Frontiers of Research on Bureaucratic Politics and Management Mini-Conference: Internal Decision-making and Management

Session Submission Type: Full Paper Panel

Part of Mini-Conference

• Frontiers of Research on Bureaucratic Politics and Management

Session Description

How do bureaucracies make decisions? And how can they be managed so as to deliver the quality and types of services that citizens and political principals desire? This panel considers the politics of issue prioritization and incentivizing personnel to comply with agendas that have been prioritized by management. Frick, Marple and Post examine how public agencies make choices between different risks to prioritize, while Hassan and Larreguy study how local governments allocate funds between patronage employment and local public goods provision. Genicot, Mansoor, and Mansuri assess the efficacy of a digital management system that incentivizes extension workers, while Titelman et al. probe why performance incentives in Chile have ceased to function as such, and are increasingly viewed as entitlements. The papers cover a wide variety of empirical contexts, including Chile, Pakistan, Kenya, and the United States. They also utilize an impressive variety of research strategies, including interviews, surveys, field experiments, and the analysis of government payroll data.

Sub Unit

• Division 6: Political Economy

Individual Presentations

• How Bureaucracies Address “Public Bads” - Alison E. Post, University of California, Berkeley; Tim Marple, University of California, Berkeley

• How Incentives and Monitoring Impact Extension Staff Performance in Punjab - Zahra Mansooor, Oxford University; Ghazala Mansuri, The World Bank

• Are Anti-corruption Audits Effective? Evidence from Brazilian Municipalities - Romain Reda Ferrali, Aix-Marseille School of Economics; Galileu Kim, Princeton University

Chair

• Dan Honig University College London

Discussants

• Mark Buntaine University of California, Santa Barbara

• Joachim Wehner London School of Economics