The origin of the term bureaucracy can be traced to eighteenth-century French literature (Albrow 1970). The early usage referred to an official workplace (bureau) in which individual activities were routinely determined by explicit rules and regulations. As modern systems of management, supervision, and control, bureaucracies are designed to rationally coordinate the duties and responsibilities of officials and employees of organizations. The delineation of official duties and responsibilities, by means of formal rules and programs of activity (March and Simon 1958), is intended to displace and constrain the otherwise private, idiosyncratic, and uniquely personal interests and actions of individuals. Bureaucratic systems of administration are designed to ensure that the activities of individuals rationally contribute to the goals and interests of the organizations within which they work.
THE CONTRIBUTION OF MAX WEBER
The historical trend toward increasing bureaucratization throughout modern Western Europe, highlighted by the changing structure of military organizations, is documented by the work of Karl Marx ([1852] 1963) and of Alexis de Tocqueville (1877). Michels’ (1949) analysis of the dynamics of power distribution within bureaucratic organizations and the concomitant development of oligarchic tendencies (fundamentally detrimental to democratic principles) provided an understanding of one of the more important unintended consequences of bureaucratic processes. However, the study of bureaucratic structure and processes as a prominent sociological topic is based on the intellectual legacy of Max Weber (1864-1920). Although Weber conducted his studies at the turn of the nineteenth century, wide recognition of his work by English-speaking theorists had to await later translations of his work (Weber 1946, 1947).
Weber’s thorough and richly informative work included consideration of Chinese, Egyptian, Roman, Prussian, and French administrative systems. In his comparative analysis of this vast array of diverse cultural systems of administration, Weber recognized an inexorable relationship between power and authority, on the one hand, and differing systems of administration on the other. In Weber’s analysis, the bureaucratic form of administration reflects one of three ways in which power can be legitimated. To gain a clear appreciation of the unique features of bureaucratic structure and processes, it is necessary to briefly address Weber’s proclaimed relationship between power, authority, and systems of administration. Power, for Weber, represents the ability or capacity to have other people behave in accordance with certain orders or dictates, irrespective of whether those affected regard its application as rightful or legitimate. Authority represents the legitimation of this power by those individuals whose activities are so ordered such that the application of power and its impact on them are perceived to be proper and acceptable. In Weber’s historical analysis, three different types of authority are identified: traditional, charismatic, and rational-legal (Weber 1947, p. 328).
Three Types of Authority. Traditional authority represents a system in which the use of power is regarded as legitimate when it is predicated upon belief in the sanctity of time-honored traditions and patterns of behavior. By contrast, charismatic authority is based on situationally specific acts of personal devotion. Under these circumstances, authority is conferred upon a specific individual who is regarded by the devoted followers to exhibit exceptional, sacred, and/or heroic characteristics. Charismatic authority is therefore limited to a specific setting and time. Rational-legal authority derives from the belief in the legitimacy of law, specifically in the legality of rules and the authority of officials and employees to perform certain legally sanctioned and mandated duties to which they have been formally assigned. Official rational-legal authority often permits individuals to perform tasks that otherwise would not be permitted. For example, police officers may engage in certain behaviors in the course of their official duties, such as the use of lethal force, that if performed by an ordinary citizen would expose the citizen to legal liability. Thus, it is not the act or set of behaviors per se that is critical to an understanding of rational-legal authority, but rather who performs the act or behavior and whether the individual performing the act is legally authorized to engage in such behavior.
Three Systems of Administration. Each type of authority is associated with a distinctive system of administration. Over the course of premodern social history, traditional authority was the principal means by which social organization was achieved. This type of authority structure resulted in the development of a wide variety of highly stable but nonetheless particularistic systems of administration, in which personal relations of dependence or loyalty provided the bases for authority. In general, these systems of administration are most clearly exemplified by patrimonial and feudal systems of administration. Unlike traditional authority, charismatic authority results in highly unstable systems of administration, because the foundations of these systems, the profoundly personal relationships between charismatic leaders and followers, are decisively limited in both time and circumstance. Given the tenuous foundation of charismatic authority structures, it is not surprising that the systems of administration that arise in such situations encounter difficulties in generating stable administrative practices. In this regard, problems pertaining to the routinization of authority and leadership succession are particularly salient and acute (Weber 1947, pp. 358-373). Thus, administrative systems predicated upon charismatic authority tend to be inherently transitory and most likely arise during periods of crisis or unprecedented change.
In contrast to the personal bases of authority inherent in both traditional and charismatic systems of administration, rational-legal systems of administration rely on impersonal rules and regulations, culminating in the emergence of highly precise and universalistic systems of administration that are most clearly exemplified by the modern rational bureaucracy. Weber clearly regards such administrative practices to be relatively recent in their development: ”Bureaucracy … is fully developed in political and ecclesiastical communities only in the modern state, and in the private economy only in the most advanced institutions of capitalism” (Weber 1978, p. 956).
THE FORMAL CHARACTERISTICS OF BUREAUCRACIES
The most distinguishing feature of modern rational bureaucracies is the formal control, prescription, and regulation of individual activity through the enforcement of rules. The explicit intent of enforcing these rules is to efficiently achieve specific organizational goals. In orchestrating individual action, a succinct and unambiguous specification of the official duties and responsibilities is provided to minimize, if not to eliminate, the influence of personal interests and ambitions upon the performance of official duties. The official or employee is then able to concentrate exclusively upon the technical aspects of the work, in particular the efficient and rational completion of assigned tasks. In addition to this attempt to separate individuals’ private concerns from their official duties and responsibilities, other distinguishing characteristics of bureaucracies include:
1. The hierarchical ordering of authority relations, limiting the areas of command and responsibility for subordinate as well as superordinate personnel
2. The recruitment and promotion of individuals on the basis of technical expertise and competence
3. A clearly defined division of labor with specialization and training required for assigned tasks
4. A structuring of the work environment to ensure continuous and full-time employment, and the fulfillment of individual career expectations within the organization
5. The impersonality and impartiality of relationships among organization members and with those outside the organization
6. The importance of ”official records” in the form of written documents.
THE RATIONALITY OF BUREAUCRATIC RULES
Within a bureaucratic organization, rules serve to direct individual action in ways that promote the technical efficiency of the organization. The distinctive feature of bureaucratic organization is not the use of rules per se but, rather, the type of rules employed within an organization as well as the justification for the use of rules. Rules have been, and continue to be, used in other forms of administration to control individual action; however, the rules used in the other administrative forms (such as rules based on tradition in feudal administration or on dependency in a patrimonial system) are not necessarily based on technical knowledge and the rational achievement of specific goals. By contrast, within a modern bureaucracy explicit rules are designed to assure uniformity of performance in accordance with technical requirements. Bureaucracies denote systems of control that attempt to ensure that the technical abilities of individuals are effectively utilized. A concerted effort is made to systematically exclude any factor or element that would reduce the prospect of an official’s or employee’s performance being anything other than organizationally focused, affectively neutral, and achievement oriented (Parsons and Shils 1951, pp. 76-91).
THE IDEAL TYPE CONSTRUCT
By underscoring the unique features of modern bureaucratic systems of administration, Weber provides an ideal-type characterization of bureaucracies. Despite subsequent confusion as to the value of the ideal-type portrayal of bureaucracies, Weber did not intend the characterization to represent an accurate empirical description of bureaucracies. As noted in the introduction to one of his edited works, ”Situations of such pure type have never existed in history. . . . The ideal types of Weber’s sociology are simply mental constructs to serve as categories of thought, the use of which will help us to catch the infinite manifoldness of reality . . . ”(Rhinestein 1954, pp. xxix-xxx). The ideal-type characterization is not suggestive of either extreme cases or distinct logical categories of phenomena (Mouzelis 1967). Rather, it provides a simplification and exaggeration of empirical events so that one can appreciate more clearly the features of the phenomena in question. Actual bureaucratic organizations may exhibit only a limited number of these properties or may possess them in varying degrees, a point well understood by Weber.
A GENERAL THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVE ON BUREAUCRATIC ORGANIZATIONS
As a general line of inquiry, the study of bureaucratic structure and processes has tended to represent a ”closed” or ”rational-system” approach to the study of organizations (Scott 1992). Predicated upon Weber’s conception of bureaucracy, the ”legal-rational” features of organizations such as the use of formal rules, the creation of specific personnel positions or roles, and personnel policies directed at the efficient achievement of organizational goals have been the focus of study. By directing attention toward the internal properties of bureaucratic organizations, interest in a number of topics has arisen, including the impact of technology on organizational structures (Thompson 1967), the interrelationships among organizational features (Hage et al. 1968), the integration of individuals within organizations (Argyris 1964; Herzberg et al. 1959), and the increase of worker productivity and organizational efficiency (Taylor 1911; Mayo 1933). Across this array of topics, a general theoretical perspective prevails in which the internal properties of bureaucratic organizations are regarded to be of cardinal importance. By directing primary attention toward the internal properties of bureaucratic organizations, the extent to which organizations are embedded in the more global structure and context of society is not fully realized. However, as bureaucratic organizations have grown in function and complexity, assuming an ever-expanding role in society, and displacing previous, more particularistic and personalized forms of administration, management, and control, the vibrant interplay between the internal properties of organizations and the environments in which they are situated has become more salient. Correspondingly, a more ”open” theoretical orientation is warranted. Organizations are viewed as ”natural systems” (Scott 1992) in which the interaction between an organization and its environment involves a series of potential two-way relationships. While many of the processes within a bureaucracy are designed to insulate the organization from external influences, invariably environmental influences can appreciably impact an organization and its internal operations. Similarly, the bureaucratic organization, with its expanding role in modern society, has unquestionably had a major impact on society.
EMPIRICAL ASSESSMENT
Stanley Udy (1959) was among the first to propose that, rather than regarding the specification of bureaucracies to be strictly a matter of definition, we need to ascertain empirically the extent to which bureaucratic characteristics are associated with one another in actual organizations. In the subsequent efforts at empirical assessment of the extent to which organizations exhibit bureaucratic properties, the works of Richard Hall (1963) and the Aston University research group (Pugh et al. 1968) are especially noteworthy. Hall’s (1963) findings suggest that among samples of U.S. organizations, bureaucratic features of organizations may vary independently of one another. As is illustrated by the negative relationship between an emphasis on technical qualifications and other bureaucratic features—in particular hierarchy of authority and rule enforcement—Hall’s study suggests that bureaucratic systems of organization may be indicative of multidimensional rather than unitary processes.
The Aston University research group (Pugh et al. 1968) reported similar findings for organizations in Britain. On the basis of their measurements of the bureaucratic characteristics of organizations specified by Weber, these researchers found four mutually independent dimensions of organizational structure rather than a single overarching bureaucratic dimension. With this finding, the authors concluded that bureaucracy is a multidimensional phenomenon and that it ”. . . is not unitary, but that organizations may be bureaucratic in any number of ways” (Pugh et al. 1968, p. 101). However, these findings have not been unchallenged. The contentious nature of inquiry into the precise structure of bureaucratic organization is succinctly reflected in the work of Blau (1970) and of Child (1972), the adoption of a modified position by one of the investigators in the original Aston group (Hickson and McMillan 1981), and the subsequent reply by Pugh (1981).
THE RISE OF BUREAUCRATIC CONTROL
Although bureaucracy existed in imperial Rome and ancient China, as well as in various national monarchies, the complexity of legislative issues arising within the modern state has caused an enormous growth of administrative function within both government and the private sector. Consequently, the power and authority of bureaucratic administrative officials to control policy within an organization as well as the modern state has, over time, increased significantly. The rise to power of bureaucratic officials means that, without expressly intending to achieve power, nonelected officials can and do have a significant impact on a broad spectrum of activities and future developments within society. As Weber noted,
The bureaucratic structure is everywhere a late product of historical development. The further back we trace our steps, the more typical is the absence of bureaucracy and of officialdom in general. Since bureaucracy has a rational character, with rules, means-ends calculus, and matter-of-factness predominating, its rise and expansion has everywhere had revolutionary results. (1978, p. 1002)
Moreover, Weber contended that traditional authority structures have been, and will continue to be, replaced by the rational-legal authority structures of modern bureaucracies, given their ”purely technical superiority over any other form of organization” (Weber 1946, p. 214). Regardless of the apparent technical benefit, the increased prominence of bureaucracies in both the public and the private sectors is not without its problems. As Weber acknowledged, certain negative consequences may follow the development of bureaucratic systems of administration to include:
1. The monopolization of information and the creation of ”official secrets”
2. The inability to change bureaucratic structure because of vested incentive and reward systems, and the dependency of society on the specialization and expertise provided by the bureaucracy
3. The tendency for bureaucracies to act in an autocratic manner, indifferent to variations or changes not previously articulated or anticipated within the bureaucracy. (Weber 1947, pp. 224-233)
A frequently expressed concern is that bureaucracies are often unresponsive to the individuals and groups they were designed to serve. To exacerbate the situation still further, few, if any, techniques of control are available outside the bureaucracies to make officials more responsive. Additionally, a number of practical problems may arise to potentially undermine bureaucratic efficiency. These difficulties can include the unwarranted application of rules and regulations, the duplication of effort, and an indifferent and even cavalier attitude among officials. Nonetheless, bureaucracies are relatively efficient and technically superior forms of administration proven to be indispensable to large, complex organizations and modern society. As Perrow has noted (1972), criticism of bureaucracies frequently relates to the fact that the actions of officials are not bureaucratic enough and personal interests may not be fully insulated from official duties.
In viewing the operation and function of bureaucracies, it is imperative that the operational efficiency of bureaucratic procedures be recognized but not at the cost of neglecting a more ”humanistic” orientation (Kamenka 1989, ch. 5). The situational constraints faced by individuals and groups both within and outside bureaucracies warrant attention. As Martin Albrow has noted, bureaucracy is ”a term of strong emotive overtones and elusive connotations” (1970, p. 13), and as such it represents more than a straightforward technical process and deserves an eclectic perspective in order to fully appreciate its complexities.
BUREAUCRATIC DYSFUNCTIONS
The classic works of Merton (1940) and of Gouldner (1954) illustrate how unanticipated developments can adversely impact the intended effectiveness of bureaucratic procedures. Merton notes that, commencing with the need for bureaucratic control, individual compliance with rules is enforced, thereby allowing for the development of routinely prescribed, reliable patterns of activity. However, when this agenda of rule compliance is implemented in a dynamic and fluctuating environment requiring more spontaneous responses, these prescribed patterns of bureaucratic activity can lead to adverse unintended consequences. Even though the circumstances require a different type of response, prescribed and fixed patterns of response may still be adopted because such responses are legitimated and defensible within the bureaucracy, given the extent to which they enhance individual reliability. Consequently, officials and employees do not accommodate the unique features of the situation, efficiency is undermined, and difficulties with clients and customers may ensue. Eventually, troublesome experiences with customers and clients may contribute to an even greater emphasis on bureaucratically reliable behavior rather than attenuating this encapsulated and counterproductive type of behavior. As Merton (1940) notes, ”Adherence to the rules, originally conceived of as a means, becomes transformed into an end in itself; there occurs the familiar process of displacement of goals whereby an instrumental value becomes a terminal value. . .” While more highly adaptive and flexible behavior is required and permitted within a bureaucracy, powerful structural constraints may operate to promote situationally inappropriate rule-bound behavior (Blau and Meyer 1987; Allinson 1984).
Like Merton, Gouldner (1954) is concerned with possible unintended effects of formal rule enforcement. In Gouldner’s model, the implications of using general and impersonal rules as a means of enforcing organizational control are investigated. The intention of using such rules is to mask or partially conceal differential power relations between subordinates and their superiors. In societies with egalitarian norms, such as the United States, this serves to enhance the legitimacy of supervisory positions, thereby reducing the prospect of tension between groups with differing power. However, the use of general and impersonal rules also has the unintended consequence of providing only minimal guidelines regarding acceptable organizational behavior. In turn, if only minimum standards of performance are specified and if individuals conform only to these standards, then a disparity arises between the stated goals of the organization, which require a level of performance beyond minimally acceptable and specified standards, and actual individual performance. Since a greater level of individual output and performance is required, more personal and closer forms of supervision need to be employed. This closer supervision increases the visibility of power relations, a consequence that may undermine the effect previously achieved by the use of general and impersonal rules.
The satirical, but nonetheless insightful, work of Peter and Hull (1969) indicates that bureaucratic processes may not always reflect the principle of personal expertise. Peter and Hull contend that even though individual talent and expertise are the formal requisites for recruitment and promotion within a bureaucracy, individuals often are promoted to positions that exceed their level of competence. Since the act of promotion often requires the assumption of new duties, an element of uncertainty over whether individuals will be as efficient in their new positions as they were in their previous positions is ever present. Not until an individual has had the position for a period of time is it apparent if he will be able to perform the newly assigned tasks in an efficient and competent manner. Most individuals are able to achieve an acceptable level of competence in their new duties; but what about those individuals who are unable to perform their new duties competently? Peter and Hull contend that, instead of being relocated to more suitable positions, these individuals remain in the elevated positions due, in all likelihood, to the difficulties and organizational costs associated with removing and reassigning them. Consequently, some individuals may be promoted to and remain in positions that exceed their level of competence, a portrayal clearly at variance with the image of operational efficiency.
THE PERVASIVENESS OF BUREAUCRACY IN SOCIETY
Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, a notable increase occurred in the number and type of functions performed within or regulated by a bureaucratic organization. Bureaucracies have superceded other more personalized, particularistic operations (ostensibly due to the technical superiority of the bureaucratic process) or, as new processes developed, they developed within the context of a bureaucratic structure. The ubiquitous presence of bureaucracies in modern society is indicated by the common usage of the term ”red tape.” The term originally denoted unnecessary and prolonged bureaucratic paperwork and procedures, and has since been expanded to encompass a more generic sense of unproductive effort. The level of everyday exposure to bureaucracies is sufficient such that notions of what a bureaucracy is (or perhaps more importantly, what it is not) have become a part of the popular culture of modern society. Fictional settings in which bureaucratic procedures interfere with the good intentions of people, promote an unproductive or unhealthy outcome, or lead to an uninspired work environment are common themes of movies, novels, syndicated cartoon features, and television shows.
The expansion of bureaucratic procedures has clearly impacted developments in the areas of health care and labor. In the area of health care, changes in the technological base of medicine, the methods by which medical services are financed, the regulatory role of government, as well as efforts to enhance the efficiency and accountability of health care providers has culminated in the bureaucratization of medical care (Mechanic 1976). In contrast to past medical practice settings characterized by a private and dyadic relationship between a doctor and a patient, the delivery of medical care in bureaucratized settings, intended to provide broader and more uniform care, increases the likelihood of conflicts of interest and the diminished salience of individualized care. When medical care is delivered in a bureaucratic setting, the specific features of patient care may be based on a number of nonclinical elements in addition to the clinically pertinent factors. Nonclinical criteria such the determination of what services will be provided and the avoidance of ”unnecessary” services, patient case management by nonmedical personnel, a predetermined referral protocol and network, and the disclosure of sensitive patient information within the bureaucratic organization all limit the role of the doctor. Each of these nonclinical, bureaucratically derived elements introduce different and potentially conflicting viewpoints in an evaluation of effective patient care and may direct attention more toward resolving organizational conflicts than enhancing patient care. The issues facing bureaucratic medical care will likely become more acute with the ”aging” of society and the need to attend to a greater number of patients suffering from debilitating, protracted, and nonrecoverable medical conditions.
The logic underlying the structure of bureaucratic organization is to control and regulate work routines on the basis of formal rules and regulations. In intending to use formal rules to administer workers’ duties and responsibilities, it is assumed that key components of a job can be identified to the extent that rules can effectively monitor and be used to evaluate individual performance. The precise specification of work routines for the purpose of enhancing worker productivity and organizational efficiency has been an ongoing interest throughout the twentieth century, as indicated by the time-motion studies and efficiency ”experts” of the early part of the century and process evaluation and quality assessments of the later part of the century. In the course of precisely specifying work responsibilities and routines, the de-skilling of the labor force (Taylor 1911) is, if not an intended outcome, a likely development. If a job can be defined in terms of specific component tasks and if the component tasks are rudimentary enough to be regulated by formal rules, then the skill requirements of job are reduced. As this process continues, the skill levels of workers in the labor force may exhibit similar reduction. Organizations can hire an individual with the nominal skill sets needed to adhere to the formally specified rules instead of hiring someone who is capable of displaying individual judgment working effectively in an environment characterized by job variability and uncertainty.
Bureaucracies have become both indispensable and despised fixtures of modern society. In the drive for overall organizational efficiency and accountability, individuals within and outside the bureaucracy often experience the unsettling feeling that they have no influence over a process that may directly impact them. The aggravation of wanting to have a problem solved or question answered but being unable to find anyone who is in the position to respond to the expressed concern fuels criticism of bureaucracies.
While criticism of bureaucratic procedures (or lack of ”appropriate” procedures) is frequent, it is also apparent many of the everyday functions in society are possible only because of the operation of bureaucracies. The major institutions of society, with the multitude of diverse projects performed every day, depend on the administrative and regulatory features of bureaucracies. The faceless bureaucratic official who may be criticized for indifference is nonetheless an essential element in such consequential areas as national defense, public education and welfare, and communications. The assessment of bureaucratic structure and procedures therefore needs to attend to both the overall scope of bureaucratic functions and the manner in which particular tasks are performed.
”Red tape” and inefficiency are two of the most heavily criticized elements of public bureaucracies, and instigate appropriate calls for reform. However, bureaucracies contain complex structures and multifaceted procedures intended to serve a number of purposes. Criticism often reflects common misperceptions rather than the true workings of bureaucracies. Regarding red tape, the bureaucracy does not necessarily create these protracted procedures in an effort to either insulate the organization from competition or to ensure that little if anything gets done without the organization’s official approval. Rather, it is more likely the result of disclosure and accountability requirements imposed on the bureaucracy (Kaufman 1977, p. 29). Similarly, inefficiency needs to be placed in the more global perspective of what in addition to the specific task is being accomplished by the bureaucracy. If the focus is limited to a specific task (e.g., construction of a highway), then the process can reasonably be viewed as inefficient if the task could have been completed sooner or cost less if done by someone else. However, there may be a number of additional goals that the bureaucracy is attempting to achieve while completing the specific task in question. In the public sector, a bureaucracy is often required to be responsive to a number of outside interest groups to ensure that its operation is socially fair, accountable, and impartial, in addition to being technically able to complete a particular task (Wilson 1989, pp.315-325). The determination of efficiency is compounded by this collateral concern regarding the attainment of social goals and specific technical goals. Bureaucracies are thus faced with the dual challenge of being socially responsible and technically proficient and therefore have to be assessed on the basis of the extent to which they concurrently achieve these two sets of goals and not just one set at the exclusion of the other.
