American Review of Public Administration

Despite discussion in the literature of “new governance, ” the self-standing government agency continues to constitute the institutional center of American public administration. Drawing on his volume Mission Mystique, the author proposes that the book’s concept of mystique and its template of institution-strengthening characteristics be used to reaffirm this point, buttress agencies against defunding, and enable them better to oversee devolved activities. Keywords government agencies, institutional vitality, mission, bureaucracy In his book On Thinking Institutionally, Hugh Heclo (2008) explains why institutions are funda-mental to human society. Whether one is talking about marriage, law, or baseball, they are social repositories of past precedent and ways of doing things. Institutions can bequeath to successive generations stable referents that give lives meaning beyond self-interest calculation and the latest trend. They also become points of access for successive generations to reshape the social fabric when institutional habits become rigid, corrupt, or repressive. This article is on the institution of bureaucracy. Viewed as a sociological abstraction or a