Bureaucrats As Law Makers

Download or read book Bureaucrats as Law-makers written by Frank M. Häge and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Council of Ministers is one of the most powerful institutions of the European Union (EU) and plays a major role in the European policy-making process. Drawing on formal theory and combining quantitative and qualitative methods in an innovative fashion, this book provides novel insights into the role of national bureaucrats in legislative decision-making of the Council of the EU. The book examines and describes the Council of Ministers' committee system and its internal decision-making process. Relying on a wide quantitative dataset as well as six detailed case studies in the policy areas of Agriculture, Environment, and Taxation, it provides a comprehensive and systematic assessment of the extent to which national bureaucrats act as law-makers in the Council. It also examines the degree to which theories on collective decision-making, delegation, and international socialization can account for variation in the involvement of bureaucrats. Investigating how often and why national officials in working parties and committees, rather than ministers, make legislative decisions in the EU, this book addresses the implications of bureaucratic influence for the democratic legitimacy of Council decision-making. The author finds that ministers play a generally more important role in legislative decision-making than often assumed, alleviating, to some extent, concerns about the democratic legitimacy of Council decisions. Bureaucrats as Law-Makers will be of interest to students, scholars and practitioners in the field of European Union politics and policy-making, legislative decision-making, intergovernmental negotiations and international socialization.

Download or read book Street-Level Bureaucracy written by Michael Lipsky and published by Russell Sage Foundation. This book was released on 1983-06-29 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Street-Level Bureaucracy is an insightful study of how public service workers, in effect, function as policy decision makers, as they wield their considerable discretion in the day-to-day implementation of public programs.

Download or read book Power Without Responsibility written by David Schoenbrod and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2008-10-01 with total page 374 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book argues that Congress's process for making law is as corrosive to the nation as unchecked deficit spending. David Schoenbrod shows that Congress and the president, instead of making the laws that govern us, generally give bureaucrats the power to make laws through agency regulations. Our elected "lawmakers" then take credit for proclaiming popular but inconsistent statutory goals and later blame the inevitable burdens and disappointments on the unelected bureaucrats. The 1970 Clean Air Act, for example, gave the Environmental Protection Agency the impossible task of making law that would satisfy both industry and environmentalists. Delegation allows Congress and the president to wield power by pressuring agency lawmakers in private, but shed responsibility by avoiding the need to personally support or oppose the laws, as they must in enacting laws themselves. Schoenbrod draws on his experience as an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council and on studies of how delegation actually works to show that this practice produces a regulatory system so cumbersome that it cannot provide the protection that people need, so large that it needlessly stifles the economy, and so complex that it keeps the voters from knowing whom to hold accountable for the consequences. Contending that delegation is unnecessary and unconstitutional, Schoenbrod has written the first book that shows how, as a practical matter, delegation can be stopped.

Download or read book Bankers, Bureaucrats, and Central Bank Politics written by Christopher Adolph and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-04-15 with total page 389 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Adolph illustrates the policy differences between central banks run by former bankers relative to those run by bureaucrats.

Download or read book The Unelected written by James R. Copland and published by Encounter Books. This book was released on 2020-09-15 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: America is highly polarized around elections, but unelected actors make many of the decisions that affect our lives. In this lucid history, James R. Copland explains how unaccountable agents have taken over much of the U.S. government apparatus. Congress has largely abdicated its authority. “Independent” administrative agencies churn out thousands of new regulations every year. Courts have enabled these rulemakers to expand their powers beyond those authorized by law—and have constrained executive efforts to rein in the bureaucratic behemoth. No ordinary citizen can know what is legal and what is not. There are some 300,000 federal crimes, 98 percent of which were created by administrative action. The proliferation of rules gives enormous discretion to unelected enforcers, and the severity of sanctions can be ruinous to citizens who unwittingly violate a regulation. Outside the bureaucracy, private attorneys regulate our conduct through lawsuits. Most of the legal theories underlying these suits were never voted upon by our elected representatives. A combination of historical accident, decisions by judges and law professors, and self-interested advocacy by litigators has built an onerous and expensive legal regime. Finally, state and local officials may be accountable to their own voters, but some reach further afield, pursuing agendas to dictate the terms of national commerce. These new antifederalists are subjecting the citizens of Wyoming and Mississippi to the whims of the electorates of New York and San Francisco—contrary to the constitutional design. In these ways, the unelected have assumed substantial control of the American republic, upended the rule of law, given the United States the world’s costliest legal system, and inverted the Constitution’s federalism. Copland caps off his account with ideas for charting a corrective course back to democratic accountability.

Download or read book Inside Congress written by Trevor Corning and published by Brookings Institution Press. This book was released on 2017-07-25 with total page 76 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Required reading for anyone who wants to understand how to work within Congress. The House and Senate have unique rules and procedures to determine how legislation moves from a policy idea to law. Evolved over the last 200 years, the rules of both chambers are designed to act as the engine for that process. Each legislative body has its own leadership positions to oversee this legislative process. To the novice, whether a newly elected representative, a lawmaker's staff on her first day at work, or a constituent visiting Washington, the entire process can seem incomprehensible. What is an open rule for a House Appropriations bill and how does it affect consideration? Why are unanimous consent agreements needed in the Senate? The authors of Inside Congress, all congressional veterans, have written the definitive guide to how Congress really works. It is the accessible and necessary resource to understanding and interpreting procedural tools, arcane precedents, and the role of party politics in the making of legislation in Congress.

Download or read book Understanding Street-Level Bureaucracy written by Peter L. Hupe and published by Policy Press. This book was released on 2015-07 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book draws together internationally acclaimed scholars from across the world to address the roles of public officials whose jobs involve dealing directly with the public. Covering a broad range of jobs, including the delivery of benefits and services, the regulation of social and economic behavior, and the expression and maintenance of public values, the book presents in-depth discussions of different approaches, the possibilities for discretionary autonomy, and directions for further research in the field.