The control of the policy advice industry: how patrons defer their decision-rights to think tank boards
| Published date | 01 September 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/00208523221133065 |
| Author | Marybel Perez,Alejandro Agafonow |
| Date | 01 September 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
The control of the policy
advice industry: how
patrons defer their
decision-rights to think
tank boards
Marybel Perez
ESSCA School of Management, France
Alejandro Agafonow
ESSCA School of Management, France
Abstract
Patrons of think tanks—for example, governments, corporations, philanthropists,
NGOs, and so forth—may control think tanks’boards, that is, their highest decision-
making body. Whether patrons are likely to control boards is a question that remains
under-explored and under-theorised in public administration and governance scholar-
ship. It is posited that patrons are likely to control boards when the marginal benefit
of partaking in decision-making does not exceed the cost of information transfer. The
comparative examination of International Relations think tanks’statutes shows that
patron control is substantial. However, patronage does not always guarantee board con-
trol. Patron control is moderated by the nature of the transaction. The conclusion
assesses patron control concerning decision-making processes in the think tank and
the idiosyncratic character of policy advice.
Points for practitioners
Practitioners can assess events of goal displacement in think tanks by learning about
mechanisms that facilitate or hinder patron control over think tanks. Laying out the con-
ditions under which patrons exercise control, the latter turns out to be substantial des-
pite not all patrons having control over think tank boards. Patron control is shown to
Corresponding author:
Marybel Perez, ESSCA School of Management, 55 quai Alphonse le Gallo, 92513 Paris, France.
Email: marybel.perez@essca.fr
Article
International
Review of
Administrative
Sciences
International Review of Administrative
Sciences
2023, Vol. 89(3) 808–824
© The Author(s) 2022
Article reuse guidelines:
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DOI: 10.1177/00208523221133065
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depend on the position of stakeholders in the decision-making chain and the nonlinear
relation between effort and influence in policy advice.
Keywords
board, governance, non-profit, policy advice, think tank
Introduction
In 2016, the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) made headlines after
receiving significant funding from Bahrein’s royal family (Evans, 2016). The funding,
which was supposed to remain secret, was reportedly destined to organise conferences
that prominent politicians attended to discuss regional issues. That year also marked
public awareness of think tank funding by foreign governments and private interests in
many countries (Bruckner, 2017; de Haldevang, 2019; Lipton and Williams, 2016;
Toosi, 2020).
This situation points to a fundamental question about public policy: namely, whose
interests are represented by the organisations supplying policy advice? That question,
we argue, underlines the importance of studying the governance of think tanks, that is,
decision-making structures that establish internal control processes and external commit-
ments that shape stakeholder control, or its lack thereof.
We propose that an examination of patron control over decision-making reveals the
terms of the relationship between think tanks and patrons, that is, the degree of authority
exercised by founders, members, and donors on think tank boards. Boards are the central
decision-making body, as established in the statutes of think tanks. They set the direction
of the organisation and outline the rules for the appointment of board members. The sta-
tutes establish who has the right to a seat on the board and who has the right to appoint
directors. Consequently, the statutes determine the terms of patron control (Leardini et al.,
2017).
The IISS, for example, is currently governed by a board of 10 trustees and its board
is self-perpetuating, that is, no other entity but the trustees has the right to appoint
incoming trustees. The board’s term of service lasts three years, although it can be
extended exceptionally upon request by the Chair or by a majority of trustees. The
lack of a body to oversee the actions of non-profit boards, similar to annual share-
holder meetings in corporations, increases the risk of collusion and expropriation
of patrons (Fama and Jensen, 1983b). Rules such as qualifications for the post, con-
flict of interest, board proceedings, liability, audit, and board tenure—some of which
are covered by the IISS Articles of Association—help to temper this risk. The
example of the IISS board suggests, however, that patron control over think tank
decision-making is weak.
The incentives of patron control are mitigated by the non-distribution constraint, that
is, profit cannot be distributed but must be reinvested or donated (Hansmann, 1980).
Since patrons contract think tank services, these organisations are operated ‘on behalf
Perez and Agafonow 809
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