What Are the Areas of Competence for Central and Local Governments? Accountability Mechanisms in Multi-Level Governance

Park

2019

Governance

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Although administrative reorganization has been a major political instrument in many democracies, there has been limited research on its effects. Aiming to address this gap, this study examines the reorganization of Korean government ministries, specifically, the impact of reorganization in the form of a merger of ministries performing interrelated but dissimilar functions. Examining the salience of policy issues expressed in official government press releases during the 12‐year period from 2001 to 2012, we found that administrative reorganization in the form of a merger has a significant impact on the relative salience of government policy agendas. Specifically, the interrupted time series estimates indicate that the salience of science and technology policy issues (in relation to education policy issues) decreased by approximately 12% to 17% following the dissolution of the Ministry of Science and Technology. We explain this finding based on the bounded rationality view of bureaucratic information processing.

Section: Conclusion and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 83%

Administrative reorganization as a signal: Bounded rationality, agency merger, and salience of policy issues

Park

2019

Governance

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“…Scholars have long pondered effective strategies for “taming bureaucracy” to promote bureaucratic accountability and integrity (Gormley ; Hong and Lim ). Many of these scholars have argued that a distinctive feature of public sector management is the use of coercive controls from above (Boyne ; Hong, ). Political authorities set policy constraints that restrict a bureaucracy's actions and can regulate these constraints through audits and inspections (Ashworth, Boyne, and Walker ; Hood et al ).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does Increasing Ethnic Representativeness Reduce Police Misconduct?

Public Administration Review

2016

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Practitioner Points• An increase in the proportion of ethnic minority police officers is significantly associated with a decrease in police misconduct as measured by substantiated complaints per officer.• Black citizens make fewer complaints against an ethnically representative police force.• With increasing ethnic representativeness, local citizens tend to be less rather than more satisfied with the services that minority officers provide.• Benefits associated with bureaucratic representativeness derive from wide-scale, substantive organizational changes that improve attitudes and behaviors toward minorities rather than the mere increase in minority officers.

“…These organizations are more or less equivalent to the government agencies that are overseen by ministerial departments in New Zealand or European democracies, but they also include state‐owned enterprises, and the legal status of their employees differs from that of civil servants. These agencies play an important role in the provision of public goods in Korea, as the total size of annual expenditures by all these agencies combined is greater than the size of annual expenditures by the central government (Hong , ). Because of their critical importance in allocating public resources, the profile of the agency heads has often been the focus of media attention.…”

Section: Institutional Background and Empirical Strategymentioning

confidence: 99%

Loyalty or Competence: Political Use of Performance Information and Negativity Bias

Public Administration Review

Kim

2019

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This article explores how political principals weigh loyalty and competence in public personnel decisions. Exploiting the abrupt shift in political leadership following the impeachment of President Park Geun-hye of Korea, the authors examine how the newly elected president made the decision to retain or dismiss 118 agency heads appointed by the previous administration. The evidence shows the importance of loyalty in managerial survival: those who had a political patronage relationship with the ousted president were less likely to survive in the new administration. However, the authors also demonstrate the relevance of competence, as measured by the outcomes of agency performance evaluation. Further, the article shows the existence of negativity bias: the punishment for low performance is greater than the reward for high performance. Finally, the authors provide support for the idea that political principals reward loyalists, but only if they show acceptable levels of competence. Evidence for Practice• This study explores how political principals weigh loyalty and competence in public personnel decisions. • Political principals' punishment for low performance is greater than their rewards for good performance. • Political principals reward loyalists, but only if they show acceptable levels of competence.• The availability of performance information may protect bureaucratic expertise from political opportunism.