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Politicians in the developing world are often faced with the challenge of delegating policy to non-professional bureaucracies who cannot guarantee outcomes consistent with lawmakers' expectations. This raises important questions. First, how does low bureaucratic capacity affect politicians’ decision-making and behavior? Second, what explains policy success in low capacity environments? This book tells the story about how political strategies and behavior change as bureaucratic capacity decreases. It argues that in a low capacity context, politicians are increasingly unwilling to depend on their administrative apparatus, and may instead resort to "bureaucratic circumvention": creating new agencies, turning to out-of-jurisdiction agents, or outsourcing to the private or non-profit sectors. The first part of the book focuses on the determinants of circumvention. It shows that this is more likely as existing bureaucratic capacity decreases, a politician’s ideology grows farther apart from that of the existing bureau, the cost of going outside the bureaucracy decreases, or policy importance increases. These hypotheses are supported through an analysis of an original dataset of delegation decisions from over 45,000 Latin American executive decrees. The second part examines the effects of agency choice on policy implementation. It argues that when politicians’ interests are aligned with those of their political allies, implementation is likely to be successful; when interests are unaligned, implementation will be less successful. These propositions are supported through evidence from six controlled case studies of public policies in Brazil, Ecuador, and Venezuela. The implications of bureaucratic circumvention are manifold. First, this concept provides a framework with which politicians may achieve policy success. However, second, since a politician may also now choose the agent closest to her preferences, implementation tends to become more politicized. Third, since the p

Politicians in the developing world are often faced with the challenge of delegating policy to non-professional bureaucracies who cannot guarantee outcomes consistent with lawmakers' expectations. This raises important questions. First, how does low bureaucratic capacity affect politicians’ decision-making and behavior? Second, what explains policy success in low capacity environments? This book tells the story about how political strategies and behavior change as bureaucratic capacity decreases. It argues that in a low capacity context, politicians are increasingly unwilling to depend on their administrative apparatus, and may instead resort to "bureaucratic circumvention": creating new agencies, turning to out-of-jurisdiction agents, or outsourcing to the private or non-profit sectors. The first part of the book focuses on the determinants of circumvention. It shows that this is more likely as existing bureaucratic capacity decreases, a politician’s ideology grows farther apart from that of the existing bureau, the cost of going outside the bureaucracy decreases, or policy importance increases. These hypotheses are supported through an analysis of an original dataset of delegation decisions from over 45,000 Latin American executive decrees. The second part examines the effects of agency choice on policy implementation. It argues that when politicians’ interests are aligned with those of their political allies, implementation is likely to be successful; when interests are unaligned, implementation will be less successful. These propositions are supported through evidence from six controlled case studies of public policies in Brazil, Ecuador, and Venezuela. The implications of bureaucratic circumvention are manifold. First, this concept provides a framework with which politicians may achieve policy success. However, second, since a politician may also now choose the agent closest to her preferences, implementation tends to become more politicized. Third, since the p

"Comparative constitutional studies rank the US president as relatively weak and most Latin American presidents as strong. However, specialized studies suggest that US presidents have great abilities to implement their agendas. The authors argue that presidents with weak formal powers 'reinforce' their ability to impose an agenda (scope), as well as their ability to make those decisions stick (force). These reinforced powers, however, have diminishing returns as formal powers rise. As a result, the sum of presidential powers ranges from high (the US) to very high (Latin America)." (author's abstract)

At the end of March, the US Justice Department charged Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and other government officials with “narcoterrorism”. Along with sanctions and naval counternarcotics operations near Venezuela, the charges are part of the Trump administration’s campaign to oust Maduro. Even if this strategy ultimately proves successful, it will do little to help re-establish democracy in the long term, writes John Polga-Hecimovich (US Naval Academy).

At the end of March, the US Justice Department charged Venezuelan President, Nicolás Maduro, and other government officials with “narcoterrorism”. John Polga-Hecimovich writes that, along with sanctions and naval counternarcotics operations near Venezuela, the charges are part of the Trump administration’s campaign to oust Maduro in favor of Juan Guaidó. And while this strategy may ultimately be successful, he argues, it will likely do little to help re-establish democracy in Venezuela in the long term.