Issue Prioritization by Bureaucratic Leaders: The Influence of Institutional Structure

Attention is an important factor in the study of institutional agenda setting. It has been shown to influence the selection of issues to consider and the prioritization of these issues. This article brings theories of issue attention and prioritization to bureaucracy, focusing on how institutional factors affect bureaucracies’ prioritization of issues. Using quantitative survey data and statistical techniques, we assess the impact of institutional factors on the prioritization of competing issues in higher education. We find that these institutional factors significantly affect the prioritization choices of universities, beyond the influence of individual leadership traits