Representative Bureaucracy and Bueaucratic Responsibility

Abstract

Scholars concerned with representative bureaucracy have expressed considerable interest in the possibility of a linkage between active and passive representation. However, the theory of representative bureaucracy as a means of insuring administra tive responsibility remains widely misunderstood and poorly operationalized. This essay provides an explication of the theory, evaluates existing attempts to operation alize the concepts involved, and reaches conclusions regarding the utility ofthe theory as legitimation of bureaucratic policy-making. The discussion seeks to clarify some of the ambiguities concerning the theory and to demonstrate the methodological com plexities involved in attempts to test the existence of representativeness in bureaucracy.