Dimensions of Bureaucracy A Cross-National Dataset on the Structure and Behavior of Public Administration 1
Year: 2010
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Scholars have emphasized the importance of having a “Weberian bureaucracy” for the\nsocio-economic development of a country, but few attempts have been made to\nmeasure public administrations according to their degree of Weberianism. This paper\npresents the study and questionnaire design of a web survey covering 58 countries,\nwhich embodies the largest cross-national dataset on the structure of public\nadministrations up to date. It also provides the main findings from the dataset: The\nfeatures often associated with a Weberian bureaucracy can neither theoretically nor\nempirically be collapsed into a single dimension (Weberian versus a patronage-based\nadministration). Instead two distinct dimensions are identified, in the paper referred to\nas professionalism (i.e. up to which extent bureaucracies are “professional” vis-à-vis\n“politicized”) and closedness (i.e. up to which extent bureaucracies are more “closed”\nor public-like vis-à-vis “open” or private-like). Finally, the paper validates these\ndimensions with information from other available data sources, and demonstrates that\nthe results have not been produced by respondent perception bias.
Authors: Carl Dahlström, Víctor Lapuente, Jan Teorell
Institutions: University of Gothenburg, Lund University
Language: English
Subfield: Public Administration
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2185298404