In the last years significant progress has been made in explaining cabinet formation in presidential democracies. However, this work has largely ignored the appointment of non-party ministers to the cabinet. The oversight is notable not only because presidents (and executives elsewhere; see Amorim Neto and Strom 2006 for example) choose to name non-partisan ministers often and choose to delegate them substantial authority, but also because this trend is of significant theoretically interest. One of the central premises of recent work on presidential cabinet formation is that including parties other than their own in coalition cabinets is beneficial to presidents seeking to build legislative support. But the delegation of authority to party-affiliated ministers also entails potential agency costs. Party-affiliated ministers are subject to simultaneous control by their party leadership and the president, which can complicate a president's ability to select suitable ministers and control them once in office. We apply an agency-theoretic perspective to ministerial selection in presidential regimes and argue that presidents appoint non-partisans when the risk of agency-loss from naming party-affiliated ministers outweighs the legislative benefits. We test this argument using an original dataset that covers over 2800 ministerial appointments in 12 Latin American countries. Our approach contributes to a more accurate understanding of the factors that shape ministerial choices and cabinet building strategies in presidential systems and to the debate about the effects of presidentialism on democratic representation and accountability
