Adele Myers
16148886
Public Administration PA 4021
Politics and Public Administration
How did Max Weber’s theory of bureaucracy have a major impact on the development of public administration systems? Illustrate your answer with examples.
German sociologist Max Weber (1864-1920) made a lasting contribution to organisation theory. His analysis of an ‘ideal type’ bureaucracy has been criticised and refined, but it remains the most quoted starting point for the study of large organisations, particularly in the public sector. The word ‘bureaucracy’ has many meanings, to political scientists it is a system of government by ‘bureaux’ of officials. To Weber the word refers to the structure found in modern large organisations, whether they are government departments, business firms, armies or organised religion. It is a continuous organisation of official functions bound by rules. Weber thought that bureaucratic organisation was the most rational means of deploying power in any setting (Brown and Steel, 1979, p.160). In this essay, I am going to discuss how Max Weber’s theory of bureaucracy had a major impact on the development of public administration systems.
Classical organisation theory evolved during the first half of this century. It represents the merger of scientific management, bureaucratic theory, and administrative theory. Max Weber expanded on Taylor 's theories, his methods involved getting the best equipment and people, and then carefully
In Goodsell’s “A Case for Bureaucracy” Goodsell makes several valid points about the argument for and against Bureaucracy. Before reading I too would have assumed bureaucracy is a waste of time and that most bureaucrats are just lazy, rude and tend to hate their job. But now I've realized that Bureaucracy does succeed. People, Americans, tend to expect bureaucrats to be able to do anything. Even when the tasks seems impossible they expect the problem to be solved immediately which ultimately sets the bureaucrats up for failure from the beginning.
The Federal Bureaucracy is an organization of non-elected officials of government or organization who implement the rules, laws, and functions of their institutions. Essentially, Congress and the president create laws that are vague. The bureaucracy is responsible for figuring out how to implement these vague laws in our society through regulations, forms and rules. The Bureaucracy consists of 500 departments with roughly 2.6 million employees. Although, the bureaucracy is not actually a branch of government it does have influence over the decisions of the three branches government.
The bureaucracy is a major base of power that can be difficult to control. Max Weber believed that bureaucracies shared certain characteristics: chain of command, division of labor, and impersonality. The chain of command is a form of organization characterized by a hierarchical structure of authority. In a military context, for example, the chain of command is the line of authority and responsibility along which orders are passed within a military unit and between different units. The division of labor is when work is divided among specialized workers in order to improve productivity.
Comparison of Marx and Weber for their approach about state and society: Max Weber is one of the philosophers able to explain economic systems such as capitalism. He was born in Germany in 1864 at that time there were a dramatic change in Germany in terms of industrial so there were a transitional German period and that influenced by those changes happened. Max Weber has a specific ideology about state and society. In constant, Karl Marx was a sociologist who were born in Germany in 1818, his idea and ideology about state and society are revolutionary. In addition, he was influenced by Communist party and he worked as a journalist he wrote a number of books and articles about capitalism, state, and society.
He believed that as societies modernize, they become more rational and create bureaucracies and as societies grow and industrialize, bureaucracies would increase in power in regards to modern life. Weber’s process, rationalization of society, incorporated that over the course of time, many aspects of society would be under bureaucratic rule and regulation. According to Max Weber, bureaucracy is represented as an ideal type. An ideal type is described as how an organization should be operated accordingly to be successful and can be carried over to how it operates in reality. In ideal bureaucracies, goals are accomplished and no individual is deviated from any given
Another difficulty faced with hours and labor was when a man named Frederick Taylor thought of the “Scientific Management Method” which stated that a manager should supervise each section of a job and time how long it would take for each part to be
The Bureaucracy in our country is largely disapproved of throughout our country. Americans are extremely critical of the Bureaucracy and claim that it is not very effective in getting the done. The Bureaucracy is expensive and ineffective, and this inefficiency stems from a variety of factors. The main problems of bureaucracy are stiff rules and regulations, impersonality, customer dissatisfaction, slow decision making and limited capabilities of workers.
Meier (1997) argues that United States (US) facing serious problem in bureaucracy and electoral institutions. It is popular for politicians to use anti-bureaucracy ideas in elections. According to author in US bureaucracy is mainly connected with the problem of governance. However, it is possible to control bureaucracy by balancing the budget, eliminating poverty, reinvigorating the education system (p.193). In my opinion, bureaucracy itself is a meaning of power, domination of chancellery.
This belief supported Weber’s view on human rights; Weber implied that there was a relationship between bureaucracies and rights. The features of Sjoberg’s theory of human rights included focusing on the bureaucracy and the role of human agency in relation to it. Unlike Weber, Sjoberg went further into the topic and includes the inequality that occurs with individuals higher up in the hierarchy. From Sjoberg and his colleagues’ studies it was proposed that individuals are capable
The German sociologist Max Weber [3] described many ideal-typical forms of public administration, government, and business. Weber agreed that bureaucracy constitutes the most efficient and rational way in which human activity can be organized, and that thus is indispensable to the modern
After hearing many valid points on each philosophy, I chose Confucianism as my philosophy because they promote peace, and they teach people alternatives of morality. Confucianism focuses on education and bureaucracy. This philosophy looks out for what 's best for the community. Also, they teach proper conduct and along with education, it can lead to good jobs and morals. Legalism is a very strict and harsh philosophy, yet they have a good economy.
In this essay I will compare and contrast Marx and Weber’s theories on social change and the rise of modern capitalism. Firstly I will provide a brief outline of Marx’s theories relating to social change and capitalism. I will then briefly outline Weber’s theories on social change and the rise of modern capitalism. Finally I will give my own critique of the theories outlining which one I prefer and the reasons for my choice.
Knott and Miller present a number of dysfunctions that are present within bureaucracies. A few types of dysfunction are goal displacement, trained incapacity and dual systems of authority (Knott & Miller, 1987, p. 110-1). According to Knott and Miller, goal displacement occurs when a rigidity cycle starts to produce greater and greater emphasis is put on the rules, rather than the actual purpose of the organization as a whole (Knott & Miller, 1987, p. 110). In consequence, goal displacement means that employees replace a concern for organizational rules and procedures in the place of organizational goals. In turn, rules and procedures loose their effectiveness and constructive purpose (Knott & Miller, 1987, p. 110)
Sociologist Max Weber’s statement that bureaucracy is the distinctive mark of the modern era clearly describes a bureaucratic type of structure now intrinsic in public sector organizations. This type of structure which has been termed by theorist J. Donald Kingsley (1949) as a "Representative Bureaucracy", basically speaks of public workforces that are representative of the people in terms of race, ethnicity, and gender. In other words, a Representative Bureaucracy, is more or less "an assessment and reconstruction of public sector organizations for the sole purpose of ensuring that all groups in society are equally represented" (Duada, 1990). Thus, in relation to this definition and many other similar constructs, one can clearly see why that
A bureaucratic organization was originally intended to have a hierarchical or pyramidal structure to help achieve the most rational and efficient operation at the lowest cost. The term bureaucracy is a combination of French and Greek words respectively. The word ‘bureau’ means desk or office and the word ‘kratos’ means rule or political power. It was first used by the French economist Jacques Claudes Marie Vincent de Gournay. In order to study the origins and nature of the expansion of bureaucratic organization, weber constructed an ideal type of Bureaucracy.