nicolai. 2010. Does Political Change Affect Senior Management Turnover? An Empirical Analysis of Top-tier Local Authorities in England. Public Administration 88 (1):136–153.10.1111/j.1467-9299.2009.01751.xGoogle Scholar
Clinton, Joshua, Bertelli, Anthony, Grose, Christian, Lewis, David, and Nixon, David. 2012. Separated Powers in the United States: The Ideology of Agencies, Presidents, and Congress. American Journal of Political Science 52 (2):341–354.10.1111/j.1540-5907.2011.00559.xGoogle Scholar
Dahlström, Carl, and Holmgren, Mikael. 2017. “Replication Data for: The Political Dynamics of Bureaucratic Turnover”, doi: 10.7910/DVN/JOSCG1, Harvard Dataverse, V1, UNF:6:S+BH79tF6Srmc+8GVMaY5Q==.Google Scholar
Doherty, Kathleen, Lewis, David, and Limbocker, Scott. 2015. Politics or Performance in Regulatory Personnel Turnover. Working paper 2015-2. Nashville, TN: Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions, Vanderbilt University.Google Scholar
Ennser-Jedenastik, Laurenz. 2013. Party Politics and the Survival of Central Bank Governors. European Journal of Political Research 53 (3):500–519.10.1111/1475-6765.12045Google Scholar
Epstein, David, and O’Halloran, Sharyn. 1999. Delegating Powers. A Transaction Cost Politics Approach to Policy Making under Separate Powers. New York: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511609312Google Scholar
Gailmard, Sean, and Patty, John. 2007. Slackers and Zealots: Civil Service, Policy Discretion, and Bureaucratic Expertise. American Journal of Political Science 51 (4):873–889.10.1111/j.1540-5907.2007.00286.xGoogle Scholar
Gailmard, Sean, and Patty, John. 2012. Learning While Governing. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Hallibaugh, Gary, Horton, Gabriel, and Lewis, David. 2014. Presidents and Patronage. American Journal of Political Science 58 (4):1024–1042.10.1111/ajps.12083Google Scholar
Heclo, Hugh. 1977. A Government of Strangers: Executive Politics in Washington. Washington, DC: Brookings Institutions Press.Google Scholar
Huber, John. 2000. Delegation to Civil Servants in Parliamentary Democracies. European Journal of Political Research 37 (3):397–413.10.1111/1475-6765.00519Google Scholar
Huber, John, and Shipan, Charles. 2002. Deliberate Discretion? The Institutional Foundations of Bureaucratic Autonomy. New York: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511804915Google Scholar
Kiewiet, Rodney, and McCubbins, Mathew. 1991. The Logic of Delegation: Congressional Parties and the Appropriations Process. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Kriner, Douglas, and Reeves, Andrew. 2015. Presidential Particularism and Divide-the-Dollar Politics. American Political Science Review 109 (1):155–171.10.1017/S0003055414000598Google Scholar
Levin, Bert. 1983. En skog av röda nålar. Om politiseringen av department och förvaltning (A Forest of Red Needles. On the Politicization of Ministries and Administration). In Makt och vanmakt (Power and Powerlessness) , edited by Bengt Rydén, 91–100. Stockholm: SNS.Google Scholar
Lewis, David. 2008. The Politics of Presidential Appointments. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.10.1515/9781400837687Google Scholar
Moe, Terry. 1985. The Politicized Presidency. In The New Direction in American Politics, edited by John Chubb and Paul Peterson, 235–271. Washington, DC: Brookings Institute.Google Scholar
Moe, Terry, and Caldwell, Michael. 1994. The Institutional Foundations of Democratic Government: A Comparison of Presidential and Parliamentary Systems. Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics 150 (1):171–195.Google Scholar
Nixon, Richard. 1978. The Memoirs of Richard Nixon. New York: Grosset & Dunlap.Google Scholar
OECD. 2012. Human Resources Management: Country Profiles. Available from http://www.oecd.org/gov/pem/hrpractices.htm, accessed 2 February 2017.Google Scholar
Peters, Guy, and Pierre, Jon, eds. 2004. Politicization of the Civil Service in Comparative Perspective. London: Routledge.10.4324/9780203799857Google Scholar
Pierre, Jon. 1995. Governing the Welfare State: Public Administration, the State, and Society in Sweden. In Governing the Modern State: An Introduction to Comparative Public Administration, edited by Jon Pierre, 140–160. Aldershot: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
Rothstein, Bo. 1996. The Social Democratic State: The Swedish Model and the Bureaucratic Problem of Social Reforms. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press.Google Scholar
Volkens, Andrea, Lehmann, Pola, Matthies, Theres, Merz, Nocals, Regel, Sven, and Wener, Annika. 2015. The Manifesto Data Collection. Manifesto Project (MRG/CMP/MARPOR). Version 2015a. Berlin: Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung.Google Scholar
Wilson, Woodrow. 1887. The Study of Administration. Political Science Quarterly 2 (2):197–222.Google Scholar
Wood, Dan, and Marchbanks III., Miner 2008. What Determines How Long Political Appointees Serve? Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory 18 (3):375–396.10.1093/jopart/mum019Google Scholar
Wood, Dan, and Waterman, Richard. 1991. The Dynamics of Political Control of the Bureaucracy. American Political Science Review 85 (3):801–828.10.2307/1963851Google Scholar
Whitford, Andrew, and Lee, Soo-Young. 2015. Exit, Voice and Loyalty with Multiple Exit Options: Evidence from the US Federal Workforce. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory 25 (2):373–398.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: Link

Dahlström and Holmgren Dataset

Dataset

https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/JOSCG1
Link
Supplementary material: PDF

Dahlström and Holmgren supplementary material

Online Appendix

Download Dahlström and Holmgren supplementary material(PDF)
PDF 405.3 KB