Of Masters and Puppets. How Elected Elites Hold Staffers Accountable

This paper examines the peculiar position of political staffers in representative democracies. Unlike many other political actors, staffers are directly involved in politics without having received a democratic mandate through elections. By applying the influential framework of delegation and accountability to this unique population, the paper takes an innovative look at the relationship between staffers and elected elites. Based on original survey data collected among Belgian and Dutch staffers, the paper analyses staffers’ autonomy and influence and examines how they are controlled by party leaders, MPs and ministers through practices of recruitment and monitoring. While the results indicate that staffers have considerable autonomy and influence, they also show that elected elites have ample opportunities to control staffers – especially MPs and ministers. Moreover, elected elites are closely involved in monitoring staffers with high degrees of political influence. Although these results demonstrate that the staffers’ involvement in politics does not entail a systemic democratic deficit, more in-depth research is needed to discover when control mechanisms like recruitment and monitoring are (in)effective tools to keep staffers accountable.