POLS 015B Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Manhattan Project, Likey, Muckraker
4 Jun 2018
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(after the midterm)
The Bureaucracy 1
Modest Beginnings:
The constitution said little about how the executive would be organized
From the beginning, congress was wary of delegating too much power to the executive but
realized the impracticality of delegating too little.
During early Federalist period, the informal custom was that civil served their tenure during good
behavior.
● Rarely were they dismissed
Democratization and the Spoils System
● Jackson= rotation in office,
○ Officials would serve in positions for a short, fixed period
● Thus democratization of the civil service was also motivated by pragmatic politics
○ Spoils the system
Max weber and bureaucracy:
The model bureaucracy is a purposive machine with interchangeable human parts designed to
facilitate collective action
According to Max:
● Hierarchical structure of authority in which commands trickel
● Division of labor
● Consistent set of abstract ruled regarding what is meant to be done and who is to do it
● A career system with appointment and advancement by demonstrated merit
● Specified goals towards which the collective action is aimed
Civil service Reform
The principles of rotation ( the spoils system) did not allow for the development of government
service as a career with job security and advancement based on merit
Needed experts not amateurs:
● Most dramatic incident: exposure of the Whiskey Ring
● Pres. Garfield was assassinated in 1881 by a demented job seeker incensed at having
lost a chance for a patronage appointment
● Revulsion against the spoils system led to the passage of the Pendleton ACt in 1883
The civil service Reform
● Jobs were given by merit
● The bureaucracy was professionalized and many bureaucrats remained even as political
administrations came and went
● The bureaucracy become more professional, less corrupt and more stable
Career Civil service led to its own agency problems:
● Career bureaucrats developed their own personal and institutional interests, and often
acted on them
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
● Their expertise in procedures and policy domains could shield their actions from outside
oversight by their principles
● Principal Agent Issue-info asymmetry
○ Civil servants (agents)
■ Might have access to info no available to the government
Expanding government
● While how the bureaucracy operated changed dramatically, what it did changed little:
○ Collecting duties and taxes
○ Delivering the mail
○
Expanding the government:
● The departments of agriculture (1889) Labor (1903) and Commerce (1903) represented
new types of government agency altogether
○ Unlike existing departments
○ These agencies serve their clientele by gathering and disseminating info such as:
■ Statistics and info on new products.
The Bureaucracy II
Why do people hate “red tape”?
What is an Iron Triangle?
The department of Homeland Security:
Formed after 9/11 which should bring under all the org. Under one roof
→ combination of 22 agencies
→ Whas the most far-reaching gov. Reorganization since the formation of the Department of
Defense
Non-cabinet Agencies
The expansion of the federal government has not been confined to cabinet level executive
departments
Independent Executive Agencies:
→EX: Social Security Administration
→ The independent executive agencies as organization look much like the divisions within
regular executive departments
Independent regulatory commissions:
→ Independent regulatory commissions are designed to maintain their independence from the
president and the executive departments
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
→ A major reason for delegating authority to an independent agencies is to avoid directly
responsibility for unpopular decisions
→ Typically deal with issues wherein we want to totally prevent political involvement is possible
The Hallow State:
Many federal programs are administered by someone else
→ Primarily the states
When Successful:
These alliances become iron triangles: Narrowly focused sub-governments controlling policy in
their domains- out of sight or oversight of the full congress, the president and the public
Iron Triangles and Captured Agencies:
Allows the regulators to be “captured” by the very interests they were instituted to regulate
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
The constitution said little about how the executive would be organized. From the beginning, congress was wary of delegating too much power to the executive but realized the impracticality of delegating too little. During early federalist period, the informal custom was that civil served their tenure during good behavior. Officials would serve in positions for a short, fixed period. Thus democratization of the civil service was also motivated by pragmatic politics. The model bureaucracy is a purposive machine with interchangeable human parts designed to facilitate collective action. Hierarchical structure of authority in which commands trickel. Consistent set of abstract ruled regarding what is meant to be done and who is to do it. A career system with appointment and advancement by demonstrated merit. Specified goals towards which the collective action is aimed. The principles of rotation ( the spoils system) did not allow for the development of government service as a career with job security and advancement based on merit.
