Special Advisers Who they are, what they do and why they matter
Abstract
Viewers of The Thick of It will know of special advisers as spin doctors and political careerists. Several well-known ministers have been special advisers, among them David Cameron, Ed Miliband, Jack Straw and Vince Cable. People also know about the public relations disasters involving Jo Moore, Damian McBride and Adam Smith. But what is the reality? What do special advisers actually do in government? Who are they, where do they come from, and what do they go on to do? This book is the most detailed study yet carried out of special advisers. The Constitution Unit’s research team, led by Dr Ben Yong and Professor Robert Hazell, assembled a comprehensive database of over 600 special advisers since 1979. They conducted written surveys, and interviewed over 100 special advisers, ministers and officials from the past thirty years. They conclude that special advisers are now a permanent and indispensable part of Whitehall, but are still treated as transient and temporary. The book concludes with practical recommendations for increasing the effectiveness of special advisers through improvements to their recruitment, induction and training, support and supervision, and strengthening their accountability.
... As senior political staff to executive politicians, they are the 'third actor' in the 'Executive Triangle' (Shaw and Eichbaum, 2018: 149), next to their bosses and senior civil servants. Despite increased research related to their genesis and history (Blick, 2004), as well as their influence on policymaking and day-to-day affairs while in government (Gains and Stoker, 2011;Yong and Hazell, 2014), our understanding with respect to their career trajectory outside of government is scarce. With few exceptions (Goplerud, 2015;Sellers, 2014), we know little about their professional lives after leaving their minister's office: where do they go? ...
... By contrast, a study by Byrne and Theakston (2016) explored the afterlives of British Members of Parliament. In the best example (and where we draw inspiration from), Sellers (2014) -in Yong andHazell's (2014) seminal book -provided a teaser chapter on the post-employment career paths of British SpAds. The chapter was buried deep in 'Appendix 3'. ...
... Centrality was measured using a binary variable. An adviser was considered central if, during their term, they worked in either the Prime Minister's Office or the Cabinet Office (see operationalisation by Yong and Hazell, 2014). Third, we controlled for effects of the policy sector in which the adviser served. ...
The article examines the post-government career moves of 521 former British special advisers who served from 1997 to 2017. Analysis of an original dataset mapping the first job each special adviser ‘landed-in’ after leaving government shows the vast majority land in corporate lobbying and policy advocacy roles. A minority become politicians, although many continue to work in political organisations. The least popular choice is public service. The findings challenge the ‘lure of power’ hypothesis and lend weight to increasing concerns about former political staff revolving to shadow lobbying. The findings point to potential lobbying regulation loopholes first raised by the UK Committee of Standards in Public Life. A multi-nominal logistic regression shows how party affiliation and occupational path dependency constrain career moves. Labour special advisers are less likely to become corporate lobbyists than Conservative and Liberal Democrat ones. Special advisers also tend to revolve back to similar professional roles held before an appointment.
... employment history). Again, the majority of literature over the past two decades examining the profi les and career paths of ministerial advisers is from Western and Southern Europe, Scandinavia, and the Anglo-Commonwealth countries (Askim et al. 2017;Blach-Ørsten et al. 2020;Cobârzan 2008;Connaughton 2010;Eymeri-Douzans et al. 2015, LSE GV314 Group 2012Maley and Van den Berg 2018;Wilson 2015;Yong and Hazell 2014). ...
... Second, we also ask what diff erences exist across various types of coalition governments and parties, in terms of the overall numbers and types of advisers ? Only a handful of existing studies investigate multi-party coalition governments (see Gouglas 2015;Askim et al. 2017;Yong and Hazell 2014), and these relations appear to be underresearched. For example, the number of appointees could indicate potential growing party demands for patronage positions that need to be accommodated. ...
... In some countries, however, such frameworks exist. Yong and Hazell (2014) found that special advisers in the United Kingdom are governed by at least fi ve governing frameworks, and the Cabinet Offi ce has published an annual list of special advisers since 2010 for added transparency. But even when a broad regulatory system exists, such as in Australia, Ng (2016; found accountability gaps where ministers strategically prevented their advisers from appearing before a parliamentary committee, oft en following scandals and controversies, in order to evade accountability. ...
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 profi les and career paths of ministerial advisers under fi ve diff erent 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 fi ve 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 fi nding 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 diff erent 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.
... Concern about controlling their impact and actions is often reflected in concerns about regulating their numbers and introducing instruments such as a code of conduct. In addition, the literature on the countries derived from the Westminster tradition focuses on both advisers' positive input into the policymaking process (Shaw & Eichbaum, 2015;Yong & Hazell, 2014) and their controversial association with policy fiascos (Tiernan, 2007). A recent direction in this literature has been to broaden the focus of political adviser research to diverse traditions in Europe and beyond (Di Mascio & Natalini, 2013;Gouglas, 2015;Öhberg et al., 2017), coupled with attention to cognate literature on policy analysis/public administration models (Craft, 2015). ...
... In countries of the Westminster genre the special adviser, or 'SpAd', has prompted a robust discussion about how the 'people who live in the dark' exert political influence but also impact on the civil service system and the convention of ministerial responsibility. These issues have encountered a greater degree of scrutiny in the UK (Yong & Hazell, 2014) than in Ireland. For example, Tony Blair's Labour administration invoked a sceptical attitude towards departmental officials, and senior advisers had the authority to funnel instructions and perform executive functions. ...
... Any move to employ a cabinet model to non-ministerial cabinet systems implies empowering advisers with executive authority and creating implications for the secretary general's position in a department. Yet the increase in staff around prime ministers' offices and the UK proposal to develop extended ministerial offices (Cabinet Office, 2013;Yong & Hazell, 2014) suggest some potential movement towards 'cabinetisation' in non-ministerial cabinet systems, albeit slow and gradual (Gouglas & Brans, 2016). In addition, Europeanisation, along with the experience of observing the European commissioners' cabinets and liaising with other member state administrations/political parties, broadens awareness of the institutional options available to politicians. ...
Ministerial advisers were first formally appointed as support for individual Irish ministers in 1973, and since then their numbers and tasks have considerably expanded. As 'temporary civil servants', they are regarded as both an accepted and criticised feature of executive government. This article focuses on the role of political staff during the period 2011-16 and centres on the period of the economic crisis and its immediate aftermath. It considers themes arising in the international literature that raise questions for the reform of the Irish 'special adviser'. In order to unpack the specifics of the Irish case, the position and function of special advisers are explored through two theoretical perspectives - public adviser bargains and the core executive. It is argued that the special adviser continues to fit somewhat uneasily within the imperatives of the political-administrative system because they are personally appointed by ministers and their selection is determined by the level and type of support required by individual ministers, as opposed to any preordained skills set.
... Yet despite the condemnation, their numbers continue to rise, they increasingly perform media relations roles, and they continue to attract controversy (Blick & Jones, 2013;C. D. Foster, 2014;Gay, 1992Gay, , 2013Hillman, 2014;2013b;Yong & Hazell, 2014). ...
... Ingham, 2010). They are more likely now to have had pregovernment experience as party appointees working in media relations or public affairs than previously, when they were more likely to come from business, academia or the civil service (Yong & Hazell, 2014). ...
... This was challenged by two illuminating accounts of life as a special adviser (Hillman, 2014;Wilkes, 2014), and the findings of the UCL Constitution Unit's special advisers project (Yong & Hazell, 2014) which led me to reconsider my decision not to interview them. I needed their perspective on journalists' claims that the media role of special advisers was transforming the rules of engagement between government and the media. ...
The aim of this study is to use the concept of ‘mediatization’ to inform a critical, grounded and fine-grained empirical analysis of the institutional dynamics that operate at the interface between government and the media in a liberal democracy. This thesis applies a novel theoretical and empirical approach to the familiar narrative of ‘political spin’, challenging the common assumption that government communications is either a neutral professional function, or an inherently unethical form of distorted communication. In May 1997, Labour came into power on a landslide, bringing into government its 24/7 strategic communications operation, determined to neutralise what it saw as the default right-wing bias of the national media. In the process, the rules of engagement between government and the media were transformed, undermining the resilience of government communications and unleashing a wave of resistance and response. Much academic attention to date has focused on party political news management, while the larger but less visible civil service media operation remains relatively un-examined and undertheorised, although some northern European scholars are exploring mediatization from within public bureaucracies. This study takes a qualitative approach to analyzing change between 1997 and 2014, through 16 in-depth interviews with former, largely middle-ranking, departmental government communicators, most of whom had performed media relations roles. This was a group of civil servants that had spent their working lives in close proximity to ministers during a time of rapidly increasing media scrutiny. These witness accounts were augmented by interviews with six journalists and three politically-appointed special advisers, together with a systematic analysis of key contemporary and archival documents. The aim was to provide insights into change over time within a shared policy and representational space that is theorised here as the ‘cross-field’, where media act as a catalyst for the concentration of political power. What can and does government communication in its current form contribute to the democratic ideal of the informed citizen?
... As will be shown, in the literature on political advisers and partisanship, broader definitions are used. In relation to political staff in the United Kingdom and Australia, "special advisers" or "partisan advisers" are the terms generally used to differentiate between public servants and those who are personally appointed to work on the staff of an elected politician (Craft, 2015;Tiernan & Weller, 2010;Yong & Hazell, 2014). Tiernan and Weller (2010) described all appointed advisers-as opposed to departmental staff-as "personal or party loyalists" (p. ...
... There is a considerable body of work on the personally appointed staff of elected politicians in Australia and internationally, which includes discussion of partisanship. Much of it is focused primarily on the policy adviser or Chief of Staff specifically or all special advisers collectively (Aucoin, 2012;Behm, 2015;Connaughton, 2010;Craft, 2015;Dahlström, 2009;Eichbaum & Shaw, 2010;Fleming & Holland, 2001;Maley, 2002;Pelgrims, 2006;Rhodes & Tiernan, 2014;Romzek & Utter, 1997;Shaw & Eichbaum, 2014;Tiernan, 2001;Walter, 1986Walter, , 2006Yong & Hazell, 2014). However, there is a gap in the literature regarding definitions of partisanship in relation to media advisers specifically. ...
... The tendency to zealotry and the rise in numbers of special advisers in government led to concern about the possible negative impact this growing phalanx of staff was having on the policy-and decision-making processes of governments. Although it is broadly acknowledged that personally appointed advisers to elected politicians are now a permanent and necessary part of the political landscape (Tiernan & Weller, 2010;Yong & Hazell, 2014), government scandals such as the Children Overboard Affair in Australia, the sponsorship scandal in Canada, and concerns about impropriety and the marginalization of the public service in the United Kingdom led to inquiries into the role, influence, accountability, and management of partisan political advisers in government (Abbott & Cohen, 2014;Aucoin, 2012 ;Tiernan, 2007;Wanna, 2006;Yong & Hazell, 2014). ...
The parliamentary media adviser is commonly portrayed as a partisan “spin-doctor,” with little distinction made between the inherent partisan nature of the role and the personal partisanship of the practitioner. Semistructured qualitative interviews with 21 journalists who became parliamentary media advisers highlight the difference between the two and offer practitioner perceptions of the advantages and disadvantages of partisanship in that role. At one extreme is the “true believer”; at the other is the “legal advocate,” with the “committed expert” in between. In doing so, this article challenges the simple, dominant conception of the partisan “spin-doctor.”
... Political advisers are now a ubiquitous feature of executive government the world over. Their advent has been variously explained as a function of the complexity of contemporary policy-making, increasingly challenging ministerial workloads, a desire for political control over bureaucracies, sceptical publics and a 24-hour media cycle (Eichbaum and Shaw 2010;OECD 2011;Yong and Hazell 2014;Craft 2016). ...
... The most obvious is remuneration, including base salary, any performance-related component of remuneration and pension entitlements (Hondeghem 2011). The country-specific details are often (although not universally) on the public record, and are reported by Gay and Fawcett (2005), Maley (2011), Yong and Hazell (2014) and the OECD (2011). ...
... Looking along the front benches one can see that [the special adviser system] has become too much of an intern programme for aspiring politicians, giving them training in a narrow set of skills, such as media, while denying them the chance to gain wider experience relevant in learning major departments. (2014, p. 77) Goplerud (2015) and Yong and Hazell (2014) shine empirical light on Turnbull's point, although neither the former nor Sellers (2014) are wholly convinced of the argument (Goplerud 2015, p. 333;Sellers 2014, p. 233). In the case of the political intern, the reward includes an introduction to the political equivalent of 'trade craft'. ...
Recent research on political advisers is characterized by an expansion beyond Westminster and clearer connections with proximate literatures. This article speaks to the second of these features by applying the Public Service Bargain (PSB) lens to minister/political adviser relationships in new ways. Extant PSB analyses either position political advisers as an independent variable influencing the core bargain between ministers and senior officials, or face difficulties when viewing advisers through existing perspectives developed to explain deals between politicians and public servants. Consequently, the nature of ?the bargain applying to political advisers? (Hood and Lodge 2006, p. 128) remains unclear. This article addresses that lacuna by deploying the reward, competence and loyalty dimensions of PSBs to specify the broad terms of the political adviser bargain, and considers the theoretical and empirical implications of such compacts.
... There is a significant gender gap in political careers across Western democracies, with women continuing to be systematically under-represented. This relates not only to women in elected office but also to those working for parties as officials and advisors (Moens, 2021;Yong & Hazell, 2014). 1 One of the main supply-side explanations advanced for women's under-representation is the gender gap in nascent political ambition, with research showing that, by the time they are young adults, women already express less interest in the idea of running for office one day (Bos et al., 2022;Fox & Lawless, 2014). In this study, we investigate the degree to which differences in ambition are present among a distinct group of politically engaged women and men: those who participate in the youth wings of political parties. 2 Although youth wings remain an understudied element of party organizations, they are an important part of the pipeline for elected representatives in Western parliamentary democracies (Binderkrantz et al., 2020;Hooghe et al., 2004;Ohmura et al., 2018). ...
... We also expect gender to interact with party ideology in fostering or hindering nascent political ambition, both as regards standing as candidates and working for the party. In addition to being more inclined to introduce candidate and intra-party quotas for women, left-wing parties elect and employ higher proportions of women than their right-wing counterparts (Kittilson, 2006;Yong & Hazell, 2014;Childs & Kittilson, 2016). This is relevant to nascent political ambition, since women in such positions may act as role models, encouraging other women to get involved (Wolbrecht & Campbell, 2007;Ladam et al., 2018) and enhancing levels of activism among women party members (Ponce et al., 2020). ...
One of the main supply‐side explanations for women's underrepresentation in politics is the gender gap in nascent political ambition. While this has been examined in terms of electoral ambition, the aspiration to pursue non‐electoral careers within parties has been overlooked. In our study, we therefore investigate whether both types of ambition – electoral and non‐electoral – vary among young women and men participating in a key entry point for political careers in Western democracies: party youth wings. To do so, we surveyed almost 2,000 members of six centre‐left and centre‐right youth wings in Australia, Italy, and Spain. We find that while, as expected, women in youth wings display lower levels of electoral ambition, they are almost as likely as men to express non‐electoral ambition. Furthermore, and contrary to our expectations, we show that women in centre‐right youth wings are no less interested in pursuing electoral and non‐electoral political careers than women in centre‐left ones. Our study thus provides new insights into the gendered nature of political ambition, highlighting that women's lower interest in electoral office does not necessarily reflect reduced interest in a political career. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved
... This article contributes to the emerging research agenda on politically appointed staff backgrounds and their career pathways (Howlett et al., 2017;Maley, 2017;Van den Berg, 2018;Wilson, 2015;Yong and Hazell, 2014). To date, much of what we know about politically appointed staff has emerged from case study and survey research. ...
... There are some indications that gender differences play out in political offices and differ across countries. Evidence from the UK (Yong and Hazell, 2014) suggests that women make up a much smaller proportion of political staff, but that Labour performs better than the Conservatives. By contrast, the Netherlands has almost balanced gender representation among staff (Van den Berg, 2018). ...
Women are underrepresented within political institutions, which can (negatively) impact policy outcomes. We examine women’s descriptive representation as politically appointed staff within ministerial offices. Politically appointed staff are now institutionalised into the policy process, so who they are is important. To date, collecting systematic data on political staff has proved impossible. However, for the first time we demonstrate how to build a systematic data set of this previously unobservable population. We use Australian Ministerial Directories (telephone records) from 1979 to 2010 (a method that can notionally be replicated in advanced democratic jurisdictions), to examine political advising careers in a similar manner as elected political elites. We find that work in political offices is divided on gender lines: men undertake more policy work, begin and end their careers in higher status roles and experience greater career progression than women. We find evidence that this negatively impacts women’s representation and their later career paths into parliament.
... This body of scholarship focuses on the expansion, roles, and effects of ministerial advisers (Askim, Karlsen, & Kolltveit, 2017;Christiansen et al., 2016;Eichbaum & Shaw, 2008;Yong & Hazell, 2014). The main reasons for the growth in ministerial advisers (also referred to as 'special' or 'political' advisers) include the aim to increase the political leadership's capacity to control the policy bureaucracy, the emergence of more complex policy problems (see also the final section on 'stress factors'), and permanent coverage by the news media on political executives. ...
... The potential threat these special advisers pose to civil service neutrality and impartiality are a cross-cutting theme in this body of scholarship (Shaw & Eichbaum, 2015). Many studies on special advisers aim to gain a better understanding of the nature of the beast, including the growth patterns (Dahlström, 2009), career backgrounds (Yong & Hazell, 2014), and functions and role understandings of special advisers (Askim et al., 2017). The last body of research has produced several typologies of ministerial advisers' functional roles (see for an overview). ...
Forthcoming in The Oxford Handbook of Political Executives, edited by Rudy B. Andeweg, Robert Elgie, Ludger Helms, Juliet Kaarbo and Ferdinand Müller-Rommel. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
... In 1964 British PM Harold Wilson employed three economists in ministers' offices who were termed 'special advisers' as they were not civil servants (Blick 2004). While there had previously been irregular and external staff in ministers' offices at times, Wilson's 'experiment' is seen as an innovation which began the process of the institutionalisation of political staff in the UK (Blick 2004;Yong and Hazell 2014). Through the 1960s and 1970s there were prominent and influential special advisers in the UK government, but their overall numbers remained relatively small. ...
... Until the Blair government came to power in 1997 there had not been more than 40 special advisers (Blick 2004, 227). Since 1997 there has been significant growth in the numbers of special advisers, especially at the centre in a variety of hybrid units supporting the PM (Yong and Hazell 2014). However the civil service model of the minister's private office has not been displaced. ...
Large, politicised and separate ministerial offices are a feature of Australian government, while the UK ministerial office remains a hybrid unit which is part of the civil service. Using an historical institutionalist lens, and focusing on institutional factors, the article analyses why the separate partisan model evolved in Australia. It argues the Australian innovation was an historical compromise made in an unsuccessful attempt to move towards US-style political-administrative institutions. By contrast, the UK ministerial office has remained unified and hybrid, and, despite experimentation, resilient to structural and ideational change. There is ongoing pressure for more committed support for British ministers but strong forces have prevented moves towards larger offices, seen in the collapse of Extended Ministerial Offices. The article argues explanations for these divergent paths can be found in concepts such as critical junctures, path dependency and institutional resistance. The article contributes to an emerging comparative literature on advisory institutions.
free eprint https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/YkzFchMBPaBZAr8trPXQ/full
... Witness accounts suggest that, after an initial period of disruption, this small but growing and increasingly coordinated group of politically appointed SpAds after 1997 came to be perceived as vital to political leadership within the civil service (Public Administration Select Committee, 2001Yong and Hazell, 2014). The interviews conducted for this study support this in part but also raise questions about significant but insidious changes in the unwritten rules of engagement for government news management. ...
... The interviews conducted for this study support this in part but also raise questions about significant but insidious changes in the unwritten rules of engagement for government news management. The media relations practices of SpAds are little researched, although former advisers are starting to explain and reflect on their work, and recent research has tried to place them in historical context and systematically audit their activities (Blick and Jones, 2013;Gay, 2013;Hillman, 2014;Wilkes, 2014;Yong and Hazell, 2014). Detailed insights into how they operate vis-a-vis the media, however, are hard to find, since such activity is conducted covertly, and the civil servants who work most closely with special advisers rarely comment publicly. ...
Despite widespread critiques of ‘political spin’, the way governments engage with the mass media has attracted relatively little empirical attention. There is a small but growing body of research into bureaucracies’ responses to mediatisation from within which have identified tensions between bureaucratic and party political values, but this has not included the United Kingdom. There are concerns that the traditional dividing line between government information and political propaganda has come under increasing pressure as a higher premium is placed on persuasion by both journalists and politicians battling for public attention in an increasingly competitive market. Within Whitehall, the arrival of Labour in 1997 after 18 years in opposition was a watershed for UK government communications, allowing the government to reconfigure its official information service in line with the party political imperative to deploy strategic communications as a defence against increasingly invasive media scrutiny. Public relations, in government as elsewhere, has grown in scale, scope and status, becoming institutionalised and normalised within state bureaucracies, but how has this affected the role, status and influence of the civil servants who conduct media management? Within the system of executive self-regulation of government publicity that is characteristic of Whitehall, government press officers must negotiate a difficult path between the need to inform citizens about the government’s programme, and demands by ministers to deploy privileged information to secure and maintain personal and party advantage in the struggle for power. Taking 1997 as a turning point, and through the voices of the actors who negotiate government news – mainly press officers, but also journalists and special advisers – this article examines the changing role and position of Whitehall press officers in what has become known as the age of political spin, finding that profound and lasting change in the rules of engagement has taken place and is continuing.
... It includes different strands of research. In none of them does media advisers constitute the central analytical concern, but in some we can nowadays find contributions that speak to this topic (e.g., Askim et al., 2017;Figenschou et al., 2017Figenschou et al., , 2023Ng, 2018;Yong and Hazell, 2014). ...
Although policy advisers have been amply studied, far fewer studies have examined media advisers. And, so far, adviser research has offered few insights into the relationship between these two key groups of political staffers. This article claims that media advisers have been empowered. It offers a rational functionalist explanation, which emphasises concerns about functional efficiency. Media generates functional pressures for the institutional strengthening of media advisers, solidifying their role. This argument is examined empirically through a case study of ministerial media adviser (MMA) empowerment in Sweden, based on interviews conducted among MMAs and political journalists. The data tell us that MMAs are on the rise, that they have become more controlling toward journalists and more assertive within ministerial staff. In the process, MMAs have come to constitute a category of their own as they have converged among themselves but diverged from policy advisers. The interview evidence indicates that MMAs also have a role in government policy, as the media has contributed to more integration of communication and policy, but additional research is needed. Overall, this work has implications for research on political communication, executives, and advisers—especially for debates about political professionals in government.
... Conversely, regarding prosopography in the anglophone literature on ministerial offices it is more difficult to find one unified tradition or inspiration. In what resembles a prosopographical study, Yong and Hazell (2014) have constructed a database of all the ministerial advisers in the British government between 1979 and 2013, sent out a survey and conducted interviews in order to answer their research questions 4 . These research questions fit well into the earlier mentioned anglophone focus on the inner workings of the ministerial office: "Who becomes a ministerial adviser in terms of age, skills and experience? ...
... There is much literature about the role of special advisors at the centre of British government. Yong and Hazell (2014) provided us with a substantial study of what they do and how they operate, whilst Blick and Jones (2013) offered similar insights (with an especial focus on their relationship to the PM). Meanwhile, Eichbaum and Shaw (2008;2010;2011) have produced a substantial body of work on the comparative study of advisers. ...
The role of Downing Street Chief-of-Staff has been neglected by examinations of British Politics, prime ministers, and political leadership and management. This is despite the role having existed since 1997. This article is a “first move” in correcting this omission. The Chief’s responsibilities are difficult to define but cover oversight of the political operation within 10 Downing Street. This includes Human Resources; “gatekeeping”; being the PM’s closest adviser; institutional reforms; and other related functions. The article uses a theoretical framework drawn from the emerging literature on political management (Lees-Marshment, in Political management: the dance of government and politics, Routledge, Abingdon, 2021) to provide an understanding of what the Chief does and why it is important that we comprehend it better. It focuses upon how chiefs have undertaken the four “D’s” (deliberating, designing, doing, and dancing) of political management and what insights can be gleaned from this evidence. Application of this framework helps to reveal key developments of chiefs’ work in a structured and detailed manner.
... In this landscape, even civil servants 'with stunted political antennae' realised that the DUP and Sinn Féin would share power in Northern Ireland for quite some time (McBride, 2019, p.24). This includes Northern Ireland's SpAds, who have exceptionally long tenures for ministerial advisers and therefore form part of the institutional memory of the administration (Yong and Hazell, 2014). In this respect, minister Jonathan Bell's witness statement that 'ministers come and go but SpAds remain' is insightful. ...
This paper explores relationships between ministers, special advisers and civil servants through the lens of a high-profile government crisis in Northern Ireland (NI). Although political–administrative relationships are a mainstay of public administration research, we still have limited understanding of how these relationships feature and function within the ‘Westminster family’ of governance when operating within devolved institutions or post-conflict societies, nor of their role in crisis. We use Scott’s institutional pillars as an analytical framework and conduct a documentary analysis of public inquiry witness statements to explore the Renewable Heat Incentive crisis which led to the collapse of the NI legislature. Utilising a novel application of existing theory, we demonstrate that the implementation of the devolved, consociational power-sharing model incubated new governance norms, that prioritised and legitimised the agendas and actions of political actors (ministers and special advisers), over civil servants. Specifically, in understanding how relational norms – particularly distrust – feed public policy failure and institutional crisis, our findings contribute to this research area and to the broader public administration field. Government institutional crisis negatively impacts upon public service delivery and the wider health of democracy. Understanding such crises is an important first step in their amelioration.
Points for practitioners
Structural, systemic and day-to-day behavioural layering of distrust adversely impacts government professionals’ ability to recognise, communicate and respond to risk; this can create policy problems, which can escalate, unchecked, until they have become full-blown crises. In order to proactively mitigate crises in other public policy contexts, managers and teams should build in awareness raising, reflection and management processes to individual and operational performance reviews to improve relational norms, and prevent the normalisation of distrust.
... It also recognises that political staffers as a group span from party central offices to legislatures and the government. Previous studies have shown that party staffers typically progress in ascending career cycle from more junior positions as party office employees and parliamentary aides towards more demanding positions, such as ministerial advisers and senior party officials (Svallfors 2020;Yong and Hazell 2014). To highlight staffers' professionality, however, their careerist motivation rarely leads to pursuing of elected office, but instead they prefer to continue professional careers in the vicinity of politics like consulting, public affairs, think tanks, and NGOs (Yong and Hazell 2014; Askim et al. 2021;Svallfors 2016Svallfors , 2017. ...
This study analyses professional policy experts in political parties. While recent studies have described the characteristics of ‘unelected politicians’, the drivers for their emergence and impact on democracy have not yet been fully elaborated. We examine these aspects via Finnish party elite interviews (n=79). We challenge the traditional party professionalization narrative where parties’ increasing publicity management efforts diminish intra-party democracy (IPD) and parties’ political ambitions. We find that in addition to campaign, media, and democratic needs, political parties in Finland are concerned especially by their policymaking capacity that has shifted to experts of public administration and lobbyists, and which parties seek to strengthen with the recruitment of more political employees. This elevates the role of partisan policy professionals within political parties, a perspective that has been downplayed in party organisation literature. We call this the imperative of expertise and conclude that while it likely limits traditional IPD, it can improve representative democracy by enhancing parties’ policy control against the technocratic tendencies of contemporary democracy.
... While there is considerable empirical data and knowledge on the demographics of civil servants and advisors in a number of developed countries (e.g. Askim et al., 2021;Bach & Veit, 2018;Christensen et al., 2014;Yong & Hazell, 2014), we know considerably less on these actors' distinct contributions to policy-making. To be sure, the recent surge in studies of political advisers has resulted in a limited number of studies which provide relevant insights on policy-making in the executive triangle (Eichbaum & Shaw, 2008;Hustedt & Salomonsen, 2017;Maley, 2015). ...
... From its establishment in the early nineteenth century, and developed since then, France has evolved a model of vast, powerful ministerial cabinets of politically appointed personal advisers to ministers, prime ministers and presidents (for a thorough analysis, see Eymeri-Douzans et al. 2015). This has been copied in many other continental European countries and which used to be the counter-model of British (and former British dominions) small ministers' private offices, before the recent flourishing of 'special advisers' in Westminster systems too (Yong and Hazell 2014;Shaw and Eichbaum 2018). ...
... The 1980s and 1990s saw the disaggregation of departmental governance into executive agencies and a further reaggregation through mergers, the result being to shift powers from the classic bureaucracy to more managerially run entities (Elston, 2012;Flinders, 2002;Talbot & Johnson, 2007). This was during the tenure of Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (1979)(1980)(1981)(1982)(1983)(1984)(1985)(1986)(1987)(1988)(1989)(1990), when the political advice received by her cabinet shifted to political appointees, special advisers and right-wing think tanks (James, 1986;Lewis, 2011;Yong, 2014). A preference for 'instinct and common sense' replaced expertise during both Thatcher's and Major's premierships (Green, 2014). ...
Previous research has identified political ideology as central in the landmark Academies Act (2010). This article further analyses how politics of evidence played its part in the policy process by focusing on long‐term structural changes and preferences among policymakers. The article draws on policymaker interviews after the reform, a mapping of think tanks and a document analysis. The analysis shows that political–ideological preferences were derived from think tanks, and the Conservative manifesto built on skewed Swedish evidence in constructing an argument for the Act. The political choices morphed into fact‐based arguments in the policy process. While think tanks had some reservations, in the Whitehall bureaucracy the argument was reformulated as a rational deliberation. This was possible because of the long‐term change in the significance of think tanks, and how policymakers preferred politically informed opinions instead of research evidence. The conclusion argues that the evidence‐based policy emphasis is an attempt to depoliticise the scope for political arguments. The political dynamic thus results in structurally empowered and layered but depoliticising use of evidence.
... Particularly the political staff provides policy advice to the PM or the president, including in foreign and security policy, and can be key players in solving disputes between different branches of government. (E.g.Mitchell, 2005;Eichbaum & Shaw, 2014;Yong & Hazell, 2014; Gherghina & Kopecký, 2016;Marland et al., 2017) ...
... In this environment, there are fewer special advisers, and staff typically serve for around 3 years. This appears to be sufficient time to build up relevant skills and networks (Yong and Hazell, 2014). Indeed, just over a quarter of all special advisers from the Thatcher and Major years went on to run for office, suggesting that perhaps staff are more ambitious than individuals from other potential candidate pools (Goplerud, 2015: 340). ...
Political advising is an increasingly important stepping-stone for a parliamentary career in many advanced democracies. Not only does this trend inform our understanding of political parties and careers, there is reason to think former advisors may have distinct attitudes compared to other types of elected officials. Using elite survey data from 42 elections in 21 countries, this study asks whether former political advisers approach representation differently than candidates with other pre-legislative experience. We find that they do. In particular, former advisors are more willing to prioritize their party’s preferences over their constituents’ preferences, and favor their own convictions over their constituent’s priorities. These findings demonstrate that former advisors have a more party-centric approach to representation, consistent with the “loyal partisan” archetype. The results inform our understanding of an increasingly common pathway to elected office as well as the personalization and professionalization of politics and have important implications for representative democracy.
... Officially the relevant minister is responsible for policy advisers and, likewise, they are only accountable to the minister, but in practice, ministers often hand over the disciplinary role to senior civil servants. 8 In comparison with the, roughly, 4000 senior civil servants who are involved at some degree of specialism in devising policy, the numbers of special advisers are low at about 100. So they are outgunned about 40:1 by civil servants; but each special adviser has a much greater impact on policy. ...
In Westminster parliamentary systems there was once a clear separation between the careers of public servants and of elected politicians. Politicians decided what policies they wanted to pursue, while public servants advised, devised and delivered the policies. This separation ensured that policy ideas were developed by a professional elite with experience and knowledge. Politicians came from a variety of backgrounds, entering politics for a variety of reasons. Over time, the source of policy advice for ministers has shifted from the professional public servant to political advisers lacking experience and with different career ambitions than public service. Increasingly, elected politicians are becoming ‘professionalised’—emerging from similar party and adviser backgrounds. The de‐separation of what were once distinct career paths has led to poorer policy development, increasing public malfeasance, a lower‐quality civil service, and democratic disenchantment. We need to separate the career paths once more.
... In the United Kingdom, the capacity of political elites to control the implementation phase through patronage is much weaker. Appointments to the civil service are meritocratic and mainly non-political (Heywood 2012), with the exception of special advisers (Yong and Hazell 2014). There is little change in personnel when governments change, and our interviews suggested that the institutional structures for implementing and monitoring public procurement are much less prone to political influence. ...
Incoming governments sometimes abuse their power to manipulate the allocation of government contracts so as to buy loyalty from cronies. While scandals suggest such practices are relatively widespread, the extent of such partisan favoritism is difficult to measure and the conditions under which it flourishes under-theorized. Drawing on theory regarding the role of institutions as constraints on corruption, we identify three spheres of political influence over government contracting and show how elites can manipulate two of those spheres to increase their opportunities to influence the procurement process and minimize external accountability, facilitating the corrupt allocation of contracts to partisan allies. Using an innovative big data methodology, we then identify the effects of a change in government on procurement markets in two countries, Hungary and the United Kingdom, which differ in terms of political influence over these institutions. We find that politically-favored companies secure 50-60% of the central government contracting market in Hungary but only 10% in the UK.
... (E.g. Mitchell, 2005;Eichbaum and Shaw, 2014;Yong and Hazell, 2014;Gherghina and Kopecký, 2016;Marland et al., 2017) Regular coordination between the staffs of the PM and the president should facilitate successful cooperation between the two executives. However, the size and responsibilities of the president's staff can also be important variables in shaping the role and influence of the president. ...
A key factor of semi-presidential regimes is power-sharing mechanisms between president and government. Influenced by Shugart and Carey’s seminal work on premier-presidential regimes, this article addresses intra-executive dynamics in light of recent scholarship on the risks and consequences associated with conflict and cooperation between the president and the cabinet. Through an in-depth comparison of three premier-presidential systems with broadly similar constitutional designs, Finland, Lithuania, and Romania, it forces us to reconsider how coordination mechanisms and political context shape presidential influence. Absent of a working constitutional division of labour and established modes of intra-executive coordination, presidents are more likely to use alternative channels of influence – such as the strategy of ‘going public’ or direct contacts with political parties, the legislature, or civil society stakeholders – and to intervene in questions falling under the competence of the government. Lack of institutionalized coordination also benefits the presidents as they hold the initiative regarding cooperation between the two executives.
... Unlike permanent civil servants, special advisors resign when parties change office. SeeGay (2013) for an official review of the development, definition and role of this position; see alsoYong and Hazell (2014).Producing Knowledge, Producing Credibility: British Think-Tank... ...
Think-tanks and their researchers are located within an interstitial and ill-defined ‘space between fields’; a space both constituted and divided by the worlds of academia, politics, journalism and business. This liminal position can be problematic for a think-tank researcher’s intellectual credibility as they lack the recognised cultural and symbolic capital derived from being located within an established profession’s jurisdiction. The question arises, how do think-tanks gain intellectual credibility? Drawing on interviews with think-tank researchers, this paper explores how these interstitial intellectuals produce policy reports. In following this process, we find that credibility emerges from a complex web of relationships across established fields/professions. Think-tank researchers must engage in a complex ‘dance’ of positioning the symbols, capitals and interests of a number of professions. To maintain their integrity, researchers must try to keep in step with competing interests from different professions; at times aligning them, at other times blocking or obscuring them from one another.
... At the same time, the increased use and influence of SpAds in Westminster systems is often linked to a desire to reassert political control over the civil service (Eichbaum and Shaw, 2010). In this vein, SpAds are a necessary, invaluable and trusted aid to ministers in a demanding political environment (Yong and Hazell, 2014). Importantly, in the UK legislatures, SpAds have no official authority over civil servants, in fact they are specifically prohibited from 'managing' civil servants in their code of conduct. ...
Using data gathered from interviews with political journalists, Government Information Officers and Special Advisers (SpAds), this chapter examines the role of these communication elites in Northern Ireland’s mandatory consociational democracy. In particular, we consider how their communication roles are affected by the consociational design of the Northern Ireland government, and how this in turn affects the communication of departmental and executive policy in Northern Ireland. While in some ways, these actors function similarly to those working elsewhere in Westminster model democracies, this political context adds complexity to their roles. For example, on the one hand, SpAds promote partisan issues to the media and reinforce ‘party fiefdoms’; on the other, they play an important diplomatic role in inter-party negotiation and conflict resolution between the five ideologically opposed parties in government. We suggest that an analysis of the government communication sphere provides a good indication of the kinds of issues and inherent contradictions which exist in post-conflict consociational democracies, meaning that scholars may gain insight into the functioning of these institutions by examining the communicative role and relationships of political communication elites.
... However, little research has been done into this. The majority of scholarship concerning partisanship focuses on political advisers generally or, where more specific, on policy advisers and chiefs of staff (Connaughton, 2010;Pelgrims, 2006;Craft, 2015;Eichbaum & Shaw, 2010;Maley, 2002;Shaw & Eichbaum, 2014;Tiernan, 2001;Yong & Hazell, 2014). Although branching across all advisers, the work of Shaw and Eichbaum (2014) is particularly enlightening. ...
This paper reports on qualitative interviews with 10 Australian news editors and nine Australian politicians about the transition of press secretaries to political journalism and associated issues of partisanship and conflict of interest. Inductive analysis of the interviews revealed the importance of professionalism, reputation and perceptions of partisanship in employment decisions by both politicians and news editors. Politicians prioritised journalistic skill above party membership and news editors were influenced by the former press secretary’s reputation as a “spear chucker” or “gun for hire”. Although the editors perceived political experience to be valuable, the majority preferred to “launder” returning journalists through a non-political reporting role before allowing them back to political news reporting, thus highlighting a tension between expectations of traditional journalistic professionalism and concerns about partisanship.
... Research on political advisors in Westminster and presidential systems has typically focused on the roles and motivation of political advisors in the government offices (Eichbaum and Shaw 2007;Eichbaum and Shaw 2008;Maley 2011;Shaw and Eichbaum 2012;Yong and Hazell 2014). This research pinpoints important factors in the work of political advisors, such as that their main motivation for working in these roles is a quest for power and influence (Romzek and Utter 1997;Eichbaum and Shaw 2007;Maley 2011), that their work is diffuse and surrounded with uncertainty concerning their legitimate space for action, and that it is often unclear to whom and for what political advisors are accountable (Romzek and Utter 1997;Romzek 2000;Eichbaum and Shaw 2007). ...
This article focuses on “partisan policy professionals” (PPPs), i.e. people who are employed to affect politics and policy, and analyzes their particular motivations and skills. This article focuses on the occupational practices of PPPs: what are their main motivations and driving forces, and what are the key skills they deploy in their work? The main motivation for PPPs is a desire to wield power and influence the course of affairs, while their working-life satisfaction comes from getting their message into the media without becoming personally exposed. The key resource of PPPs is context-dependent politically useful knowledge, in three main forms: “Problem formulation” involves highlighting and framing social problems and their possible solutions. “Process expertise” consists of understanding the “where, how, and why” of the political and policy-making processes. “Information access” is the skill to be very fast in finding reliable and relevant information. These motivations and skills underpin a particular professionalism based in an “entrepreneurial ethos”, which differs from both the ethos of elected politicians, and that of civil servants, and which has some potentially problematic implications for democratic governance.
Cet article explore les relations entre les ministres, les conseillers spéciaux et les fonctionnaires à travers le prisme d’une crise gouvernementale très médiatisée en Irlande du Nord. Bien que les relations politico-administratives soient un pilier de la recherche sur l’administration publique, la manière dont ces relations se présentent et fonctionnent au sein de la « famille Westminster » de la gouvernance est encore mal comprise lorsqu’elle opère dans des institutions décentralisées ou des sociétés post-conflit, tout comme leur rôle en cas de crise. Nous utilisons les piliers institutionnels de Scott comme cadre analytique et menons une analyse documentaire des déclarations des témoins de l’enquête publique pour explorer la crise du programme d’incitation au chauffage renouvelable qui a conduit à l’effondrement du Parlement d’Irlande du Nord. Grâce à une nouvelle application de la théorie existante, nous démontrons que la mise en œuvre du modèle de partage du pouvoir décentralisé et consociatif a engendré de nouvelles normes de gouvernance, qui ont donné la priorité et légitimé les agendas et les actions des acteurs politiques (ministres et conseillers spéciaux), par rapport aux fonctionnaires. Plus précisément, en comprenant comment les normes relationnelles – en particulier la méfiance – alimentent l’échec des politiques publiques et la crise institutionnelle, nos résultats contribuent à ce domaine de recherche et à celui, plus large, de l’administration publique. Les crises institutionnelles des gouvernements ont un impact négatif sur la prestation des services publics et sur la santé de la démocratie en général. La compréhension de ces crises est un premier pas important vers leur amélioration. Remarques à l’intention des praticiens La formation structurelle, systémique et comportementale quotidienne de la méfiance a un impact négatif sur la capacité des professionnels du gouvernement à reconnaître, communiquer et répondre aux risques ; cela peut créer des problèmes politiques qui peuvent s’aggraver, sans contrôle, jusqu’à ce qu’ils deviennent des crises à part entière. Afin d’atténuer de manière proactive les crises dans d’autres contextes de politique publique, les responsables et les équipes devraient intégrer des processus de sensibilisation, de réflexion et de gestion dans les évaluations des performances individuelles et opérationnelles afin d’améliorer les normes relationnelles et d’empêcher la normalisation de la méfiance.
"The neo-liberal era and its NPM-driven reforms being over, our polities confronted with terrible poly- crises and great transitions to handle, rediscover the importance of robust Neo-Weberian States and public administrations. Public employers are thus in great need of attracting the young talented people from the Z and Alpha Generations to join the Public Service. Alas, the public sector’s attractiveness in the eyes of youngsters has dropped in almost all European countries, for many reasons that are diagnosed in the article’s first section. This tricky situation calls for the setting up of a new, proactive public policy of attractiveness, whose target group, the undecided young people whose education does not predestine them to the public or the private sector, is identified in the next section. Then, a plea in favor of activating four pertinent levers of intrinsic motivation amongst these youngsters is presented in detail. The article concludes on the likely contribution of such an attractive policy to the overall objective of reconnecting (young) people with the State and the public institutions — a great need for our post-modern democracies."
This chapter presents the concept of the core executive as originally formulated and subsequently revised, drawing attention to the central questions ‘Who does what?’ and ‘With what resources?’. It then elaborates on the three main aspects of the definition: organisations and processes, coordination and conflict. Yet today’s societies are different to those that existed when the concept was unveiled, and so by way of providing a context for the rest of the book we also describe different societal trends that may have had a bearing on the shape and operation of contemporary core executives, including developments in the media, the recentring of the government apparatus, coalition dynamics and the rise of populism, as well as large-scale crises such as the global COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, the chapter sets out the thematic framework that guides the eight country cases: the particular configuration of core executive actors and institutions; the resources at their disposal; the ways in which governing activities are coordinated and conflict is arbitrated; and the degree to which societal developments have changed the composition and functioning of the core executive.
Westminster administrative systems were characterized by a clear separation between the political careers and roles of elected ministers and career civil servants. The former set the values or aims of the organization; the latter utilize those values when generating policy ideas. This separation provides what H. A. Simon calls procedural rationality. The decision premise of public servants is (1) an apolitical commitment to government service and (2) a commitment to advise on and implement the current government values, including expert advice using their personal and institutional memory and procedural knowledge. Using evidence from Australia and the UK, we track the de-separation of political careers. Policy advice increasingly comes from outside the career public service, including politically appointed special advisors. Furthermore, senior politicians are increasingly drawn from the world of the special and external advisors. De-separation changes the decision premise of all actors which we argue deleteriously affects the nature of policy formation.
In 1997, the recently appointed French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin took a firm stance in favor of the Internet and announced an ambitious program to develop information technology and networks. In a country characterized by the lingering presence of the Minitel and bureaucratic reluctance to Internet solutions, this allocution, referred as the Hourtin speech, has been acknowledged as a turning-point in French internet policies. However, little is known about the dynamics that made such a statement possible. Based on interviews and personal archive of key actors, this paper offers to investigate the administrative and political processes that enabled such a change of position at the highest level of the State. While the role played by civil servants or government officials in promoting the development of the Internet in France has often been overlooked in internet histories, we offer new insight on the political work and administrative mobilizations that contributed to the diffusion of internet solutions and more broadly, to the advent of a digital revolution.
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.
This article analyzes career paths and career considerations among policy professionals in Sweden. It builds on a longitudinal dataset where the professionals' careers are mapped and interviews conducted over a six‐year period. We found that: (1) skills such as the ability to navigate the political system make policy professionals employable in a variety of organizations; (2) considerations regarding different aspects of power were central to their career decisions; and (3) the barriers in their labor market are related to ideological commitments, loyalties, and value hierarchies that make policy professionals reluctant to move anywhere their skills could take them.
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Einführend zeigt der Beitrag die wachsende Relevanz von Politikberatung als Tätigkeitsfeld und Forschungsgegenstand auf. Nach einer Begriffsklärung und Verortung in der Politikwissenschaft werden Schwerpunkte der Politikberatungsforschung wie auch aktuell diskutierte Trends behandelt. Auf diese Weise er wird verdeutlicht, dass eine systematische Fortführung der wissenschaftlichen Diskussion möglich und notwendig ist. Dass das Handbuch Politikberatung hierzu einen Beitrag leisten will, wird anhand der Schwerpunktsetzung des Bandes erläutert.
This chapter contains the theoretical framework the study in this book is based on. Embedded in institutional theory and building on four strands of literature—semi-presidentialism, public administration, political leadership, and foreign policy analysis—it highlights the role of institutions in facilitating successful policy-making. It outlines key concepts and findings from institutional theory before moving more specifically to the incentives that presidents and prime ministers have for engaging in intra-executive cooperation. The specific challenges related to leadership in foreign and security policy, including European Union affairs, are emphasized. The chapter identifies various intra-executive coordination mechanisms and puts forward a theoretical framework for the subsequent empirical chapters.
This chapter will examine the causes and consequences of recruiting an increasing number of political staff from outside the permanent civil service. The evidence is ‘politicisation’ has grown in recent decades as a consequence of the influx of appointees. The threat posed to the traditional Whitehall model from the escalation of partisanship is significant, upending the once sacred civil service ‘monopoly’ over policy advice. The debate is nevertheless more nuanced than depicted by images of shadowy special advisers. The nature of the policy process has changed radically over the last thirty years. The growth of policy-relevant research, the impact of new technology, and the demand for ‘user-driven’ public services led Ministers to seek varieties of specialist advice from outside the permanent bureaucracy. Politicisation ought not to be confused with the legitimate search for expertise.
In the present paper we argue that the emergence of political advisers in the Westminster (and not only) administrative tradition can be understood as part of a process of ‘cabinetisation’, which started in the 1980s and continues till today. Given the lack of theory on this concept the main aim of the present paper is to develop cabinetisation from a background concept to a systematized one, which can then be used for systematic comparative research. Thus, the main question driving the present paper is: what is cabinetisation? The fundamental challenge is the delimitation of the concept in order to avoid the risk of conceptual stretching. Once the scope of the concept has been settled, cabinetisation is illustrated by using two examples of Westminster tradition systems, Australia and Canada, where the phenomenon has arguably advanced more than in others. An interesting question here is the following. Does the organisation and logic of advisory work around the minister in those countries belong to the ministerial cabinet species? Did Australia and Canada cross the Rubicon, thus passing the point of no return, or do ministerial offices in these systems can still be classified as falling within the Westminster tradition? We suggest that on the basis of what we know from the literature, Australian ministerial offices can be classified as variants of the ministerial cabinet species, while Canadian ones are heading there but did not yet pass the point of no return.
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.
en Political advisors in Canada are comparatively numerous and highly differentiated in role. Based on a recent survey, this article examines how senior ministerial policy advisors, a subset of the political staff community, perceive their support for ministers and their relationships with public servants. It finds that they increase ministers' policy capacity, encourage greater responsiveness from public servants, and generally feel that they enjoy good relations with officials and respect their role. Since much depends on advisors' personal maturity, however, the paper endorses the Trudeau government's release of a code of conduct for ministerial‐exempt staff as a means of embedding accountability more deeply within political staff culture.
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fr Au Canada, les conseillers politiques sont comparativement nombreux et ont des rôles fortement différenciés. Basé sur un récent sondage, cet article examine la question des hauts conseillers politiques ministériels, un sous‐ensemble du personnel ministériel, et la manière dont ceux‐ci perçoivent leur soutien aux ministres et leurs relations avec les fonctionnaires. Selon l'article, les conseillers politiques permettent aux ministres d'accroître leur capacité en matière d’élaboration de politiques, promeuvent le développement de la réceptivité chez les fonctionnaires, et ils ont généralement l'impression d'entretenir de bonnes relations avec les dirigeants et de respecter leur rôle. Cependant, comme beaucoup de choses dépendent de la maturité personnelle des conseillers, l'article soutient la publication par le gouvernement Trudeau d'un code de conduite pour le personnel ministériel exonéré, comme moyen d'ancrer l'imputabilité plus profondément dans la culture du personnel ministériel.
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