The animators of administrative law:challenging the ‘monopoly’ of law’s application

This paper makes two novel contributions to public law by looking beyond legal judgments and doctrinal analysis in developing socio-legal understandings of administrative discretion. To begin, it sets up administrative decision-makers as the ‘animators’ of administrative law and as central subjects in understanding how administrative law is brought to life. The first contribution is to draw on semi-structured interviews with frontline officials to present novel understandings of discretion and control of discretionary power. The second contribution is to develop two themes through which we can theorise on administrative discretion at first instance: (i) institutional bureaucratic culture; and (ii) dissonant decision making. In doing so, pathways to closing knowledge gaps are illuminated, and constructive dialogues between administrators and legal scholars on how administrative law is really brought to life are developed.