Workways of governance : monitoring our government's health

The war on terrorism raises profound questions of governance, not primarily about power or policy, but about the capacities of government agencies: their personnel, procedures, working habits and styles and ability to interface with other agencies.

The contributors to this volume discuss these attributes as "workways of governance."The scholar-analysts who have contributed to this book attempt to examine and suggest answers to the public's doubts about the effectiveness of government agencies.

Using a periodic assessment of the quality of institutional life and work in government, the contributors propose establishing guidelines for evaluating government entities and monitoring the entities on an annual or biennial basis.

In this volume, the scholars apply the proposed establishing guidelines to the leading institutions of the federal government: the House of Representatives, the Senate, the presidency (focusing on White House organization and staffing), the executive branch (focusing on the civil service), and the federal judiciary.