Representative bureaucracy and its symbolic effect on citizens: a conceptual replication

ABSTRACT

Representative bureaucracy has been a topic of research for over half a century, but only recently studied experimentally. Initial empirical findings from two prior experiments – one involving policing, the other recycling – showed gender representation effects on citizens’ trust and cooperation. In this conceptual replication, we examine gender representation effects in another policy domain: emergency preparedness. However, despite using a similar sample and experimental paradigm, we find no effects. These null findings are important, as they suggest that the symbolic effects of gender representation may be policy-specific – and that replication is needed to test the boundary conditions of previously reported results.

KEYWORDS:

• Experimental methods
• behavioural public administration
• representative bureaucracy
• co-production

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.