Effective Government: Reorganization of Executive Departments

Abstract

Governments change over time in response to broad social and economic trends but the overall structure remains remarkably stable. The growth of government in the early 20th century reflects the perils of both stability and change in organizational structure. A large number of agencies were created in response to modernization but, following the organizational style of an earlier era, many were “quasi-autonomous bits of government over which there was little if any effective control except for the legislature's biennial appropriation acts.” These conditions led to constitutional revision and the reorganization initiatives described below. Governor-elect Blunt has indicated that he plans a review of governmental organization in the near future. If so, it will be the first such review since the early 1970s. If governmental reorganization is infrequent, a cross-departmental review of practices and procedures is even less frequent. In fact, there has been only one such review which occurred in the 1990s. That review resulted in significant process changes both within and across departments. The review was initiated by Governor Carnahan and conducted by the Commission on Management and Productivity, frequently known as COMAP. This report briefly summarizes the evolution of the structure of modern state government and the COMAP process review of the 1990s.