INSTITUTIONS AND GROWTH IN KOREA AND TAIWAN - THE BUREAUCRACY

How do competent bureaucracies emerge in developing countries? We exam ine bureaucratic reform in Korea and Taiwan and argue that in both cas es political leaders had an interest in reforming the civil service to carry out their programmatic initiatives. In addition, both governmen ts undertook organisational reforms that made certain parts of the bur eaucracy more meritocratic, while utilising centralised and insulated 'pilot agencies' in overall policy coordination. However we reject the approach to bureaucratic reform that focuses primarily on its efficie ncy-enhancing effects. If delegation, bureaucratic and policy reform p rovided an easily available solution to the authoritarian's dilemma, d ictators would have more uniformly positive economic records. Rather w e analyse the political and institutional constraints under which gove rning elites operate. In doing so, we underscore several important var iations in the design of bureaucratic organisation, which in turn mirr or larger policy differences between the two countries.