Reforms of International Public Administrations: How Different Administrative Styles Determine Organizational Change

Whereas national administrative reforms have been a focus of public administration research (e.g. Pollitt & Bouckaert, 2011), scholars more or less neglected the reforms of international public administrations (IPAs) with only few exemptions (Bauer & Knill, 2007; Bauer, 2008; 2012; Kassim et al., 2013; Schön-Quinlivan, 2011; Geri, 2001). In addition, many important international organizations are ignored since reform studies focused on the EU, FAO, OECD or UN reforms. In this context, a set of structural, institutional and actor-related driving forces have been identified like economic forces, political variables, elite decision-making, and institutional features of administrative systems. We expand the IPA-research and the explanatory variables by the concept of administrative styles. Such styles or administrative traditions provide the “filters” for reform elements and determining which are applicable in the administrative contexts (and for those, that are not). Examples for these styles are servant, institutional entrepreneur, policy entrepreneur and policy as well as institutional entrepreneur (Knill et al. 2016; Enkler et al 2017). We expect certain reforms in different sectors of an IPA (personnel (human resources reforms), finances / budgeting reforms, organizational reforms, controlling reforms) to be determined by an administrative style. The paper analyzes 15 different IPAs, their different reforms and the potential effect of the administrative styles.