The Structure of Appointment Politics: Consistency or Change?

Abstract

Given its importance and level of conflict in recent decades, scholars have expended great effort analyzing appointment politics. However, despite descriptions that might lead to conclusions that the structure of how nominees are dealt with has changed over time, quantitative analyses have not investigated possible structural changes. We remedy this by conducting a changepoint analysis using data on executive nominations from 1885–2016. Two breaks involving Senate‐initiated institutional changes are uncovered: one associated with postwar congressional reorganization, the other with post‐Watergate era alterations to the relationship between Senate and President. By contrast, neither executive‐initiated changes nor disruptions in norms produced breaks. Thus, our analysis defines three different historical eras of the appointment process, suggests what causes one period to be replaced by another, and details what factors drove appointment politics in different eras. It also urges caution in generalizing from analyses of appointments incorporating features only measurable for more recent years.

Between politics and bureaucracy: a systematic literature review on the dynamics of public appointments

“…The political-administrative background can influence the existence of a less professionalized bureaucratic state structure, or with patrimonial roots that favor patronage and patronage (Bach et al ., 2018). That is, the historical tradition of bureaucracy (Chudnovsky, 2017; Mikkelsen, 2018), its professionalization (Abers and Oliveira, 2015) and institutional changes over time (Hollibaugh and Rothenberg, 2021) will influence the criteria that will be used for appointments.…”

Presidential Patronage and Executive Branch Appointments, 1925–1959

“…Second, and related, to the extent that the composition of the bureaucracy has implications for the decisions made and outputs produced by the executive branch, how patronage is administered affects which constituencies benefit from the president's influence over personnel. Third, while previous literature has studied the prevalence and distribution of political appointees in federal bureaucracies (e.g., Lewis 2008) and has evaluated the Senate's response to presidential nominations to high-level executive branch positions (Hollibaugh and Rothenberg 2021;McCarty and Razaghian 1999), it remains largely unclear whether and how patronage considerations might affect the president's choice to nominate or appoint particular individuals. Fourth, and finally, scholars have studied distributive politics extensively in the context of federal spending and other public goods (Berry, Burden, and Howell 2010;Fiorina 1974;Rogowski 2016;Stein and Bickers 1994), yet it is unclear whether those insights apply similarly to the allocation of valuable bureaucratic positions-itself a distributive phenomenon.…”

“…2 Patronage considerations have been omnipresent for American presidents, including both in the era of the spoils system (e.g., James 2000;Skowronek 1982) and in contemporary politics (Lewis 2008). Previous studies have made important progress in identifying when presidents award bureaucratic positions to political appointees (e.g., Hollibaugh 2015b; Hollibaugh, Horton, and Lewis 2014;Lewis 2008) and how the Senate evaluates executive branch nominations to positions requiring confirmation (e.g., Hollibaugh and Rothenberg 2021;McCarty and Razaghian 1999). However, this scholarship has paid less attention to how presidents distribute bureaucratic positions across political constituencies or the patronage mechanisms that affect their allocation.…”