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The WHO regional office in Africa reported the first outbreak of ebola in 2014 March 23rd. Since then 25 178 cases has been reported from five countries in Western Africa as well as from US and Spain which has led to 10 445 casualties (WHO, 2015b). In Sweden, the Swedish Contingencies Agency was assigned SEK100 million from the government to contribute to the international response to stop the outbreak.

The aim of this master thesis is to clarify the relation between the Swedish government, Swedish contingencies agencies, and WHO (World Food Programme) in relation to the ebola outbreak in Weston Africa 2014 based on a thematic approach and a modified theory from May et al. (2008) about centralized authority.

The main theory in this essay is May et al (2008) theory regarding delegated to centralized authority, which is supplemented by an explaining process-tracing. The theory is developed to contain four different themes; centralized authority, leadership & strategy, operative organization, and other organization.

The conclusion from the study is three; (1) an agency can receive signals from different directions that could effect the experience of centralized authority, (2) the concepts of the theory has a more dynamic than linear connection and (3), the only direct consequence of an organization that has been exposed to a potential centralized authority is agenda instability.