Talk:Bureaucracy

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Comment on "Iron Triangle"

Presently, the article credit Thomas Lowi (1971) for coining the phrase. It's been quite a while since I've checked the original sources, but I've usually seen credit going to Douglass Cates, Power in Washington, which was published quite a few years earlier (1964) by Random House. I'm not a registered "user," but I have no objections to having my "IP address" recorded -- I'm professor Wm. Freudenburg, UCSB <freudenburg@es.ucsb.edu> if anyone wants to follow up. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.111.76.21 (talk) 16:28, 19 May 2008 (UTC)


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I have expanded info on Weber's theories on bureaucracy. Perhaps at some future's date majority of that can be moved to their own specialized articles, but for present I think it is the best home for them. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 18:49, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC) well blah blah blah

Contents

[edit] POV example removed

The article says:

"Not allowing people to use common sense, as everything must be as is written by the law. For example: a particular person cannot be convicted even if they are clearly guilty of a crime, simply because the law does not accept the evidence given against them."

But many philosophies consider this procedural justice, not an anomaly of bureaucracy gone wild. Letting someone go who can't be convicted in the eyes of the law? The article says it is against common sense. I say it is common sense. Either way it's POV. I deleted the example. Illuminatingvision 07:40, 20 December 2006 (UTC)


[edit] A suggestion..

I think it would be appropriate to mention the film Brazil, which is almost entirely about the dehumanising effects of bureaucracy run wild... not sure which section though. Perhaps a whole new one concerning bureaucracy in literature and film?

If one were to do this, maybe include the movie Office Space? It is pretty much how pop culture views the bureaucracy.

  • Agreed. (Maybe not Office Space, but certainly Brazil.) And perhaps a tounge-in-cheek reference to the bureaucracy of the wiki itself might be fun too, and worthwhile. For instance, that so many of the ideals that are attempted to be portrayed in this encyclopaedia are in such contrast with the pace of modern living. (eg. the tension between the world of blogs as a personal model of expression vs. the wiki as a public model held to certain standards.) Information doesn't seem to be viewed as being inclusive to the wiki if it hasn't been run through the non-virtual publishing bureaucracy first. This seems quite backwards when the entire project of the wiki is founded upon the freedom of the virtual, open-source edit. Is this not stifling, and retrogressive, from a certain vantage point? Not that any of this is definitively true, but that these kinds of ubquitous bureaucratic cages are present (as explored in the film Brazil), seems worth mentioning in any progressive article on bureaucracy.

I went here tying to locate the side effects from the imposed bureaucracy, the old ways(wich are mostly present in Brazil or in any other 3° world contrys). If anyone could write it...

I came on here to suggest adding a link to Brazil, but found that it had already been suggested! Wikipedia is pretty freakin cool.

[edit] Another suggestion..

We need a new article regarding bureaucratic agencies as in (US) government. With such points as GS ratings, Senior Executive Service, and etc.

Thank you for your suggestions. Be bold, register and try creating them. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 04:18, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

The following was added by an anon to the bottom. Perhaps it can be incorportated into the text: Some procedures that are created from bureaucracy to solve one particular problem often become another problem within itself due to differing viewpoints and intentions of all members involved in the process.

[edit] Another suggestion..

If one is going to mention Brazil which i agree is as the person above put it "pretty freakin cool" then one should also mention other bureaucrats in fiction primarily the Vogon from Douglas Adams's acclaimed Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series those being a race supposedly entirely bureaucratic. Though do mention the Vogons from the audio play and the books rather than the movie version, it really was appalling.

[edit] Problems

Can we get some citations? The two sections on Marx and Weber read like OR. POV of the article seems unneccessarily swayed towards Weber. --Scaife (Talk) Don't forget Hanlon's Razor 21:18, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

What do you mean "read like original research"? 99 % of that stuff on weber can be found in a basic University text-book (one of which I have added to sources). And how do you mean "swayed towards Weber?" Weber is the person everyone refers to when introducing the concept of bureaucracy. Yes, one should be careful in adding information without sources but one should be equally careful about filling a page with templates "just because". For example, there is no way one can claim that the sentence "the Oxford English Dictionary cites usage in several different years between 1818 and 1860, prior to Weber's birth in 1864" lacks sources. They are right there. -Samulili 19:32, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Shouldn't the Peter_principle be mentioned in here somewhere?SMesser 22:27, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Why all the Marxism?

I am not sure why there is so much Marx in this article. Bureaucracy refers to the methodology of public and private administration. What does this have to do with Marxism in particular? IF Marx should be mentioned (I don't see why), it should not go to the extend of arguing about the feasibility of socialism. That's just totally off topic. Dietwald 09:08, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Neither am I. Marx didn't say much about the topic... With the excetion of the excellent section on Weber written by Piotrus, this article needs a rewrite. I hope to get around to rewriting it myself in the near future, unless someone beats me to it. 172 | Talk 03:36, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Dudes, marx was the first to make considerations from de bureaucracy, and Weber wrote all of his principles in bureaucracy(valids until today), based on Marx!Totaly necessary. For me, you should include Trotsky and Stalin too!The first sense of bureaucracy.

Suggestion 3

Hey, but the film is higly relevant to the word "bureacracy". I think it is an excellent idea.

I think the Karl Marx section (tagged with original research) should be deleted. I agree with the above comments that it is not relevant. --Vince 18:02, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps split instead of deletion would be better?-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  19:52, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
You mean delete the section and split it up into existing sections? Or make new sections? I think some of the material could be summarized and included in the introduction or a theory section. --Vince 20:25, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
I think the Marx theory on the historical basis for bureaucracy is useful. It might be shortened, worked into the History section, or possibly placed after Weber's theory. It's not merely American & English capitalists who use bureacracies.SMesser 22:15, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Weber's ideal bureaucracy

Under Criticism: "As Max Weber himself noted, in reality no ideal type organization can exist. Thus the real bureaucracy will be less optimal and effective than his ideal model. Each of Weber's seven principles can degenerate."

This so-called criticism misses the point of Weber's Ideal type, completely. In short not a valid criticism of Weber’s model and should be removed.

The part you quoted is confusing. I don't think it should be removed but it should be improved, for Weber did point out that "total bureaucracy" will fail. In other words Weber believed that an ideal (pure, ideal type) bureaucracy will not be ideal (good).
Basically, what I think is wrong with those sentences is the word "thus". The two aren't in fact connected. I'll remove the first one. -Samulili 09:06, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Serious gaps in this article

Marx died in 1883. Weber died in 1920. Yet most of this article tells us what Weber and Marx said. While it is true that this article ought to include these viewpoints--especially Weber's contributions, which are still taught in college courses on bureaucracy--the focus of this article ought to be elsewhere. Our understanding of bureaucracy has progressed considerably since 1883 and 1920. Now, we mostly worry about the policy implications of delegating rule-making powers (among other responsibilities) from elected politicians to unelected bureaucracies. This concern is dominant both in politics (how many times have you heard a campaign advertisment mention "unaccountable bureaucrats?") as well as in academia (which has moved from "iron triangles" to "capture theory" to "police patrols and fire alarms"). Indeed, the bulk of the bureaucratic studies literature focuses exclusively on questions of delegation and policy control: Legislatures delegate regulatory authority to bureaucrats, who may use this authority in unexpected ways.

I wrote a section on these topics a couple months ago (the "Current Debates" section in the article), which should probably be renamed, expanded, and moved upward (IMHO). To make this article relevant to the typical visitor, should we not be focusing more on these issues of accountability and regulation? While Weber's contributions are relevant (probably more so than Marx's), the detailed summary of them available here belongs in a textbook, or in a less prominent part of the present article.

Implementing these suggestions would involve rather radical changes to the article as presently constituted. Although Wikipedia's guidelines encourage us to be bold, I'll forego overhauling the article until waiting for some feedback. (Better yet, since I'm quite pressed for time, perhaps somebody else wants to step up to the plate.)

Apologies for the long rant. A10brown 20:06, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Suggestion add Subset Bureaucratic Reform

See the Talk page which I created "Government Reform subset Bureaucratic Reform" I have recently added this talk page with references to my web blog on government Reform at: http://managementconsultant.blogsome.com and my Ebook site at: http://ebooksbylrosier.blogspot.com Reprinted articles are noted but few all other material is my original work and constitutes a break through in Bureaucratic reform.

You realize that the wiki adds "nofollow" tags to those links, right? Perhaps your SEO efforts would be better spent elsewhere....
- A10brown 20:50, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Islamic influences

Some sources suggest the Ottoman city of Bursa as the first source of bureaucracy, I see no mention of it in the article though.

Or, alternately, any mention of the extensive Chinese bureaucratic systems that extend back into ancient times. The "Development of Bureaucracy" section seems to assume the ridiculous idea that the first bureaucracy to develop was in the United States. siafu 03:54, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Origins/Development

I'm not aware of any good sources on the history of bureaucratic government or authority (Foucault maybe?), but surely the United States is not the origin of the idea. Granted, early bureaucracies weren't called "bureaucracies" or any similar name (bureaucracies precede both the French and English languages after all), but the general idea was already taking shape in the ancient world-- the cursus honorum in the Roman Empire, for example, was a series of bureaucratic posts (aediles and censors in particular), and the ancient Chinese states (even those preceding the Qin Dynasty) were known for their bureaucratic functioning and authority.

So, in short, the section needs a complete rewrite. Anyone have anything to suggest or argue? siafu 22:48, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

--I wrote a description of some of the origins of bureaucracy from ancient Sumer to the modern day. Most of that is based on my own personal knowledge of history, which is pretty thorough. If anyone wants to make any changes, though, that's fine. Segregold 17:55, 17 August 2007

[edit] Further development

I contributed the bit on the etymology and a bit on the Marxian interpretation. However there exists a large contemporary literature on bureaucracy and therefore I agree the article could be expanded. Both the Marxist and Weberian interpretations have been very influential though. User:Jurriaan 23:57 25 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Problems with Lead Section

The banned user Serafin, editing anonymously, insists on including this information at the top of the article:

In a literal sense, Bureaucracy means the rule of offices. In democratic systems however political power belongs to the people, and administrative offices are created only for the execution of legal rules not for political or other influences.

It is a complete non sequitur, and contradicts another part of the lead section:

Examples of everyday bureaucracies include governments, armed forces, corporations, hospitals, courts, ministries and schools.

Of these, only (some) governments are "democratic systems". Yet Serafin insists on making his argument in the lead paragraph, violating WP:NPOV and WP:LEAD. -- Karldoh 11:12, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I've tried to restore what was before. Please watch this page, everybody. His edits can be reverted on sight and should be reported, for example at User:Luna Santin/Sockwatch/Serafin or WP:AIV. Sciurinæ 20:04, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] American usage

The sub-section selectively uses definitions to try to prove a POV. In each example, two or more definitions, listed earlier in precedence in the source, do not have any negative connotation to them. I do not suggest that the assertion is entirely false, only that the citations used do not prove the claims made and, in fact, imply the claims are not as widely accepted as indicated. Shoreranger (talk) 19:18, 4 April 2008 (UTC)