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Following the Gulf oil spill and US housing meltdown, policy-makers revamped the associated administrative infrastructure in an effort to sharpen each agency's focus, based on the perspective that asking an organization to fulfill competing missions undermines performance. Using a formal model, I demonstrate that priority goal ambiguity introduced when an agency balances multiple roles does have detrimental effects. Yet, assigning competing missions to one organization can be better than separating them, as the underlying tasks supporting the goals may require coordination. In fact, it is precisely when ambiguity becomes more debilitating that the importance of coordination intensifies. Moreover, if the bureau is misinformed about which goals are more valued politically, fostering uncertainty in agencies charged with multiple goals can even be beneficial. The article thus describes how such organizations function and why these arrangements persist, demonstrating that structural choices impact behavior even when agencies and overseers agree on policy objectives.

Examines how politicians use administrative procedures to design air pollution control agencies; focuses on performance, and different procedures and policies; US.

Theoretical work assumes that legislators use ex ante design to gain bureaucratic influence, not only at an agency's appointment stage but also as an ongoing tactic. Yet no empirical work has investigated whether or not legislators prefer to use design to exert influence after an agency's appointment stage. Using a mail survey of more than 2,500 legislators, we model legislators' preferences for ex ante design as a function of both institutional factors and individual legislators' characteristics. Our results suggest that the feasibility of agency design as an ongoing tactic of bureaucratic influence is more limited than theoretical work indicates and that both institutional‐ and individual‐level factors explain legislators' preferences.

We propose a model where a regional government's choice of the number of bureaucratic agencies operating in a region depends upon the degree of substitutability and complementarity of the bureaucratic services being demanded. We show that, if the government perceives the citizens' demand as a demand for substitutable services, it will choose provision by two independent agencies. If the government perceives the citizens' demand as a demand for complementary services, it will choose provision by a single consolidated agency. Exogenous shocks to the number of citizens amplify these incentives. Evidence from the Italian National Health Service (NHS) supports this hypothesis. Results show a positive effect of proxies of substitutable services on the number of regional Local Health Authorities (LHAs) and a negative effect of proxies of complementary services. The major immigration amnesties, taken as shocks to the number of citizens entitled to the service, magnify these effects.

Empirical studies suggest that mission-oriented bureaucrats bias their design of program alternatives to increase the odds that a superior will choose the kind of program the officials want. However, political executives may anticipate this manipulation and try to reassert control. These struggles are examined in three models. In Model 1 a senior bureaucrat is interested only in missions; the bureaucrat's political superior controls him or her by rejecting inferior proposals and entertaining new options from other policy specialists. Model 2 is a principal-agent analysis. Here the official is interested only in budgets; the official's superior reduces search bias by creating an ex ante incentive scheme. In Model 3 the bureaucrat cares about both budgets and programs; the superior uses both his or her final review authority and ex ante incentives to reduce agenda manipulation. The models' contrasting implications for the political control of bureaucracy are examined.

We propose a model where a regional government's choice of the number of bureaucratic agencies operating in a region depends upon the degree of substitutability and complementarity of the bureaucratic services being demanded. We show that, if the government perceives the citizens' demand as a demand for substitutable services, it will choose provision by two independent agencies. If the government perceives the citizens' demand as a demand for complementary services, it will choose provision by a single consolidated agency. Exogenous shocks to the number of citizens amplify these incentives. Evidence from the Italian National Health Service (NHS) supports this hypothesis. Results show a positive effect of proxies of substitutable services on the number of regional local health authorities and a negative effect of proxies of complementary services. The major immigration amnesties, taken as shocks to the number of citizens entitled to the service, magnify these effects.