Bureaucracy and Its “Objectives”? A Response to Alexandru Roman

It never hurts to ponder the role and position of societal institutions in their own time and context and consider whether their function has changed in response to environmental changes. Roman’s central thesis is that “ . . . administrative efficiency cannot be freely associated with bureaucratic constructs . . . ” (see “Abstract”; nota bene, all page numbers to Roman’s piece are from the submitted article, not from the printed version) and that the “ . . . ability [of bureaucracy] to serve as a psychological buffer for its members is currently as important, if not more, than efficiency” (p. 2). Later in his piece, he writes that “presently, a public servant [ . . . ] is a ‘bureaucrat’ most often for ‘protection’ purposes” (p. 15). I will address his overall claim that bureaucracies’ telos has changed over time, by providing some historical considerations to Roman’s mainly contemporary argument, and while doing so, will comment on some specific parts of the text.

Since the late 19th century, it has been a staple in organization theory to believe that bureaucratic organization was better than other types of organization (e.g., collegial organization) in enhancing administrative efficiency. At the same time, authors since Veblen, Dewey, Warnotte, and Merton (p. 17) have pointed out that bureaucracies are not so efficient and that they, actually, have dehumanizing consequences for those working in them. Roman reports this and counters that bureaucracies do not underperform and that they are responsive to societal need (p. 17), but that their performance cannot always be evaluated in quantified terms (p. 12). He also questions, and rightly so, whether bureaucracy is dehumanizing and not able to cope with the complexity of societal demands (p. 12). His article outlines a normative argument, but it is unclear on what basis he came to conclude that bureaucracies nowadays are perhaps less associated with administrative efficiency and increasingly serve to shield civil servants from environmental volatility and stakeholders by using rules as an isolation mechanism (p. 16). Normative pieces are important, but when advancing the argument that the objectives of bureaucracy have changed from the traditional efficiency focus to a “buffering” function, we really need some evidence of that. Sure, it is possible that civil servants invoke rules to establish some degree of predictability and survival (p. 16), but let us be clear that this is possible for anyone working in a bureaucratic organization in the public, nonprofit, and private sectors. Allow me to elaborate on the basis of four problems with the Roman article.

One problem is conceptual and concerns the conflation of bureaucratic organization with government (and sometimes also the conflation of government and governance). Let us be clear about one thing: Bureaucracy is the organizational form adopted by any organization that reaches a certain threshold in personnel size. Public, nonprofit, and private organizations are bureaucracies. “Boeing,” “Chase Manhattan,” Walmart,” “Microsoft,” the “Red Cross,” “Greenpeace,” “Transparency International,” hospitals, universities, and so on and so forth are just as much bureaucracies as the U.S. Department of Defense, as the City of London, and as the government of Namibia. I find it amazing and—honestly—somewhat lazy that some scholars, and a bit simple-minded that some citizens, continue to equate bureaucracy with government. We need civic education, and everyone should be required to read Goodsell (2015). Conflating “government” and “governance” also creates some confusion, for the term “governance” encompasses a larger category of institutions (namely, all those societal organizations and institutions somehow involved in the “steering” of society, hence, religious organizations, nonprofits, private corporations, government organizations, etc.)

Partially related to the first problem, second, is a perceptual and theoretical problem. No matter how many Goodsells try to set the record straight, the stereotype of bureaucracy as being slow (in comparison with what or who?), incompetent (in comparison with what or who?), too large (in comparison with what?), and populated with “pencil-pushers” who embrace “red tape,” rather than creatively (re)solving a problem, is extremely persistent. As far as the U.S. public sector is concerned, we might point to a historically deeply rooted suspicion of government (Wills, 1999), but we have seen trust in and respect for government dwindle since the 1960s in most Western countries. Peoples’ biased and stereotypical image of government bureaucracies is strengthened by reports about mistakes, fraud, and mediocracy. Reporting that today, 99% of public sector activity has been satisfactorily concluded is simply not considered newsworthy. And, are mistakes, fraud, and mediocracy not found in nonprofit and private organizations? With regard to fraud, have we forgotten the numerous scandals in a variety of private organizations such as Enron, Tyco International, Worldcom, and so on (see, for overview, “After Enron, the Deluge,” 2006). The perceptual problem bleeds into the theoretical because the conceptualization of “bureaucracy” in Roman’s piece is based on the stereotype rather than on Max Weber’s neutral ideal-type. As so many authors before me have pointed out, but apparently without success, Weber’s ideal-type cannot, to use Roman’s words, “be held up in practice” (p. 5). It is nothing more nothing less but a theoretical construct to which reality can be compared (see Fry & Raadschelders, 2014, p. 61, footnote 30 for overview of literature between the 1960s and 2000s explaining what an ideal-type is). And, though on a side note, “jurisdictional areas” (p. 5) is not one of the dimensions of Weber’s ideal-type of bureaucracy.

The third problem is the lack of evidentiary support. Somehow it must be possible to “measure” or “show” that this shift from being focused on enhancing efficiency to buffering employees from the environment has indeed taken place. Let us forget about the enormous efforts at performance management and measurement and ask whether this shift has taken place across all bureaucratic (public, private, nonprofit) organizations, or only in public organizations. If there has been such a shift, what have the consequences been? By way of example, the changes in political–administrative institutional arrangements in the decades between 1780 and 1820 and the changes in the scope and range of government service delivery during the 1880-1920 years were huge. People “felt” this “shift” in their time and some considered the theoretical and conceptual meaning in scholarly fashion (e.g., Hegel, de Tocqueville, Max Weber, Emile Durkheim, etc.), others through the means of the novelist (Victor Hugo, Franz Kafka), and yet others even through music (listen to Erik Satie’s Sonatine Bureaucratique). Today, the historical evidence is overwhelming that—indeed—those two periods in recent history have established a public sector for which no historical precedent exists (Raadschelders, 1998, pp. 15-19; 2011). Are we in the midst of changes now that are as monumental as those that unfolded one respectively two centuries ago? The acceleration of information and communication exchanges, for instance, certainly constitutes a significant change in and for society at large. We are living in a global world, where we can know what happens 10,000 miles away in a manner of seconds. But what are the consequences of this for large organizations and for, among these, governmental organizations? And, does the “communication revolution” overhaul the institutional fabric of society and government to the same degree as the Enlightenment (and its emphasis on rationalism) and the American and French Revolutions did toward the end of the 18th century, and the Industrial Revolution did from the end of the 19th? I do not think that the institutional makeup of society and government in the Western world has changed since then but also suggest that we do not yet have sufficient hindsight to determine this; hence, I also do not know whether the telos of bureaucratic organizations has shifted but that argument requires some historical considerations.

This takes me to the fourth problem, which is the lack of historical context, and I will indulge myself and hopefully convince the reader that an argument can be made alternative to the one Roman presents.

It has been argued that rudiments of bureaucratization existed as early as 12,000 to 19,000 years ago, given that at least one archaeological site provides indication of such organizational features as division of labor, hierarchy, and rules regulating operations and behavior (Nystrom & Nystrom, 1998). However, that might be stretching the concept of bureaucracy. These three aspects of organization are not unique to bureaucracy. Common pool resource management systems, as analyzed by Elinor Ostrom and many associates across the globe, are not described as if they are bureaucracies and yet they do exhibit specialization, have hierarchy, and operate on the basis of rules-in-use. Less removed in time, but still before writing became widespread, there is evidence of bureaucracy in the Minoan civilization some 4,000 years ago (Chadwick, 1959). It does not take much imagination (or knowledge, for that matter) to know that as soon as people started to live a sedentary life, mastered agriculture, and came to live in populations rapidly larger than the nomadic hunter–gatherer bands of some 30 to 50 individuals, some type of formal organization was needed to maintain order and control in society. People now started to live in groups large enough that they no longer knew all members of their community. In these artificially created societies, as Bertrand Russell (1931/1962, p. 205) called it (compare with Benedict Anderson’s, 2006, imagined communities), the authority to make binding decisions transferred from the elders of old to more formal political institutions supported by bureaucratic organization. The moment that formal political–administrative institutions emerge in society constitutes a first major shift in the nature of communal and societal interaction.

Those acquiring positions of political authority created organizational structures that could help them monitor and govern “their” jurisdiction. These organizations secured mainly internal order and stability (say: police and justice) and protected the territory against outside aggressors (say: military). Tax agencies collected revenue in kind, labor, and money, to pay for these traditional government services. Let us call these government organizations, bureaucracies. It may well be, in fact, that the first bureaucracies are found in government. Organized religion (e.g., the Catholic Church) copied bureaucratic practices from Roman bureaucracy (Raadschelders, 2002). In craft and industry, this type of organizational structure is not found before the 17th century and really takes off from the middle of the 18th century on (McKendrick, 1961).

Let us assume that it is possible that unconsciously, we still equate bureaucracy with government, because it is governments where they first emerged. It is more important, though, to consider why people think of bureaucracy in pejorative terms: For most of history, bureaucracies served those in power, and bureaucrats used bureaucracy as a means to advance themselves. The anthropological, archeological, and historical literature is replete with examples of societies and their political regimes collapsing when the cost of bureaucracy was higher than its benefit. This point has to be emphasized: For most of history, bureaucracy served as the means of the ruling class to extract resources in labor, kind, and money from a subservient population. They did not exist to provide “services” to people. Social stratification was such that very few people actually had access to political power; the far majority (let us say: 95%) had none. People were subjects. From the emergence of government and bureaucracy millennia ago until the late 18th century, little changed in the nature of relations between government and society.

Some 250 years ago, monumental changes were afoot. The Enlightenment not only raised expectations about the possibility of a scientifically managed society but also advanced the notion that society (and thus, government) could be rationally designed and was malleable. What started as an idea quickly became reality, because designing a new type of government is exactly what happened in the slipstream of the American and French Revolutions. In earlier publications, I mentioned what happened back then in a span of about 40 years: Formal constitutions, separation of church and state, separation of politics from administration, and the separation of public office from officeholder are just a few examples. More importantly, and at least in terms of political theory, no longer were rulers at the top of the social hierarchy but the people. It may have taken some 100+ years to enfranchise the people, but it happened. Historically speaking, the shift from subject to citizen was swift (Weber, 1976). I believe that the 1780-1820 period represents the second main shift in society–government relations.

The third major change started in the second half of the 19th century and was prompted by the combined effects of industrialization, urbanization, and rapid population growth. Societal demand for government services went well beyond the traditional maintenance of order and safety. Governmental involvement in education, health care, environment, housing, utilities, transport, and so on, the list is quite long, was visible and has been measured in terms of personnel growth, and thus, of organizational differentiation, growth of revenue and expenditure, and increasing regulation. And as far as organizational development is concerned, bureaucratization was certainly not limited to the public sector (Whyte, 1956). When we put the enormous changes in government–society relations and in government itself during these two periods (1780-1820, 1880-1920) together, then we can see how vastly different government and society are today from any of their historical predecessors.

It is against this background that I have been thinking about Roman’s argument that the objective of bureaucracy (read: government bureaucracy) has changed. Governments provide a wider range of services than ever before, and despite thoughts about reforming the welfare state, or even thoughts about a “hollowed out” state, a significant decline of government services is just not in the cards. The reason is simple: Government is the only actor left that has the authority to make binding decisions on behalf of the entire population. Libertarians may not like this, but in societies with (hundreds of) millions of people, we simply cannot survive without government. It is exactly because government is the only actor that can make binding decisions for society at large, that it is “stuck” with the “wicked problems” that no other societal actor can or want to (re)solve: Only government has that mandate and authority, and only government can generate the means. What if government bureaucracies seriously embarked upon the quest to “reduce” its size (read: services, unconditionally)? The founding fathers of this country provided the answer: Should the people not be content with their government then they can rebel. Should civil servants, as Roman suggests, increasingly use bureaucracy as a means of “buffering” with less and less attention for service delivery? I suspect that would not be tolerated for long. It would certainly not be tolerated for long should they do so en masse. If anything, though, and we learned this from Goodsell, people are generally quite content with the quality of service delivery. Discontent targets political officeholders who, especially at federal and state levels, seek to manipulate politics to their own advantage. By way of example, does redistricting to “secure” a seat for one or the other party not fly in the face of what democracy—rule by the people—can and ought to be? This rule by the people is, of course, qualified for based in indirect representation. The direct democracy of the village square is past, but people should expect that their vote counts for something.

By way of conclusion, it is nothing short of amazing that governments since the second half of the 19th century have been able to respond to the myriad and very complex societal demands in the way they have. Civil servants in the late 19th century had no historical precedent to fall back on. They had to be innovative in the face of the societal problems (e.g., epidemics, child labor, squalid housing, etc.) created by the “triple whammy” of industrialization, urbanization, and rapid population growth (Stillman, 1998). And they have been able to do so despite operating in a volatile and sometimes even hostile political environment. And civil servants today have to address problems for which there is no historical precedent regarding how to deal with these.

Civil servants are the sergeants in government, and the bureaucracy that they are and have to be (rules not only exist to shield from the environment, they also exist to assure some measure of due process, equality of opportunity, and fairness) still serves society. It is when that stops that we face a breakdown of society. Let me be clear, this is not a blind or naïve endorsement of government. We should keep bureaucrats on their toes and strive for improvements of bureaucracies’ structure and functioning. But then, let us also keep political officeholders accountable by, for instance, considering reforms of the political system.