Responsive Democracy: Increasing State Accountability in East Asia

8 | Transparency, Participation, and Democratic Responsiveness

8 | Transparency, Participation, and Democratic Responsiveness Although the twentieth century witnessed the birth of more than 85 democracies, the extent of democratic consolidation across these countries varies greatly (Geddes 1999; Huntington 1991). The U.S. Department of State expresses its commitment to democracy “until all the citizens of the world have the fundamental right to choose those who govern them through an ongoing civil process that includes free, fair, and transparent elections” (U.S. Department of State,“Democracy”). This includes a belief that public of‹cials in a representative democracy hold of‹ce in the name of the people and remain accountable to the people for their actions. By this de‹nition, securing citizens’ rights to free and fair elections is only a partial ‹rst step along the path toward true democracy.A critical link in the chain of democratic accountability occurs when elected of‹cials delegate sweeping policy-making authority to unelected bureaucrats.After all, as the U.S. government’s de‹nition of democracy implies, accountability in governance is a cornerstone of stable democracy. Yet elected of‹cials may be unable to control these bureaucrats and citizens may have dif‹culty holding these policymakers accountable. This situation is especially troublesome given the extraordinary breadth and depth of the responsibilities that elected policymakers routinely delegate to administrative agencies in modern nation-states, including, in the U.S. case, authority to interpret health, safety, environmental and economic regulations as well as to allocate public investments. One solution to this delegation dilemma is to empower the public directly to participate in bureaucratic policy-making. In this book, I have sought to explain the recent development of administrative procedural re145 form in new democracies in the hopes of expanding on existing theories of why politicians adopt procedures that open up the administrative state. To increase accountability, some countries require that bureaucratic agencies provide the public with information on their past performance (e.g., public disclosure) and direct opportunities to participate in future bureaucratic policy-making (e.g., notice, public hearing, and comment procedures). They also bestow on civil society the right to monitor bureaucratic compliance with legislative directives (e.g., citizen lawsuits and judicial review). Other democracies, however, appear to exclude civil society from direct participation in bureaucratic policy-making. It is, of course, understandable why legislatures would support administrative procedure laws designed to limit and monitor executive branch power. However, it is less obvious why chief executives would go along with laws that would reduce their underlings’ discretion and limit their own power to act freely. To resolve this seeming paradox, I developed a “reining-in” theory of control. My theory identi‹ed a key causal variable that appears capable of resolving the paradox: executive branch members with con›icting policy preferences. My investigation into the conditions under which politicians support administrative procedure acts (APAs) centered on how understanding the effects of institutional variation in presidential democracies on principalagent relationships can help explain recent enactment of APAs. According to my reining-in theory, a president’s ability to appoint and dismiss his bureaucratic agents affects the degree to which con›ict arises within his branch. If a president can freely appoint and dismiss loyalists and enemies , he can solve current delegation problems without resorting to alternative mechanisms. However, a president who faces intrabranch con›ict over policy issues and who is constrained by constitutional appointment rules will solve his delegation problems by resorting to a second-best solution . The resulting enactment of APAs or APA-like laws represents a new equilibrium outcome from this interaction between a president and his agents. While some scholars have argued that APAs are a tool for preserving the status quo, I ‹nd that APAs can help presidents change it. Having developed the theory in chapter 2, the evidence presented in chapters 3 through 5 supported my various predictions. Chapter 3 presented a case study of South Korea’s ‹rst civilian government under President Kim Young Sam. Archival data, secondary sources, and interviews with key presidential advisers, senior career bureaucrats, and politicians revealed the existence of a professionalized civil service with policy prefer146 | Responsive Democracy ences that con›icted with those of the president. This motivated him to initiate an APA. Indeed, the South Korean case showed that when Kim wanted to change the status quo by deregulating the economy, he confronted resistance from bureaucrats whose incentives and professional survival were vested in the...