Practice question · True or false
Because administration is unavoidably political, the normative case for a non-partisan civil service collapses.
Hints
- Distinguish a claim about what is from a claim about what ought to be.
- The descriptive finding and the normative rule are separate.
Show the answer
False
Why
False, and the confusion is the standard misuse of the finding. That officials exercise judgement and shape outcomes is a description; that appointments should not follow elections is a rule about how to organise the service. The first does not license abandoning the second, if anything it strengthens the case for insulating that judgement from party.
Practise Politics and Bureaucracy
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