Journal Articles
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Item A third force?: Ministerial advisers in the Executive(New Zealand Institute of Public Administration, 2003) Eichbaum C; Shaw RH; Eichbaum, C; Shaw, RHItem Why we should all be nicer to ministerial advisers(2005) Eichbaum C; Shaw RHItem Politics and administration: Some reflections on the 'Setchell Affair' (or boundary riding in the purple zone)(Institute of Public Administration New Zealand, 2008) Eichbaum C; Shaw RHItem Ministerial advisers and the politics of policy-making: Bureaucratic permanence and popular control(Blackwell, 2007) Eichbaum C; Shaw RHThe advent of ministerial advisers of the partisan variety - a third element interposing itself into Westminster's bilateral monopoly - has been acknowledged as a significant development in a number of jurisdictions. While there are commonalities across contexts, the New Zealand experience provides an opportunity to explore the extent to which the advent of ministerial advisers is consistent with rational choice accounts of relations between political and administrative actors in executive government. Public administration reform in New Zealand since the mid 1980s - and in particular machinery of government design - was quite explicitly informed by rational choice accounts, and normative Public Choice in particular. This article reflects on the role of ministerial advisers in the policy-making process and, on the basis of assessments by a variety of political and policy actors, examines the extent to which the institutional and relational aspects of executive government are indeed consistent with rational choice accounts of the 'politics of policy-making'. The reader is offered a new perspective through which to view the advent, and the contribution of ministerial advisers to policy-making in executive government. © 2007 The Authors Journal compilation © 2007 National Council of the Institute of Public Administration Australia.Item Item Enemy or ally? Senior officials' perceptions of ministerial advisers before and after MMP(Victoria University of Wellington, 2006) Eichbaum C; Shaw RHThere is now a well-established literature on the various second-order effects of the adoption of proportional representation in New Zealand. One feature of the contemporary executive landscape, however, remains substantially under-researched. This article reports on research regarding ministerial advisers in New Zealand Cabinet ministers' offices. More specifically, it compares senior public servants' current attitudes towards ministerial advisers with pre-MMP speculation regarding the possible future influence of such advisers. The article concludes that while there are concerns about the possible long-term influence of political advisers, for the majority of senior officials working relationships with ministerial advisers are positive and productive.Item Minding the minister? Ministerial advisers in New Zealand government(Royal Society of New Zealand, 2007) Eichbaum C; Shaw RHItem Revisiting politicization: Political advisers and public servants in Westminster systems(Wiley Periodicals, 2008) Eichbaum C; Shaw RHIn recent times much has been made of the threat some argue is posed by political advisers to the impartiality of the Westminster civil service. Drawing on survey of senior New Zealand civil servants, this article examines the degree to which political advisers are perceived as a threat to civil service neutrality and describes the form taken by that threat as variously perceived. On the evidence reported, it is suggested that traditional understandings of "politicization" need to be reconceptualized if they are to fully account for the nature of the relationship between political and civil service advisers. To existing conceptions of politicization, therefore, the article proposes adding another: "administrative politicization," allowing for different gradations of politicization to be identified, and enabling a nuanced assessment of the nature and extent of a risk to civil service neutrality that, the data suggest, is not as great as is sometimes alleged. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.Item Shaping bureaucratic reform down-under(2004) Shaw RHThis article tests the capacity of Dunleavy's bureau-shaping model to explain a specific set of reforms in the New Zealand public service. It finds that the model accounts for certain features of the changes, including the motives of some senior bureaucrats and the structural reforms made to several government departments. However, it fails to explain the diverse motives of officials and the influence of ministers. The article concludes that the model could be strengthened by incorporating an analysis of (a) the political dimensions of decision making, (b) motivational diversity amongst bureaucrats and (c) the importance of institutional context to political outcomes. © 2004 Taylor & Francis Ltd.Item Ministerial advisers, politicization and the retreat from Westminster: The case of New Zealand(Blackwell, 2007) Eichbaum C; Shaw RHPolitical advisers are an established third element in a number of Westminster-styled jurisdictions, as they are in New Zealand's institution of executive government. In this paper we report the initial findings of a research project focusing on the role and accountabilities of ministerial advisers in New Zealand. We locate these findings in the context of a growing body of international and comparative research on the role and accountabilities of non civil- or public-service advisers within political executives and comment on the extent to which the findings affirm or refute the view that the 'third element' constitutes a threat to the continued application of Westminster principles and practices in New Zealand's system of government - once described as more Westminster than Westminster. In doing so, we highlight deficiencies in standard conceptions of politicization and argue that there is a need to more clearly differentiate between its procedural and substantive dimensions. © 2007 The Author. Journal compilation © 2007 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.