Politicized Meritocracy: Determinants of Selection in City Governments

• In Event: Local Elections, Institutions, and Bureaucracies in the Global South and North

Abstract

A large literature on public bureaucracies identifies meritocratic civil service as paramount to building representative, non-political and high-quality bureaucracies. Yet, recent work on the composition of US federal and local bureaucracies challenges this view. What drives partisan and racial composition of meritocratic bureaucracies? Focusing on selection in New York City's government, this project addresses the question in three steps. First, I use detailed administrative data on the characteristics of city employees, including their partisanship, race and gender, to illustrate the representational gaps between local bureaucrats and their clients. Second, I focus on the New York Police Department (NYPD) to unpack the dynamics of partisan and racial misrepresentation. Using detailed records on officer exams, appointments, promotions and demotions as well as retirements, I trace the types of individuals selecting in and out of NYPD, their political socialization on the force and differential career trajectories of various types of officers. Third, I evaluate how institutional factors drive selection in US law enforcement, including preference misalignment with political principals and bureaucrat-client relationships (such as fatal police shootings, killings of police officers and introduction of body cameras). By delineating the complexities of partisan and racial selection in modern bureaucracies, this study aims to provide new evidence on the determinants of representativeness and performance of city governments.

Author

• Elisa Maria Wirsching, Princeton University