Reviews
At the Pleasure of the Crown: The Politics of Bureaucratic Appointments by Christopher A. Cooper
harmanmundi's review
3.0
At The Pleasure of the Crown by Christopher Cooper is fairly short (107 page) analysis of how Deputy Minister appointments have changed from the period between 1920-2013 in the provinces.
The main argument is that the traditional why of thinking that new public management-y reforms created this "quest for control" culture of the public service, isn't fully correct. Cooper argues that the quest for control of the public service was always a think it just expressed itself differently. Modern Premiers are much more concerned with commitment of Deputies to government's agenda rather than the "fearless advice" style of leadership of the post war era. This is reflected in the evidence through case studies and quantitate data showing DM turnover being as high as 50% when a new Premier is elected. typical y/y variance being 35%. Much higher than pervious eras (pre-1980s).
Overall, I think it's a pretty good book. the first chapter and introduction aren't very interesting, imo. The last section of the first chapter sets the stage of the rest of the analysis, so feel free to skip/skim the first 30ish pages, if you want to read it for yourself. It's a book about public administration theory, so not inherently super "fun", but if you're interested in how govt works, give it a read.
I give this book 3 out of 5 stars.
The main argument is that the traditional why of thinking that new public management-y reforms created this "quest for control" culture of the public service, isn't fully correct. Cooper argues that the quest for control of the public service was always a think it just expressed itself differently. Modern Premiers are much more concerned with commitment of Deputies to government's agenda rather than the "fearless advice" style of leadership of the post war era. This is reflected in the evidence through case studies and quantitate data showing DM turnover being as high as 50% when a new Premier is elected. typical y/y variance being 35%. Much higher than pervious eras (pre-1980s).
Overall, I think it's a pretty good book. the first chapter and introduction aren't very interesting, imo. The last section of the first chapter sets the stage of the rest of the analysis, so feel free to skip/skim the first 30ish pages, if you want to read it for yourself. It's a book about public administration theory, so not inherently super "fun", but if you're interested in how govt works, give it a read.
I give this book 3 out of 5 stars.
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