Politicians, experts or both? Democratic delegation and junior ministers in Spain

Abstract

This article aims at contributing to a better understanding of the role of junior ministers (JMs) in contemporary parliamentary governments. Using principal–agent theory, we attempt to shed light on the content of the delegation relationship between JMs and their principals, mainly cabinet ministers and the prime minister. By applying categorical principal components analysis, we examine recruitment patterns in order to clarify whether JMs tend to focus on policy outputs, party building or political projection and management. The analysis employs data on all the Spanish Secretarios de Estado (SEs) from the creation of the office in 1977 until 2010. The results suggest that delegation to SEs mostly emphasizes policy outputs, since expertise dominates as a recruitment feature, though political skills and party connections are also valued complementary assets.