AGENCY THEORY AND AGENCY ENVIRONMENT: ELEMENTS AND RELATIONS WITHIN BRITISH  CIVIL SERVICE Cover Image

AGENCY THEORY AND AGENCY ENVIRONMENT: ELEMENTS AND RELATIONS WITHIN BRITISH CIVIL SERVICE
AGENCY THEORY AND AGENCY ENVIRONMENT: ELEMENTS AND RELATIONS WITHIN BRITISH CIVIL SERVICE

Author(s): Önder Kutlu
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences
Published by: Central European University (CEU) - Center for Policy Studies
Keywords: Agency theory; administrative reform; the Next Steps initiative; policy-making.

Summary/Abstract: This article examines an important tool of politics, the dichotomy between politics and administration, to reform administrative systems. Due to its success and the pioneering role in the implementation of agency reform and resultant provision of lessons for many countries (i.e. Netherlands and Norway) the British case is selected for evaluation. The British Next Steps Agencies Reform is examined by deploying historical reconstruction model, and intended to find out its basic elements and interactions between different such actors of the initiative as politicians, bureaucrats, agencies and departments. This illustrates the scale and scope of the relations with the idea of having shed light on Agency theory. Having examined the essential elements the study wishes to focus on the mechanism which has been introduced by the initiative dispenses certain degree of power to agencies. In doing so, the paper targets a balance between two actors of political systems, bureaucrats, and politicians.

  • Issue Year: 2011
  • Issue No: 01
  • Page Range: 83-110
  • Page Count: 28
  • Language: English