Politics, Policy, and Organization: Frontiers in the Scientific Study of Bureaucracy. Edited by George A. Krause and Kenneth J. Meier. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003. 352p. $65.

This text consists of papers originally presented at the Fifth Public Management Conference meeting at Texas A&M University in December, 1999. The editors in the introductory chapter aptly define the challenges facing contributors: “We know little about how bureaucratic (a) agencies make decisions … (b) structures affect responsiveness and performance … (c) agencies resolve goal conflict on a day-to-day basis, (d) external performance criteria affect bureaucracies and (e) organizations socialize their members” (p. 15).