Rule Following and Discretion at Government's Frontlines: Continuity and Change during Organization Socialization

Abstract

As important players in the policy process, many studies have investigated the determinants of bureaucratic behavior. One intriguing set of findings suggests that behavior is linked to bureaucrats’ views of themselves as government officials and their views of the people who they serve. Despite the importance of workers’ perceptions, we have little understanding about how bureaucrats develop psychologically. From a theoretical perspective, workers’ views may be associated with extraorganization influences (like their personalities and preorganization experiences) or organization influences (like training, peers, and culture). However, few studies have examined how workers develop during organization socialization, so it is difficult to disentangle the impact of these various influences. This article improves our understanding of bureaucratic psychology by studying how police officers and welfare caseworkers develop their default rule-following identities: the typical rule-following selves that bureaucrats project during interactions with citizens. This article's findings show change and continuity during socialization: though many workers shifted their default rule-following identities, and some organization influences were associated with the identities that workers developed, they remained tethered to their entering rule-following expectations. The article concludes by discussing the theoretical implications of these findings for our understanding of bureaucrats as well as the practical implications for how public organizations recruit and manage their workforces.

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