Revisiting the Gospel: Appointed Political Staffs and Core Executive Policy Coordination

This article argues appointed political staffs are important, yet understudied, mechanisms for core executive policy coordination. It suggests revisions to update core executive theory to better accommodate the increasingly systematic use of political staffs throughout core executives. An analytical framework for political staffs’ core executive policy coordination is set out to specify important distinctions related to the type, and nature, of their likely policy coordination. The article concludes by returning to six established modes of executive politics to update them by integrating the policy coordination functions of political staffs in each variant.