Personnel deregulation: Exploring differences in the American states

Personnel deregulation has occupied a central place on the American reform agenda for several years. For example, formal calls for personnel deregulation can be traced to the National Academy of Public Administration (1983), the Volcker Commission (1989), the Winter Commission (1993), Reinventing Government (Osborne and Gaebler 1992), and most recently to the National Performance Review/National Partnership for Reinventing Government (1993). Deregulation represents an important topic for inquiry because, in part, it entails a dramatic reorientation in the locus of personnel responsibility (from centralized control to decentralized discretion) and in the accountability relationships that govern the personnel function (from bureaucratic, hierarchical control to reliance on professional accountability of managers). Still, knowledge is limited about the levels of personnel deregulation present in various jurisdictions and about the factors that are related to them. This article presents a measure of state government personnel deregulation. The measure demonstrates wide variation in the extent of such deregulation. ne article then tests a number of hypotheses regarding relationships thought to affect personnel deregulation levels. Findings suggest the importance of public employee unionism, political party control, and administrative professionalism to the states' personnel deregulation levels.