Politics or Bureaucratic Failures? Understanding the Dynamics of Policy Failures in Democratic Governance

This study seeks to advance our understanding of policy failures as the nexus of politics and bureaucratic failure. In doing so, it presents a typology to illustrate different types of policy failures by the degree of bureaucratic capacities and politics/political incentives involved in a policy problem, and explores two cases of such failures in South Korea. This study claims that policy failures are joint products of political and bureaucratic failures to varying degrees and that the discussion of both sides helps to enhance accountability and avoid political blame games and bureau-bashing.

This study reflects on two Korean cases to demonstrate politically-driven and administratively-driven failures in the high- and low-capacity bureaucracy and their consequences. These cases also reveal the dynamic nature of policy failures moving from one category to another during the policy processes.

The first case concerns the failure in emergency response of the Korea Coast Guard (KCG) during and after the sinking of the ferry MV Sewol. A low bureaucratic capacity and lack of motivation to fulfill their function may be the direct cause of the failure, which will be the focus of the discussion of bureaucratic failure. Yet, it also reveals aspects of political failures before and after the accident, where politicians have failed to provide a bureaucratic agency with autonomy and stacked the deck against a less salient agency for political or electoral gains.

The second case discusses the politics of preliminary feasibility studies (PFS) required for major public projects. This case explores policy failures uniquely manifested in a highly capable bureaucracy, which shows how politics-laden issues plant the seeds of policy failures driven by the prompt implementation of flawed decisions. The discussion section further discusses key arguments and implications drawn from the case studies. The final section offers concluding thoughts and avenues for future research.