Why do successive administrative reforms consolidate the state in some cycles but leave later reforms harder to govern? This paper develops the concept of capacity-conditioned reform sequencing: a recursive process through which each reform changes the implementation conditions inherited by the next. Implementation capacity is defined through three dimensions - coordination continuity, technical expertise retention and leadership stability. The argument is examined through theory-building process tracing of three Portuguese central-government reform cycles between 2005 and 2026: PRACE, PREMAC and ReFOAP. Documentary, legal, audit and organisational evidence is triangulated with an original 2026 practitioner survey of 62 respondents. The survey is used descriptively and does not support population inference. The analysis identifies three distinct capacity legacies. PRACE combined organisational rationalisation with comparatively stable coordination, producing coordinated consolidation but only partial expertise retention. PREMAC compressed structural reduction under austerity and external pressure, producing capacityeroding retrenchment. ReFOAP pursues digital integration, interoperability and shared services as attempted capacity recovery, although its outcomes remain unsettled. The paper contributes by treating implementation capacity as both a precondition and an outcome of reform, and by specifying how reform sequences create positive, negative or recovery-oriented capacity legacies. It concludes that administrative reform should be evaluated not only by structures changed, savings achieved or systems digitised, but by the coordination, expertise and leadership capacity it leaves behind.

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administrative reform,implementation capacity,reform sequencing,state capacity,coordination,institutional change,Portugal,digital transformation