2000 Taylor and Francis. The research literature on bureaucracy generally assumes that bureaucrats are risk averse, and some work goes further to characterize bureaucrats as risk avoiding and conservative (LaPiere 1965; Sjoberg, Brymer, and Farris 1966; Wolman 1971; Boyer 1973; Kaufman 1981). At the same time, the prescriptive literature, the most recent being the reinventing government movement (Osborne and Gaebler 1992; see also Barzelay 1992; Johnston 1993; Report of the National Performance Review, 1993), requires bureaucrats to be entrepreneurs, individuals who take major risks in an effort to achieve major performance breakthroughs. Although diametrically opposed in terms of objectives (scholarship versus practical advice), 60both stress a concern with individuals and agencies that deviate from the norm (those that fail and those that succeed beyond expectations).
