Administrative Justice and the Control of Bureaucracy

This book answers key questions about the relationship between administrative justice institutions and government officials through a new theoretical model, derived from an innovative analysis of interdisciplinary literature and an empirical case study. This groundbreaking model develops existing work on the control of bureaucracy by emphasising three under-explored areas: - the nature of the issues which citizens raise and the ways in which the matters are presented - the fundamental structure of government decision-making whereby different forms of organisation produces different responses to attempts by administrative justice institutions to achieve control - the operational practices of administrative justice institutions, where comparisons between three distinctive institutions help to identify features of institutional design that facilitate or prevent the exercise of control. The book concludes by assessing where the balance should be struck between legal control and government autonomy. Fundamentally, the model advanced in the book problematises the idea of government control by administrative justice institutions and argues for attention to be paid to the limits of legal control and the importance of context when assessing these issues.

Chris Gill is a lecturer at the School of Law, University of Glasgow, UK.