We develop a theory of policymaking between a principal, an agent, and an overseer. The agent increases the overall quality of policy outcomes through costly capacity investments. Oversight impacts agent investment incentives, but only if the policy bias of the agent does as well. The principal...

Theories of political accountability typically focus on voter-politician relationships. However, overall government performance depends on both elected politicians and unelected bureaucrats. Politicians are agents of voters while serving as principals to bureaucrats. We develop a model of...