ABSTRACT
Ever shifting relationships between bureaucrats and politicians have played a direct or indirect role in several major debates in Southeast Asia since colonization. One theme concerns the contradictions of the colonial inheritance, with its ideology of a politics–administration separation coupled with extreme executive dominance in practice. A second theme involves the role of the bureaucracy in promoting economic transformation in several Southeast Asian states modeling themselves after the successful newly industrialized countries (NICs). Finally, more recent calls for good governance in the wake of the East Asian financial crisis coupled with democratization trends in the region have raised the salience of the concept of democratic accountability of both politicians and bureaucrats. This entry examines each of these areas, concluding that the dynamics of the bureaucrat–politician relationship are likely to continue to be a central point of theoretical and practical contestation in the coming years.
