| Abstract |
We study the economic and political impact of meritocratic reforms on the structure of the bureaucracy, proposing a tradeoff between increased performance and political backlash. Focusing on Italian reforms from the 1990s that sought to professionalize the municipal civil service, we leverage variation in policy uptake owing to population thresholds that enabled the creation of a city manager position. We document three findings. Cities with managers reshape the local bureaucracy, hiring and firing employees at a higher rate than non-manager cities, although the size of the local workforce declines similarly in both types of city. Employees resist changes brought on by managers, going on strike at higher rates. Voters do not punish incumbents for these changes: while turnout increases, incumbents win at similar rates and candidates from civic list parties, which appoint the majority of managers, receive a high vote share. These findings point to the challenging politics of the ``technocratic turn'' in governance over recent decades.
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