Presidential Reorganization and the Politics of Public Agencies

Abstract

Modern American public welfare agencies are the results of the continual reorganization of multiple agencies, departments, and programs. I develop four themes about the micro-foundations of reorganization in this article to illustrate how politics intersect with agency structure and the reshaping of the national bureaucracy. The empirical part of this article examines President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s assembling of a national health, education, and public welfare agency. The creation of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) in 1953 represents a critical juncture in that evolutionary process.