Challenging Paradigms in the Study of Bureaucracy

Session Submission Type: In-Person Full Paper Panel

Session Description

A substantial body of research in comparative politics and political economy has centered on the causes and consequences of bureaucratic performance in both developed and developing countries. Undergirding much of this research is a paradigmatic commitment to a Weberian model of good governance—one in which bureaucracies are expected to have formal selection rules, strong norms, and hierarchical management structures, for instance. Do the salutary effects of these formal recruitment procedures hold when considered in light of unanticipated outcomes? Do rigid hierarchical structures impede the flow of critical information across organizational nodes?

This panel represents an effort to generate new theoretical and empirical insights to these questions. The papers are varied in their approach—drawing upon evidence from qualitative interviews, surveys, RCTs, and administrative data. With an eye towards generalizable theory building, the papers are also regionally varied. Kuipers studies Indonesia to examine the effect of failure on the national civil service exam on attitudinal outcomes such as outgroup intolerance, perceptions of corruption, and national solidarity. Gabiras-Diaz and Slough present results from an RCT conducted in collaboration with Colombia’s Office of the Inspector Attorney General, in which they rolled out an intervention designed to improve organizational nodes’ compliance with requests for data from higher-ups. Toral leverages administrative data, a survey, and in-depth interviews to examine how Brazilian prosecutors (an extraordinarily Weberian bureaucracy with high autonomy, discretion, and capacity) fight corruption at the local level, and how their strategies shape both politics and service delivery.

Sub Unit

• Theme Panel

Individual Presentations

• Failing the Test - Nicholas Kuipers, UC Berkeley

• The Limit of Decentralized Data Collection: Experimental Evidence from Colombia - Natalia Garbiras-Díaz, European University Institute; Tara L Slough, New York University

• The Political Economy of Oversight: Prosecutors and Corruption in Brazil - Guillermo Toral, Vanderbilt University

Chair

• Jan Henryk Pierskalla Ohio State University

Discussants

• Ian R. Turner Yale University

• Rikhil R Bhavnani University of Wisconsin, Madison