Discretion of Officials in Public and Social Policy at the Central and Local Levels Cover Image

Rozhodovací volnost úředníků veřejné a sociální politiky na státní a lokální úrovni
Discretion of Officials in Public and Social Policy at the Central and Local Levels

Author(s): Pavel Horák
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences
Published by: Masarykova univerzita nakladatelství
Keywords: discretion; public and social policy; policy implementation; policy modification; unsatisfied clients; officials at state and local level; factors influencing discretion; institutional environment of organization

Summary/Abstract: The paper presents a wide spectrum of the existing theories of sociology, law and political science dealing with the discretion of officials in public and social policy. Concretely, the paper focuses on three different ways of how to understand the existence of discretion (definition perspective), its functions (role perspective), and its use by officials at the state and local levels (structural perspective). These perspectives are presented in order to identify factors that determine officials’ discretion and to grasp the concept of discretion as a tool that reveals the limits of officials’ behavior. In the end the paper summarizes the constituent factors determining public officials’ discretion

  • Issue Year: XI/2004
  • Issue No: 1
  • Page Range: 35-52
  • Page Count: 17
  • Language: Czech