ABSTRACT
This entry explores the logic, politics, and various presidential responses to a key component of the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978: the Senior Executive Service (SES). Proponents who designed the SES argued that its creation would simultaneously assure leadership continuity across administrations, political responsiveness to a given president, and institutional competence in terms of creating an elite cadre of generalist executives. The mechanisms that would presumably achieve these seemingly competing principles were increased mobility and compensation of the best public managers in the federal government; linking rewards to performance; and increased retention, training, and quality. However, conflicting purposes, politics, shifting administrative emphases, and distrust have characterized the SES's decades of implementation. Many key aspects of the reformers’ central assumptions have been sorely compromised, if not undermined, as a consequence. The most recent challenges have come in the form of a new performance-based pay system for members of the SES enacted in the fiscal year 2004 National Defense Authorization Act, as well as continued and increased scrutiny of careerist leadership in an age of gridlock and partisanship.
