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Chapter 14: The Bureaucracy
American Democracy Now, 3/e
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The Bureaucracy
Bureaucrats and Bureaucracy Who Are the Bureaucrats? Bureaucracy: An Organizational Structure
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Bureaucrats and Bureaucracy
Most people think of government agencies when they hear the word bureaucracy, and they think of government employees when they hear the word bureaucrat —and their thoughts are oft en negative.
Are the negative images and the criticisms of bureaucrats and bureaucracies fair?
Before we can answer, we must understand who the bureaucrats are, what they are hired to do, and how they are expected to accomplish their work.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Who Are the Bureaucrats?
Bureaucrats provide the public services that elected officials authorize, and in doing so they make decisions that affect people daily.
Studies show government employees to be very hard workers who are motivated by the recognition of the importance of public service.
Compared with private-sector employees, public servants have higher levels of formal education, must comply with more stringent codes of behavior, and express a greater concern for serving the public.
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Who Are the Bureaucrats?
Joining the 23 million national, state, and local bureaucrats are the so-called shadow bureaucrats—employees on the payroll of private for-profit businesses and private nonprofit organizations with government contracts.
Through a process of contracting-out (also called outsourcing or privatizing ), the government signs work contracts with these organizations to assist in the implementation of national policy.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Bureaucracy: An Organizational Structure
Max Weber (1864–1920) coined the word bureaucracy to describe large organizations, such as government, with the following features: a division of labor, specialization of job tasks, hiring systems based on worker competency, hierarchy with a vertical chain of command, and standard operating procedures.
Organizations with bureaucratic features are not unique to government.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Federal Bureaucrats
Political scientists distinguish among national bureaucrats according to several factors, including the process by which they are hired, the procedures by which they can be fired, and the grounds for which they can be fired.
On the basis of these factors, we can differentiate among three categories of national civilian bureaucrats: political appointees, civil servants, and senior executive service employees.
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Political Appointees
Every four years, after the presidential election, the federal government publishes the plum book, which lists thousands of top jobs in the bureaucracy to which the president will appoint people through the patronage system.
The president not only hires but also can fire political appointees at his pleasure.
More common than firing is the resignation or retirement of appointees who no longer enjoy presidential approval.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Civil Servants
Open Competition and Competence Political Neutrality Civil Service Reform Act (1978) Unionized Civil Servants The Senior Executive Service
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State, Local, and Shadow Bureaucrats
Today, the overwhelming majority of the almost 20 million state and local bureaucrats, and possibly as many as 15 million shadow bureaucrats, provide various national public services.
Through devolution and contracting-out, the national government relies on these non-national bureaucrats to serve the people’s daily needs.
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The Evolution and Organization of the Federal Bureaucracy
Today, as the U.S. population tops 300 million, more than 2,000 executive branch units, employing 4 million bureaucrats (2.7 million civilian bureaucrats and about 1.5 million military personnel), implement volumes of national policies.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Departments
The Department of Homeland Security, established in 2002, is the newest of 15 federal departments, each responsible for one broadly defined policy area.
The president holds the 15 departments accountable through the appointment of a head official.
Secretary is the title of this top political appointee in all departments except the Department of Justice, where the head is the attorney general.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Independent Administrative Agencies
A host of independent administrative agencies are each responsible for a more narrowly defined function of the national government.
Structurally independent administrative agencies look like cabinet departments, with a single head appointed by the president.
However, these agencies are “independent” because Congresses and presidents place them outside of the cabinet departments.
In addition, these agencies have a varying level of independence from the president.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Independent Regulatory Commissions
Independent regulatory commissions are bureaucracies outside of the cabinet departments with the authority to develop standards of behavior for specific industries and businesses, to monitor compliance with these standards, and to impose sanctions on those it finds guilty of violating the standards.
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Government Corporations
Like private businesses, government corporations sell a service or a product; but unlike private businesses, they are government owned.
A bipartisan board typically directs each government corporation.
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Executive Office of the President (EOP)
The EOP is composed of dozens of offices and councils that assist the president in managing the complex and sprawling executive branch of the bureaucracy.
The president has the authority to fi re these appointees at his pleasure.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Hybrids
In addition to the five categories of bureaucracy we have considered, the executive branch features hybrid agencies that have characteristics of more than one category.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is one such hybrid.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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The Bureaucracy
Where Do You Stand?Do you think the United States is safer with the creation of the Department of Homeland Security?
a. Yes, we’re safer
b. No, we’re not safer
c. Made no difference
Source: “Homeland Security: Do Americans Feel Safer?” www.gallup.com/poll/7321/Homeland-Security-Americans-Feel-Safer.aspx.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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The Bureaucracy
Where Do You Stand?Do you think the U.S. government should be bigger and provide more services, or smaller and provide fewer services?
a. Bigger with more services
b. Smaller with fewer services
Source: “U.S. Public Opinion Poll of Government,” www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/cgi-bin/hsrun.exe/Roperweb/pom/StateId/D0VKruXZJfmB2DdabjpyuXEHZvhUo-U4Jw/HAHTpage/Summary_Link?qstn_id=1702684.
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Federal Bureaucrats’ Roles in Public Policy
Agenda Setting Policy Formulation Policy Approval Resource Allocation Policy Implementation Policy Evaluation
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Federal Bureaucratic Accountability
When it comes to public service, everyone is watching.
National sunshine laws open up government functions and documents to the public, ensuring transparency and the public’s right to know about government business and decision making.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Accountability to the People
The Administrative Procedure Act (APA) of 1946.
The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) of 1966. The Government in the Sunshine Act of 1976. Sunshine laws and e-government provide
citizens with the means to find out what is going on in the bureaucracy.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Accountability to the Courts
Individuals that believe the action of a bureaucrat or bureaucracy has caused them harm can fi le suit in a court of law once they have exhausted all quasi-judicial processes of the bureaucracy.
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Accountability to Congress Congress approves the legislation that creates,
regulates, and funds bureaucracies. More than one-quarter of the president’s appointees are
subject to Senate confirmation. Congress encourages bureaucratic accountability
through the monitoring of bureaucracies’ policy implementation, a form of legislative oversight.
An evaluation of bureaucratic performance can also be required in the authorization legislation by a sunset clause, which forces the expiration of the program or policy after a specified number of years unless Congress reauthorizes it through new legislation.
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Accountability to the President
Like Congress, the president can use the authorization and appropriation processes to ensure accountability.
In addition, because most top political appointees serve at the president’s pleasure, they are responsive to the president’s policy preferences.
The OMB evaluates bureaucratic performance for the president.
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Internal Accountability
Codes of Behavior and the Ethics in Government Act
Whistle-Blower Protections and Inspectors General
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Can Bureaucratic Performance Be Improved?
Charles Goodsell has found that two-thirds to three-fourths of Americans report their encounters with government bureaucrats and bureaucracy as “satisfactory.”
However, research consistently shows that some national agencies perform better than do others.
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Can Bureaucratic Performance Be Improved?
William T. Gormley and Steven Balla reviewed national performance data and summarized the characteristics of national agencies that perform well.
These characteristics include legislative language that clearly states the goal of the legislation and provides high levels of administrative discretion, allowing bureaucrats to determine the best way to achieve the goal.
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Can Bureaucratic Performance Be Improved?
Better-performing bureaucracies tend to be those with easily measured goals, especially goals that include providing resources to citizens (such as Social Security checks) as opposed to taking resources (tax collection).
Another factor is high levels of support from elected officials, the media, and diverse groups of citizens for the legislated goal and the implementing agency.
Effective leaders also important.
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Does Contracting-Out Improve Performance?
Charles Goodsell has analyzed the body of research that assesses the efficiency of public policy implementation by government bureaucrats compared with the efficiency of private organizations. He has found that “the assumption that business always does better than government is not upheld.”
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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The Bureaucracy
Where Do You Stand?
Would you agree or disagree that when programs are run by the federal government, they tend to be wasteful and inefficient?
a. Agree
b. Disagree
Source: “Trends in Political Values and Core Attitudes: 1987–2007,” http://people-press.org/reports/pdf/312.pdf.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Citizens’ Role in Bureaucratic Performance
The effectiveness of public policies depends on people’s knowledge of and compliance with the law.
It depends on their applying for the government programs for which they qualify and their conformity to the rules, regulations, standards, and directions of bureaucrats.
This symbiotic relationship is essential to the success of government.
©2013, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
