Scholarship on executive politics provides conflicting views about whether staffing administrative agencies through politicized or (politically) autonomous means is the best method for maximizing bureaucratic competence. We offer a theoretical account which maintains that obtaining a proper balance between both types of personnel systems across the supervisory and subordinate levels of an organization will best foster bureaucratic competence. We evaluate our organizational balancing thesis using data on executive branch general revenue fund forecasts in the American states from 1987 to 2002. States with a combination of politically appointed agency executives and merit-selected subordinates generally provide more accurate revenue forecasts than states that possess uniformly politicized personnel selection systems. Conversely, states with a combination of department head-appointed executives and subordinates chosen from an at-will system (i.e., nonmerit) produce more accurate forecasts than states with uniformly autonomous personnel selection systems. Our statistical findings underscore the positive consequences associated with balancing politicized and autonomous means of selecting personnel within hierarchies of political organizations.

The recession of the early 1980s prompted many states to establish budget stabilization (rainy day) funds. Initial examinations of rainy day funds find a limited impact by the funds in alleviating fiscal stress. In this article, we propose an enhanced model of rainy day fund impact. Using data from 48 states for the 1990-1991 recession, our analysis indicates that the presence of a number of structural factors and the maintenance of generally large balances in other funds entering recession helps to alleviate fiscal stress when a state's economy is in recession.

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Th e Great Recession resulted in fi scal crises for governments across the Western world. Signifi cant cuts in government programs were initiated as many governments scrambled to reduce their growing budget defi cits. Th is article explores how European governments reacted during the recent crisis. In particular, the authors focus on the interlinkages between shifts toward more centralized decision making. Th e article uses a survey of thousands of public sector executives in 17 European countries. Th e authors fi nd evidence of a centralization cascade, such that centralizing one element of the decision-making process leads to greater centralization throughout the system. Results also show that having a high number of organizational goals and facing clear sanctions for failing to achieve goals lead to greater centralization, but greater organizational commitment reduces the need to centralize.