The differential effects of organizational characteristics and politico-administrative context on agency autonomy: investigating differences between and within country clusters

The past two decades have witnessed a significant leap in theoretically based, empirical investigations on what happens after the delegation of public tasks to semi-autonomous agencies. Empirical studies provide mixed results though with regard to the effects of organizational characteristics on perceived agency autonomy. Some organizational factors seem to have explanatory power in some contexts, but not in others. Additionally, international comparisons indicate substantial differences between countries with regard to overall levels of agency autonomy, also for countries belonging to similar “families” in terms of administrative traditions. The article compares the perceived managerial autonomy of government agencies in three country clusters (Nordic, Latin-Napoleonic, Continental) comprising ten European countries, drawing on a unique dataset based on surveys of chief executives. It shows that the effects of organizational characteristics on agencies’ managerial autonomy are mediated by administrative traditions and country-specific factors. The findings indicate the context-specific nature of governing public sector organizations