Ministerial Advisers Research Articles

The multifaceted nature of trust in the uptake of advice: policy advice utilization in ministerial cabinets

ABSTRACT What makes policy advice circulate more easily towards the apex of governments and shape the opinions of its users along the way? This article investigates the utilization of policy advice in ministerial cabinets, by focusing on the individuals appointed to work as closest aides of ministers: ministerial advisers. While we know quite a lot about the operation of policy advisory systems at the macro and meso levels, the micro-dispositions affecting the circulation and utilization of policy advice are under-researched topics. Building on recent research waves on policy advice and policy advisory systems, we expect that trust between ministerial advisers and their advice-suppliers is a pivotal driver of policy advice utilization. Based on an original survey conducted in the ministerial cabinets of French-speaking Belgium, this article provides evidence that ministerial advisers’ overall propensity to trust advice-suppliers tends to boost policy advice utilization. Yet, we show that the characteristics of advice suppliers also come into play in advisory relationships and that ministerial advisers have various needs in that regard, depending on them being high or low trust individuals. Our findings speak to the importance of paying attention to relational dynamics and informality in policy advising.

Decabinetisation as a presidentialisation strategy: a process-tracing analysis of the executive state law in Greece

ABSTRACT This paper develops and empirically tests the novel concept of ‘decabinetisation’, a type of depoliticisation reform that affects the advisory and support offices of executive politicians. Reforms that restrict and constrain the work of ministerial advisers and reduce the political resources of ministers are puzzling, even more so when pressure to reform ministerial offices is absent. To understand why governments undermine a system that has been put in place to serve them, this paper investigates the provisions of Law 4622/2019 on the Executive State in Greece, using ‘theory-building process-tracing’ based on data collected from government documents and 23 elite interviews. Initially selected as an extreme case of second-order decabinetisation in the absence of pressure to reform, the study morphed into a more typical case that exemplifies how ministerial office reforms can be the result of strategic forms of presidentialisation. Decabinetisation can be triggered by the Prime Minister’s intention to ‘presidentialise’ the core executive in face of centre-of-government dysfunctionalities; policy entrepreneurs couple the problem and politics stream with the decabinetisation policy; but the reform becomes possible only in the presence of a critical juncture during which the power asymmetry between the head of government and other members of government is big.

Ministerial Advisers as Power Resources: Exploring Expansion, Stability and Contraction in Westminster Ministers’ Offices

Abstract In this article, we argue that the entourage of ministerial advisers available to prime ministers and other ministers is an institutional power resource that can serve as a useful indicator to measure the changing nature of the political executive. Two novel contributions are made utilising four new datasets on ministerial advisers coupled with a comparative analysis of 21 governments in Australia, Britain, Canada and New Zealand, in varying dates between 1997 and 2020. First, by using ministerial advisers as a proxy indicator, we chart how the offices of executive politicians can either expand, remain stable or contract. As a corrective to the general long-term narrative that ministers’ offices continually expand, our evidence shows this expansion has in some cases been interrupted and more generally manifests in different patterns from one government to the next. Second, we interrogate these patterns against the background of four typical assumptions from the party family, government tenure, parliamentary control and leadership stability literature. The new datasets, typology and analysis provide fresh comparative insights to advance our understanding about the evolving nature of the political executive in the four classic Westminster family countries.

Comparing ministerial advisers across politicization settings: Still hiding in the shadows?

AbstractThe article examines the proposition that the characteristics of ministerial advisers are shaped by specific settings of the politicization of ministerial administration. Four types of politicization settings are identified, resulting from variation in the scope of formal political appointments and appointments into bureaucracy. Using data from an original expert survey and semi‐structured expert interviews, the contribution analyses eleven cases from Central and Eastern Europe. It documents that the functional differentiation of advisers from other administrative actors, and their political and policymaking roles, are conditioned by the politicization settings in which they operate. The political roles of advisers are most pronounced where they do not face other formal political appointees, and appointments into bureaucracy are low. Policymaking roles are strongest where formal political appointees manage high politics, and bureaucratic appointments are limited. The article also identifies “invisible” advisers as a new type of player unknown in established Western bureaucracies.

Comparing Ministerial Advisers Across Politicization Settings: Still Hiding in the Shadows?

Comparing Ministerial Advisers Across Politicization Settings: Still Hiding in the Shadows?

A positive partnership: public servants in ministerial offices

ABSTRACT The Australian system of government was founded on the Westminster tradition, which relies on the binary relationship between Ministers and the Australian Public Service (APS). However, the increasing number of ministerial advisers over the past 40 years has changed the balance of power in the Australian executive. While public servants are able to work in a Minister's office, this article considers whether the movement of public servants between the public service and ministerial offices has the effect of politicising the role of the APS. Based on 22 interviews with current and former Commonwealth Ministers, public servants and ministerial advisers, the authors argue that public servants gaining experience in ministerial offices is beneficial to both the APS and the Minister's office. This is because public servants are exposed to the political side of government which helps improve the output of the department, while the Minister's office gains technical expertise. Despite these benefits, there appears to be fewer public servants working in ministerial offices over recent years. This article considers the benefits of public servants working in a ministerial office, why the movement has reduced, and explores ways in which this can be changed to support the executive governance of Australia.

Policy advice utilization in Belgian ministerial cabinets: the contingent importance of internal and external sources of advice

Ministerial cabinets hold a central place in the Belgian politico-administrative system, carrying out the bulk of policy formulation. However, they do not operate in isolation and rely on other actors of the policy advisory system for information supply and advice. They request, receive and use various advisory inputs. This article investigates how ministerial advisers utilize policy advice when they formulate policies. Based on a unique survey targeting ministerial cabinet members, it shows that policy advice utilization varies according to the source and its location in the policy advisory system. The sample consists of ministerial advisers from 11 ministerial cabinets in the two Belgian federated entities’ governments of Wallonia and the Wallonia-Brussels Federation. Ministerial advisers still predominantly use advice from the civil service, which points to the continued importance of advice provision from internal, in-house sources. However, advice from external actors – such as trade unions, civil society or consulting firms – have been observed to have rather high repercussions on policy formulation activities too. Advisory bodies appear to be very much active in supplying advice, but this same advice does not yield comparatively higher utilization scores. Points for practitioners This study focuses on policy advice utilization by members of ministerial cabinets in Belgium, especially when they formulate policies. It shows that internal, in-house sources remain important advice-providers and their advisory inputs still abundantly feed into the policy work carried out at the level of government. However, this article provides evidence that external sources might also supply advice that directly finds its way to decision-makers working in ministerial cabinets and that have considerable repercussions at that level too. This is the case for advice from trade unions, (organized) civil society or consulting firms, among others. Quite importantly for practitioners, our results suggest that ministerial advisers sometimes prefer controlling advisory exchanges and running separate consultations with one stakeholder at a time, instead of having to deal with collective, internal institutions that represent multiple interests, like advisory bodies. We did not observe striking differences in the degree of utilization between solicited and unsolicited advice, which means that for civil servants or stakeholders, sending policy advice previously unrequested by ministerial cabinets is not necessarily a fruitless strategy to follow.

Populists in Government: Normal or Exceptional?

AbstractHow is government affected by including populists in a governing coalition? We investigate if populist political parties behave ‘normally’ when they attain power, or if they govern differently from mainstream political parties. Empirically, we use survey data from 282 ministerial advisers from three cabinets in Norway. Our conclusion is that populists govern normally on some governance dimensions and exceptionally on others. Populists in office had ample professional experience, adhered to collegial decision making and thought the bureaucracy delivered quality and was politically responsive – on a par with the non-populists. However, populists differed from non-populist politicians in their contact patterns and their communicative concerns. That populists in this context belong to a party with a long history of parliamentary representation (Norway's Progress Party) suggests elements of exceptionalism are things one should expect to find in practically all populist parties that attain power.

From ménage à trois back to pas de deux? Ministerial advisers, civil servants and the contest of policy ideas

The institutionalization of the role of ministerial advisers in most parliamentary democracies has transformed what was once à pas de deux between ministers and senior civil servants into a ménage à trois. This article assesses the impact of ministerial advisers on the contest of policy ideas. It makes a theoretical case for paying closer attention to this issue than has thus far been the case, and assesses civil servants’ perceptions of advisers’ influence on contestability. The core conclusion, which is at variance with much of the scholarship on ministerial advisers, is that advisers pose a greater threat to policy contestability than to civil service impartiality.

Ministerial Advisers in Slovakia: Profiles and Career Paths, 2010 – 2020

Abstract This study examines the transparency of the regulatory framework under which ministerial advisors exist within the politicized context of a Central and Eastern European perspective. We compare profiles and career paths of ministerial advisers under five different types of coalition governments and examine if variance across government types can be explained by type of party – established vs. new parties. Empirically, the article draws on a cohort of 162 ministerial advisers in Slovakia across five governments from 2010 to 2020. We arrive at multiple findings. Firstly, we suggest the limitation in the availability and reporting of data is an important finding as it highlights accountability gaps and lack of government transparency irrespective of the party in power. Secondly, within the low regulatory environment, ministers appoint multiple types of staff including both formal “visible” ministerial advisers and “invisible” ministerial agents that, if one could accurately measure, would likely demonstrate that the ministerial advisory system is more inflated than we currently present. The ad-hoc nature of the advisory system also creates fluctuations in the size of the ministerial adviser cohort across governments and across different ministries. This would also help to explain the next finding, which is that, contrary to the experience in many countries, the overall size of the advisor population does not grow, probably because executive politicians have other avenues of appointing advisory agents. Fourthly, the advisers have a fairly equal distribution of prior employment from both the public sector and the private sector, but we do see some evidence of more established political parties preferring to recruit from the public sector and newer parties preferring to recruit from the private sector. Lastly, the appointment process appears to be highly controlled by individual ministers, suggesting personal ties are essential (link between ministerial and advisor education) and party-political criteria are a low consideration. The research is conducted using a biographical approach in which freedom of information requests and open source data is scrapped and then triangulated via a dozen interviews with current and former advisers. It argues that regulation is weak, lacking public scrutiny, which provides loopholes for employing ministerial agents in informal ways that could create, at worst, the opportunity for corrupt behavior, or at least, lead to poor practices in good governance. Therefore, future research should focus on both the formal “visible” and informal “invisible” ways that ministers recruit their advisory agents, how their agents function, and whether existing regulatory measures create a transparent and accountable governance framework.

Public service bargains and non-partisan ministerial advisors: servants of two masters

To what extent can the public service bargain framework be applied to non-partisan ministerial advisors? Public service bargains are defined as ‘explicit or implicit agreements between public servants – the civil or uniformed services of the state – and those they serve’. The public service bargain framework has increasingly been used as an analytical tool with which to examine the elements of the bargain as experienced by various actors in different jurisdictions. The elements of the public service bargain framework are explored through the experiences of a distinct subgroup of non-partisan advisors – portfolio private secretaries – serving in the politicised environment of ministers’ offices. The minister’s office has been characterised as the ‘purple zone’ where politics (represented by the colour blue) and administration (represented by the colour red) converge to transform political will into administrative action. This qualitative research article: briefly reviews the public service bargain literature; describes the actors and setting; gives voice to their experience of the public service bargain; applies the public service bargain heuristic; and reveals new insights into how the public service bargain operates with dual principals. Points for practitioners The public service bargain framework allows for dual principal–single agent relationships within public administration settings. Applying the public service bargain heuristic to this group of non-partisan advisors: enables a view of how the public service bargain operates at different levels (macro, meso and micro); shows that the public service bargain for these advisors has changed over time in response to administrative reforms; and demonstrates that these advisors are professionally and personally affected through the misaligned expectations of dual principals.

Political Constitutionalism: Individual Responsibility and Collective Restraint

Australia’s Constitution has been shaped by a blend of legal and political constitutionalism; yet there is limited attention given to political mechanisms of control in Australia. With the recent developments in the United Kingdom and the turmoil of Brexit that shifted the balance between legal and political constitutionalism, it is timely to examine how political constitutionalism has evolved in Australia. This article argues that Australian political constitutionalism is distinct from the United Kingdom as it is shaped not by internal conflict about the nature of the constitution but rather by the significant evolutionary development of fundamental institutions. In particular, it is argued that there are three critical junctures for political constitutionalism in Australia: the foundations of the Commonwealth, the formation of disciplined political parties and the rise of oversight bodies. It is contended that Australia may be reaching a new critical juncture due to the fragmentation of responsible government from privatisation and outsourcing and the rise of ministerial advisers.

Public Office as a Stepping-Stone? Investigating the Careers of Ministerial Advisors

Ministerial advisors have become an essential aspect of executive branches worldwide, thus making the ministerial advisor office a potential route for young politicians aspiring to an expanding political class. The article studies which professions ministerial advisors migrate to following their ministerial careers, how ministerial advisors’ post-ministerial careers compare to their pre-ministerial careers, and if the variance in careers can be explained by the resources that ministerial advisors obtain while in government. Empirically, the article draws on a cohort of 139 ministerial advisors in Norwegian governments between 2001 and 2009; it covers positions in the political sphere and the public, private and voluntary occupational sectors over a period from each ministerial advisor’s youth to the end of 2017. The bibliographic data are combined with surveys and elite interviews. The results show that more than expanding the political class as a recruitment ground for future Members of the Parliament and ministers, ministerial advisor appointments serve as stepping-stones to careers outside of politics. Most ministerial advisors experience shifts between occupational sectors and upwards to higher positions. However, ministerial advisors’ attractiveness in the labour market is surprisingly unaffected by what they actually did in office; rather, it rests on resources such as insider knowledge and networks.

Ministerial Advisers in Slovakia: Profiles and Career Paths, 2010–2020

Ministerial Advisers in Slovakia: Profiles and Career Paths, 2010–2020

From Government Office to Private PR: Career Patterns of Special Ministerial Advisers and the Privatization of Politics

This article presents a study on special ministerial advisers examining their careers beyond their role in the machinery of government. Applying a theoretical framework derived from the literature on the sociology of work and the transformation of the organization of politics in the Nordic welfare states, we make two theoretical points. First, special advisers are part of an emerging group of partisan policy professionals, and second, the characteristics of this group are best analyzed through the lens of the boundaryless career. By combining these two positions, we contribute to studies on special advisers by offering a longer career perspective, and we contribute to studies on the boundaryless career by analyzing a job market other than the dot-com and cultural industries. Mapping the entire career paths of all Danish special ministerial advisers from 2000 to 2017 ( n = 144), we show that the position of special adviser serves as a stepping-stone to a new labor market that typically culminates with a position in private public relations. This conclusion lends fresh support to concerns about the privatization of politics changing policy formation in the Nordic welfare states.

Navigating the dichotomy: The top public servant's craft.

How in their day‐to‐day practices do top public servants straddle the politics–administration dichotomy (PAD), which tells them to serve and yet influence their ministers at the same time? To examine this, we discuss how three informal ‘rules of the game’ govern day‐to‐day political–administrative interactions in the Dutch core executive: mutual respect, discretionary space, and reciprocal loyalty. Drawing from 31 hours of elite‐interviews with one particular (authoritative) top public servant, who served multiple prime ministers, and supplementary interviews with his (former) ministers and co‐workers, we illustrate the top public servants’ craft of responsively and yet astutely straddling the ambiguous boundaries between ‘politics’ and ‘administration’. We argue that if PAD‐driven scholarship on elite administrative work is to remain relevant, it has to come to terms with the boundary‐blurring impacts of temporal interactions, the emergence of ‘hybrid’ ministerial advisers, and the ‘thickening’ of accountability regimes that affects both politicians and public servants.

Still friends? Revisiting New Zealand public servants’ perceptions of ministerial advisers

ABSTRACTTen years ago, political advisers – or ministerial advisers as they are known in Aotearoa New Zealand – were a relatively recent arrival on the stage of executive government. They attracted some attention but empirical insights were thin on the ground. In 2006 Political Science published the first systematic research on public servants’ perceptions of the actions, activities and impacts of their partisan counterparts. That work concluded that relations between permanent and political advisers were, in the main, in cordial good health: certainly there were areas of tension but on balance the protagonists were more akin to allies rather than enemies. But more than a decade has passed and a reassessment of the state of relations between the respective cadrés is well overdue. This article compares those earlier findings with new data on officials’ perceptions of ministerial advisers collected in 2017, and assesses whether or not the relationship between public servants and political appointees can still reasonably be characterised as one of amity.

Administracinio teismo įstatymo projektai tarpukario Lietuvoje

[only abstract and summary in English; full article and abstract in Lithuanian] The very first law under which Lithuanian administrative courts were established was adopted in 1999. However, the predecessors of the Administrative Court (the Commission of Legal Ministerial Advisors, Complaints and Remanding Commission of the Seimas, State Council) were created in the third decade of the 20th century. Notwithstanding this, these authorities could not match the judicial review of public administrators’ activity. Consequently, the first draft laws on the Administrative Court were drafted in the fourth decade. There were over ten of such drafts but only two remained. The goal of the article is to reveal the content and the background of draft laws on the Administrative Court developed in 1932 and 1940, which were found in the Wroblewski Library Manuscript Division. Summary The predecessors of the administrative court were created in the third decade of the 20th century in Lithuania. Notwithstanding, these authorities could not match the judicial review of public administrators’ activity. It is noteworthy that sometimes the Senior Tribunal performed the functions of the administrative court and reviewed the legality of administrative acts. However, some laws did not provide the possibility to challenge administrative acts in the courts. That was the main reason to create Law on the Administrative Court of the Republic of Lithuania. There were a number of attempts to establish judicial review in Lithuania in various laws: in Constitutions, State Council Statute, Law on the Judicial System. Around 10 draft laws on the Administrative Court were prepared by the State Council and the Seimas Commission. However, these attempts were unsuccessful. The first draft law on the Administrative Court was drafted in 1932 by the State Council. The main proposals of this document were: first, the Administrative Court is an Administrative Division of the Supreme Court of Lithuania; second, the Administrative Court disposes general jurisdiction of judicial review of individual or regulatory administrative acts due to the violation of subjective rights of natural or legal person; third, the Administrative Court is the only judicial instance and before bringing an action into court, a plaintiff must go through all lower review processes. The draft law created in 1940 by the Seimas Commission was almost the same but more detailed in the provisions of administrative process, what is more, the Administrative Court was proposed to be a separate judicial body. The main initiators of the Law on the Administrative Court were two lawyers: member of the State Council, judge of the Senior Tribunal, ad hoc judge of the Permanent Court of International Justice, constitutional and administrative law scholar M. Romeris and Memel Territory Governor, Meyer of Kaunas, member of the Seimas and last Prime Minister A. Merkys.

Policy advisory styles in the francophone Belgian civil service

In a context of the rising importance of ministerial advisers, this article provides empirical evidence about the nature of involvement of civil servants in policy work. Based on a survey of graduated civil servants in francophone Belgium, it shows that civil servants are much involved in policy work even in a politico-administrative system characterised by strong ministerial cabinets. Belgian francophone civil servants are ‘incidental advisors’. They are less process generalists than issue specialists who mostly deal with policy implementation. Their policy advisory style oscillates between ‘rational technician’ and ‘client advisor’. Despite a low institutionalisation of policy advice in the civil service, civil servants significantly serve the ministers in the policy formulation (for harmonization) phase, supplying information and analysis and participating to the writing of policy-related texts.Points for practitionersThe francophone Belgian case shows the importance of policy tasks conducted by civil servants. It also provides evidence about the importance of in-house policy-analytical capacity as it shows that civil servants primarily rely on internal information sources and consultation when involved in policy formulation.

Ministerial advisers in executive government: Out from the dark and into the limelight

Ministers increasingly rely on advisers for support and advice. In many countries, these political aides are labelled differently. Generally, they serve as close confidants to their political masters and operate in the ‘shadowland’ between politics and bureaucracy. Scholarship has dragged the ministerial advisers out of the dark and described their background and functions. Still, the field of scholarship has a Westminster bias, is characterized by single case studies, and remains under‐theorized. The lack of comparative focus and theoretical underpinnings can be explained by the complex nature of ministerial advisers. This introductory article suggests a definition for ministerial advisers and reviews the extant literature on these important actors. The main argument is that the extent and relevance of ministerial advisers in executive government merits integration into mainstream public administration and political science theory and research.