Bureaucratic accountability in third‐party governance: Experimental evidence of blame attribution during times of budgetary crisis
| Date | 01 December 2017 |
| Author | Zachary Mohr,Jaclyn Piatak,Suzanne Leland |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/padm.12341 |
| Published date | 01 December 2017 |
SYMPOSIUM ARTICLE
Bureaucratic accountability in third-party
governance: Experimental evidence of blame
attribution during times of budgetary crisis
Jaclyn Piatak | Zachary Mohr | Suzanne Leland
Department of Political Science & Public
Administration, University of North Carolina
at Charlotte, Charlotte, NC
Correspondence
Jaclyn Piatak , Department of Political
Science & Public Administration, University of
North Carolina at Charlotte, 9201 University
City Blvd., Charlotte, NC 28223.
Email: jpiatak@uncc.edu
With the rise of third-party government, the lines between the
sectors have blurred as has accountability. Public service delivery
failures can erode government legitimacy and trust, but who do
citizens blame when something goes wrong? To answer this ques-
tion, we employ an experiment to see whether citizens hold local
governments and private contractors equally accountable for serv-
ice delivery failure. We also examine how they expect the employ-
ees to be held accountable. Results demonstrate that blame is
attributed to those providing the service directly. However, the
introduction of a budget shortfall lessens the blame assigned to
the contractor, and implicates the city even when the service is
provided indirectly through a contract. Finally, citizens are less in
favour of terminating the employment of both public and contract
employees under budget shortfalls. Findings suggest that if citizens
are given information about the context and who is in control of
the service, they attribute blame accordingly.
1|INTRODUCTION
The blurring of sectors has created important implications in the citizen-bureaucratic accountability chain. As New
Public Management calls for more third-party government, it also warns that poor performance by employees can
undermine the legitimacy of the administrative state (Hood 1991; Dunleavy and Hood 1994; Rosenbloom
et al. 2015). In the case of local government, contracting out has become so routine that contract employees are
the new street-level bureaucrats with whom citizens are likely to interact (Kettl 1993; Smith and Lipsky 1993). Con-
tractors are even another step removed from elected officials than public administrators, and we know surprisingly
little about how citizens attribute blame to third parties in the face of service delivery failure when compared to
their public sector counterparts.
For this reason, we employ an experiment to see how the blurring of sectors in service delivery impacts who
citizens hold responsible when workers engage in illegal behaviour. We also test different conditions, such as budg-
etary constraints, and how citizens believe those engaging in illegal behaviour should be held accountable. We ask
DOI: 10.1111/padm.12341
976 © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/padm Public Administration. 2017;95:976–989.
To continue reading
Request your trial