When the cat is away: How institutional autonomy, low salience, and issue complexity shape administrative action

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Carelli, Daniel; Pierre, Jon
• 署名单位: University of Gothenburg
• 刊物名称: PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0033-3298
• DOI: 10.1111/padm.12912
• 发表日期: 2024
• 页码: 207-221
• 关键词: antimicrobial resistance; Political control; COORDINATION; DELEGATION; DISCRETION; reforms; service

摘要

Political issues sometimes display an intriguing combination of high degrees of complexity, low political saliency, and high levels of administrative autonomy. This article investigates how this type of issues shapes the relationship between politicians and the public service. More specifically, we advance the notion of administrative action space to describe the emergence of collaborative governance when directives from the political level are intermittent or absent. Using an illustrative case on the administration of measures to address antimicrobial resistance (AMR), a transnational public health issue in Europe, we find that senior public servants nested in epistemic communities play a leading role in driving agency and facilitating governance of complex but low-salient issues when administrative autonomy is extensive.