BUREAUCRACY AND ORGANIZATIONAL PERFORMANCE: CAUSALITY ARGUMENTS ABOUT PUBLIC SCHOOLS

as schools take actions that are linked to improved performance. ew contemporary public policies are as controversial as school choice. School privatization advocates argue that market-based school systems can educate students better than public schools. Chubb and Moe (1988, 1990), for example, contend that the institutional features of the public school system-particularly its bureaucratic structure and democratic governance-make it an ineffective organization that depresses student performance. Their remedy is to convert schools into more market-based institutions with less bureaucracy and less democratic control (Chubb and Moe 1988, 1990). Opponents of school choice contend the proponents' arguments lack empirical support, fail to consider the multiple goals of public education, and support policies that generate more costs than benefits (Henig 1994; Paris 1995; Witte 1992; Smith and Meier 1995). Lost in the public debate is the realization that some points of dispute are important theoretical questions in their own right. Both Chubb and Moe (1990) and their harshest and somewhat intemperate critics (Smith and Meier 1994) use neo-institutional arguments derived from organization theory. Some issues at dispute, as a result, are relevant not only to public policy debates but are also testable propositions that promise theoretical insight into how institutions respond to and influence their environments (Thompson 1967; March and Olsen 1989). This research examines one small, but crucial, empirical question in the school choice debate-what is the relationship between levels of bureaucracy and organizational performance? Chubb and Moe (1990) contend that bureaucracy leads to poor performance on the part of public schools. Smith and Meier (1994), in contrast, argue that bureaucracy is an adaptation to poor performance, that when organizations recognize their

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