Chapter 5

BUREAUCRACY, THE CIVIL SERVICE, AND PERSONNEL ADMINISTRATION

Nature and Thrust of Bureaucracy

Literally, bureaucracy would stand for 'rule by officials'. The word bureau came from the old French term, meaning a broad
cloth used to mantle a desk or an agency. Kratos (from the suffix, 'cracy') as additional word to it is a Greek origin, meaning to
rule. These days, it is understood that bureaucracy refers to the salaried officials who conduct the business and intricacies of
government (and the private sector) advising on, and applying to, policy decisions.

While the term has been understood in a variety of contexts, the most popular meaning it evokes is that it is attached to
bureaucratic organizations. Bureaucracy as an art of governance may be understood as the administrative machinery of the
state: staffed by public officials (rank) and civil servants (file). When we talk about bureaucracy, it is ideally an organizational
structure with a rationalized system (Weber) man- dated to bring about efficiency and effectiveness in the achievement of a
policy goal or in administering provisions of social services to the people.

Bureaucracy then is the skeletal framework of any large organization, for the purpose of this study it is viewed as the working
force behind the government. Bureaucracy is just one institution, yet a very essential mechanism of public administration.
Lazo (2009) stressed to add its importance in this wise:

The more efficient way of organizing public administration was first used in appointments for procurement officers with the
French and Prussian armies in the 18th century and early 19th century. It demonstrated its usefulness in this area and spread
rapidly. In the United States, the coming of bureaucratic mode was embodied in the move for civil service reform at the turn of
the century which eventually took most administrative positions out of the party control, and based them on competitive civil
service examinations. By World War II, some form or another of bureaucracy was the usual method of organizing public
administration throughout Europe and North America. As new states attained their independence, they so generally adopted
some form of bureaucracy. It is today the usual mode of administrative organization throughout the world, although there are
many variations on its general theme. (p. 214)

Weber's Bureaucracy

For Max Weber, the state is a "human community that claims the monopoly of legitimate use of physical force within a given
territory." He argued that the state is really a relation of men dominating men supported by means of legitimate force, and
that through this, the state presides over a situation in which the dominance of some prevails over the others. This
dominance, however, is "the consequence of the competition to gain power" within the context of legitimacy. In discussing
the concept of legitimacy, he identified three modes of authority by which domination is engendered: through traditional
authority, charismatic domination by a leader, and domination by a rational-legal authority chosen on the basis of rules.

1. Traditional Authority: It is the legitimized power that emanates from existing past and present customs and traditions and
by dominant religious and social institutions. The authority is vested on the person because of his ascribed qualities like
birthright, age, and sex (Thompson and Hickey, 1996 in Schaefer, 2005). An example of this authority is the King or Queen, or
Monarch.

2. Charismatic Authority: It is the legitimized power due to personal charm and emotional appeal to people. This authority
makes people obey without question because of the magnetic and overwhelming appeal of a person that generates
enthusiasm, loyalty, and blind obedience to the figure of authority. A government built on this type of authority is very
unstable and highly volatile because the death or change of leadership can mean a change in the form of governance
(Thompson and Hickey, 1996; Kendall, 2004 in Schaefer, 2005).

3. Legal-Rational Authority: It is the legitimized power vested by a bureaucratic organization that defines policies regarding
who shall exercise power, the extent of the power, and how it will be exercised. It is vested on the person who is either
appointed or elected because of his superior knowledge, specialized training and expertise (Thompson and Hickey, 1996 in
Kendall, 2004:411-412). Presidents and Prime Ministers assume office upon election, and the position they take yields
authority.

Weber expressed its preference with the last form of authority, which he referred to as the pure or ideal type. In this form, he
prescribed a bureaucratic organization to be the most logical and efficient mechanism by which a rational legal type of leader-
ship can be supported.¹

To classic scholars, Gerth and Mills, they argued that in Weber's model, bureaucracy is essentially a modern creation which
belongs to the legal-rational type of authority and is the most technically advanced form of organization, expressing "the
highest degree of efficiency" and, in that sense, it is "the most rational means for carrying out imperative control of human
beings." Thus, they then provided chief features and characteristics of Weberian bureaucratic model:

It is hierarchical in structure, based on strict adherence to rules and regulations, impersonal on its behavioral side, with official
documents and files providing the necessary permanence and continuity. There is also security of tenure, promotion based
seniority or merit; and positions are held on a full-time basis.

Weber, a German sociologist, was perhaps the most influential figure in propagating an ideal bureaucratic thesis which
continued to influence modern day bureaucracies. To Weber, he viewed bureaucracy as a unique form of organization found
not just in government but also in all aspects of human organizations in a society. Weber conceived of bureaucracy as a
structured hierarchy in which salaried officials reached rational decisions by applying explicit rules to the facts before them.
For him, bureaucracy is an ideal type. He pointed out a set of principles that should characterize bureaucratic organizations:

1. There is a firmly ordered hierarchy that ensures that lower offices are supervised by specified higher ones within a chain of
command;
2. Each office has its own area of expertise, specialization or competence;
3. Authority is impersonal vested in rules that govern official business. Decisions are reached by methodically applying runs
to particular cases, where private motives are impertinent;
4. People are recruited to serve in the bureaucracy on the basis of merits and fitness;
5. Bureaucratic rules are strict enough to regulate personal discretion;
6. The office in the bureaucracy is considered a public trust; and
7. Civil servants are salaried employees according to rank.

It is to be stressed that Weber's central idea was the bureaucracy made administration more efficient and rational; further, he
believed that it was the means by which modern industrial efficiency could be brought to bear on civil affairs.3 For Weber, the
ideal bureau was a fine piece of administrative machinery. But like many modern devices, bureaucracy brought the risks of
dominating its supposed masters. Weber's contribution was therefore to pose a question of relationship between bureaucracy
and democracy, an issue that agitated much discussion about bureaucracy in the 20th century politics.

In Weber's view, the growth of bureaucratization was further stimulated by the pressures of democratization, which resulted
in the weakening of ideas of tradition and privilege, and replaced them with a belief in an open competition and meritocracy.
He believed that the process of rationalization would ensure that all industrial societies, whether nominally capitalist or
communist, would increasingly resemble each other as they adopted bureaucratic form of administration.*

Development of Bureaucratic Thoughts

There are at least three treatises concerning bureaucratic schools of thoughts, which are: the Liberal or Rational
Administrative Thought; the Conservative or Power Block Thought; and the New Right or Government Oversupply Thought.
Liberal or Rational Administrative Thought criticizes bureaucracy for its lack of accountability and openness. Marxist discourses
criticized bureaucracy as an apparatus of class sub- ordination and the New Right theorist viewed bureaucracy as an innately
inefficient and self-serving organization.

Liberal or Rational Administrative Thought

The inner characteristic of Weberian bureaucratic model is rationality in view of the fact that bureaucratization manifests
effective, efficient and predictable social organization. Organizational efficiency would be achieved through professional civil
service, one that is responsive and neutral in dealing with its administrative functions. Bureaucratization strengthens
hierarchical authority since directives and commands would be exercised from the top management rather than from the
masses. In short, rational administrative thought served a highly stratified authoritarian society. But the Weberian model has
also its potential danger as cited by Heywood (2001):

The domination of the bureaucratic ideal could bring about a "pigeon-holding of the spirit" as the social environment become
increasingly depersonalized and mechanical. Reason and bureaucracy could therefore become "iron cage" confining human
passions and individual freedoms.

Furthermore, anyone who understands and works in Weberian bureaucracy could realize that such model is not at
all'impersonal or predictable the way Weber proposed his ideal model. "Bureaucrats are psychological beings and seldom act
in the sterile manner implied by Weber. In a bureaucracy, as in other organizations, improvisation, informality and
entrepreneurship in the dision-making process are common."6

Some political scientists argued that bureaucratic agencies are fast becoming pressure groups themselves. Far from being
neutral and passive administrators, bureaucrats are active participants in the formation of laws and policies. Elected and
appointed executives are often entirely dependent on the data and advice that career civil servants provide. Leaders, in effect,
become followers. Civil servants frequently lobby legislators to get the programs they want. It is a fact that it is too difficult to
con- trol and manage bureaucracy ideally regardless of where it is observed and practiced. That is the reason why bureaucracy
often connotes a negative term.

Conservative or Power Block Thought

Power Block Thought is a socialist discourse, particularly Marxism. Karl Marx has not defined his thesis on bureaucracy the way
Weber propagated his bureaucratic theory. To Marx, bureaucracy is somewhat associated to the specific requirement of
capitalism. He sees bureaucracy as an instrument through which the bourgeoisies' interest is promoted on one hand, and the
capitalist system defended on the other hand. The view of bureaucracy is rather conservative. As Ralp Miliban, a neo-Marxist,
puts it:

Top civil servants are conservative in the sense they are within their elected sphere, the conscious and unconscious allies of
existing economic and social elites. This happens for a number of reasons. Most obviously despite the formal requirements of
political neutrality, top civil servants share the same educational and social background as industrialists and business
managers, and are therefore likely to share their ideas, prejudices and general outlook. The possibility that rising civil servants
may harbor radical or socialist sympathies is also encountered by recruit- ment and promotion procedures designed to ensure
their ideological soundness (Heywood, 2001:360).

The failure perhaps of Marxist conception about bureaucracy is that it regards the problem of bureaucratization in socialist
states in a minimum consideration. For Marx and Engels, "this problem was effectively discounted by the assumption that the
bureaucracy, with the state, would wither away as a classless, communist society came into existence." This left Marxism open
to criticism by social scientists such as Weber and Michels who argued that bureaucracy is a broader social phenomenon, and
one that socialist emphasizes on common ownership and planning could only strengthen it. The experience of the 20th
century communism made it impossible for Marxist thinkers to continue ignoring this problem.

In the past capitalist bureaucracy, the name Leon Trotsky emerged as the most influential Marxist analyst. He believed that
bureaucracy as a social stratum could be removed by political revolution. In his book, The Revolution Betrayed, he lamented a
bureaucratic problem? "... a combination of Russian backwardness and the proletariat's lack of political sophistication had
created conditions in which the state bureaucracy could expand and block further advances towards socialism. The Stalinist
dictatorship was thus merely the political expression of these dominant bureaucratic interests, entirely cut off from those of
the masses..."

For Milovan Djilas, "the power of the bureaucracy in Orthodox communist regimes stemmed from its control of productive
wealth, and this meant that communist social systems increasingly resembled a form of state capitalism."
New Right or Government Oversupply Thought

The emergence of rational choice and public choice theory ushered in a new un- derstanding and concept of bureaucracy
based on the sightings of the New Right theo- rists. They believed that bureaucracy was simply inefficient and overly self-
serving. As Heywood (2002) conceptualized public choice theory in this respect:

Public choice theory is a sub-field of rational choice theory, based on the assumptions of neoclassical economics. Its central
assertion is that political issues are best analyzed by examining the behavior of individuals understood as rationally self-
interested actors. The "public" character of public choice theory stems from its concern with the provision of so-called public
goods, goods that are delivered by government rather than the market, because (as with clean air) their benefit can- not be
withheld from individuals who choose not to contribute to their provision. Public choice theorists have generally highlighted
the failures and defects of government in this respect, focusing on issues such as the impact of the bureaucracy on the policy
process and the consequences of lobbying and interest-group politics. (p. 276)

Meanwhile, rational choice theory postulates an individual as an abstract model. It purports to overestimate human rationality
in that it ignores the fact that people seldom possess a clear set of preferred goals and rarely make decisions in the light of full
and accurate knowledge. Thus, leaving the government to assume and presume what is best left for the constituencies to
content with. (Lazo, 2009:17) William Niskanen argued that senior bureaucrats regardless of their image as public servants are
primarily motivated by career self-interest and thus, seek an expansion of the agency in which they work and an increase in its
budget. This is because

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