Poster #109 - Administrative Burden as a Feature of Politicized, Fragmented Governance: Corruption and Bureaucratic Complexity

• In Event: Friday Poster Reception

Abstract

This article examines how administrative burden relates to corruption within public organizations operating in fragmented governance systems characterized by high levels of politicization, using Colombia as an illustrative case. While administrative burden has predominantly been conceptualized as an exogenous cost imposed on citizens and users of public services, this paper reconceptualizes it as an endogenous feature of governance systems, shaped by politico–administrative relationships and institutional configurations. Specifically, it argues that in contexts marked by weak bureaucratic autonomy, blurred policy role separation, and pervasive political interference, administrative burden becomes embedded within organizational structures in ways that reshape incentives, discretion, and rule enforcement. While prior research conceptualizes administrative burden as an organizational or interactional phenomenon, this article argues that in fragmented and politicized governance systems, administrative burden is best understood as an endogenous feature of the political-administrative order itself.

Building on the administrative burden literature, which conceptualizes burdens as learning, compliance, and psychological costs affecting behavior (Sievert, Vogel, & Feeney, 2022), the article develops a theoretical framework linking bureaucratic complexity to corruption through three mechanisms: opacity in procedures, discretionary implementation, and increased transaction costs that incentivize informal exchanges. This perspective is extended by incorporating insights from the study of politicized bureaucracies. Drawing on González and Sanabria-Pulido (2025), the article highlights how hybrid public administration systems, where formal merit-based arrangements coexist with clientelism and patronage, reshape organizational capacity and weaken the effective operation of formal rules, thereby amplifying the behavioral effects of administrative burden within public organizations.

Empirically, the article proposes a quantitative research design that combines survey-based measures of bureaucratic perceptions with administrative records on corruption-related outcomes from oversight and judicial institutions across Colombian public entities. This design allows for the systematic analysis of how variation in administrative burden, formalization, and politicization relates to corruption across organizations and territories, while accounting for structural features such as weak meritocratic systems and political interference.

Consistent with recent work on the political economy of administrative burden and corruption (Nieto-Morales, Peeters, & Lotta, 2024), the article conceptualizes corruption not solely as a function of individual incentives but as an outcome shaped by organizational environments in which burdens, discretion, and institutional weakness interact. By bridging the study of administrative burden, politicized bureaucracy, and corruption, this article advances a theoretical contribution that positions bureaucratic complexity as a central mechanism through which governance failures are produced and reproduced in weak institutional contexts.
References
González, C. I., & Sanabria-Pulido, P. (2025). When politics shapes administration: Bureaucratic autonomy, policy role separation, and organizational capacity in an institutionally weak public administration. Public Administration and Development. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1002/pad.70050
Nieto-Morales, F., Peeters, R., & Lotta, G. (2024). Burdens, bribes, and bureaucrats: The political economy of petty corruption and administrative burdens. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 34(4), 481–497. https://doi.org/10.1093/jopart/muae010
Sievert, M., Vogel, D., & Feeney, M. K. (2022). Formalization and administrative burden as obstacles to employee recruitment: Consequences for the public sector. Review of Public Personnel Administration, 42(1), 3–30. https://doi.org/10.1177/0734371X20932997

Author

• Pablo Sanabria-Pulido
  Presenting Author