Chapter Outline

The Federal Bureaucracy: Form, Personnel and Activities

1. Hierarchical authority refers to a chain of command whereby officials and units at the top of a bureaucracy have authority over those in the middle, who in turn control those at the bottom. It speeds action by reducing conflict over the power to make decisions.
2. Job specialization refers to how responsibilities for all positions are explicitly defined. There is a precise division of labor within the organization. It yields efficiency because each individual is required to concentrate on a particular job.
3. Formalized rules make up the standardized procedures and established regulations by which a bureaucracy conducts its operations. These enable workers to make quick and consistent judgments because decisions are made on the basis of pre-established guidelines rather than deliberation and personal inclination.

The U.S. bureaucracy employs more than 2.5 million people who have responsibility for administering thousands of programs. There are five general types of organizations within the federal bureaucracy.

1. There are fourteen cabinet (executive) departments headed by a secretary who serves as a member of the president's cabinet and is responsible for establishing the department's general policy and overseeing its operations.
2. Independent agencies have a narrower area of responsibility than cabinet departments. Examples are NASA and the CIA.
3. Regulatory agencies are created when Congress recognizes the importance of close and continuous regulation of an economic activity. They can issue regulations, implement them and judge whether individuals or organizations have complied with them. Examples are the SEC and the EPA.
4. Government corporations charge clients for their services and are governed by a board of directors. They receive federal funding to help defray operating expenses, and their directors are appointed by the president with Senate approval. Examples are the U.S. Postal Service and the FDIC.
5. Presidential commissions are permanent commissions that provide ongoing recommendations to presidents in particular areas of responsibility.

More than 90 percent of federal employees are hired through merit criteria. Merit hiring protects government workers from being fired for partisan reasons.

1. Federal employees are given GS job rankings which range from GS-1 to GS-18.
2. Federal employees have few rights of collective action.

The primary function of administrative agencies is policy implementation, which is to say that they carry out the authoritative decisions of Congress, the president and the courts. The bureaucracy does not simply administer policy; it also makes it.

1. The bureaucracy initiates ideas for legislative programs.
2. Administrative agencies develop public policy in the process of implementing it. Through rule making, administrative agencies decide how the law will operate in practice.
3. Agencies are charged with delivery of services.
4. Agencies determine whether others are complying with policy.

Development of the Federal Bureaucracy: Politics and Administration

The bureaucracy embodies three different management styles: patronage, merit and executive leadership, each of which has strengths and weaknesses.

1. The patronage system allows the president to give executive positions to partisan friends and loyalists (the Jackson's spoils system).
2. The merit (civil service) system provides for certain federal employees to be hired through competitive examinations or by virtue of having special qualifications. The administrative objective of the merit system is neutral competence--service to everyone, not just to the incumbent administration.
3. The executive leadership system provides presidents with management tools to coordinate the bureaucracy's activities and to increase its efficiency and responsiveness.

The Bureaucracy's Power Imperative

1. Administrators look out for their own agency's interests, which is known as the "agency point of view."
2. Sources of bureaucratic power include specialized knowledge, the support of interests that benefit from the programs they run (clientele groups) and the backing of the president and Congress.

Bureaucratic Accountability

1. Presidents can hold the bureaucracy accountable through the tools of reorganization, presidential appointees and the executive budget.
1. Reorganization is more successful if done on a small scale.
2. Presidential appointees can be effective in influencing policy in regulatory agencies.
3. The OMB reviews all budgetary requests, however generally there is little change from year to year.
2. Congress exerts control over the bureaucracy in a general sense through its power to authorize and fund programs.
1. Congress uses its oversight function to ensure compliance with legislative intent.
2. Congress can include specific provisions in laws that limit bureaucrats' options when they implement policy.
3. Sunset laws set a specific date when a law will expire unless it is re-enacted by Congress.
3. The judiciary promotes bureaucratic accountability primarily by
1. Encouraging administrators to act responsibly in their dealings with the public.
2. By protecting individuals and groups from the bureaucracy's worst abuses.
3. Supporting administrators if their actions appear consistent with the laws they are administering.
4. The bureaucracy has internal mechanisms of accountability.
1. Whistle-blowing is the act of reporting instances of bureaucratic corruption or mismanagement by one's fellow bureaucrats.
2. Though the bureaucracy does not represent the demographic characteristics of the population at the top levels, a larger proportion of women and minorities are found in it than in the other parts of the federal government. The concept of demographic representation proposes that various groups and interests in society will be treated more fairly.

Reinventing Government

1. Many plans for reinventing government are based on a desire to change programs that primarily provide goods and services into programs that encourage independence.
2. Some programs seek to foster competition among and between agencies and private firms.
3. Such proposals require agencies to monitor their performance by standards of efficiency, responsiveness and outcomes.
4. Most proposals encourage downsizing of the federal bureaucracy.

Some aspects of "reinventing government" efforts draw criticism.

1. Analysts question the soundness of principles of decentralized management and market-oriented programs as applied to governmental services.
2. Delegation of control to lower-level administrators weakens the kind of hierarchical connection between elected and administrative officials that was supposed to assure faithful administration of the laws made by Congress.
3. Government may be so reduced that it may not have the financial and human resources to adequately perform the missions it retains.