A discussion of many aspects of bureaucracy in China including defining 'bureaucrat', levels of bureaucratic power, bargaining and the friction between center and local government within the bureaucratic process.
2,855 words (approx. 11.4 pages), 7 sources, 2001, $ 84.95
Abstract This paper identifies what a bureaucrat is, and the levels under which they are classified in China. It illustrates the levels of bureaucratic power, their status at each level, and what is involved in the fluctuation of their status. Bargaining is discussed and revealed as one of the key components of the bureaucratic process in China. The paper also looks at the friction between center and local government within the bureaucratic process, and with the help of two case studies, cites clear examples of what challenges are faced by those leading the way in China's political horizon.
From the Paper "Bureaucratic politics in China is a unique process, under which lies a webbing of bureaucratic levels, status variation and bargaining; each contributing to its unparalleled complexity."
Abstract The paper reviews the situation in sub-Saharan Africa, Bangladesh and illustrates the consequences of bureaucratic corruption. The paper shows how this results in poverty and in the growth of the country's economy being greatly deterred. The paper concludes that a bureaucratic system that is not corrupt has much to offer a country, while a corrupt bureaucracy drains the country of growth potential and hope.
Outline:
Objective
Introduction
Sub-Saharan Africa Bureaucratic Corruption
Blackburn and Forgues-Puccio
Results of Bureaucratic Corruption in Bangladesh
Empirical Studies
Summary and Conclusion
From the Paper "In the Nigerian Village Square article entitled: "The Effects of Bureaucratic Corruption on Economic Development: The Case of Sub-Saharan Africa" examined are "the incidence and causes of bureaucratic corruption in Sub-Saharan Africa" and the results or consequences on "economic development" in that area of Africa. Stated to be results of that corruption are "underdeveloped human and natural resources, extremely low levels of productivity, inability to attract and sustain direct foreign investment, continuous mismatch of capital and needs, and deplorable infrastructures. (Klitgaard, 1990; as cited by Ifediora, 2005)"
Abstract This paper argues that Weber understood the threat posed by bureaucratic power much better than Wilson. This is because he perceived the damage that bureaucratization would do to the democratic process. Individualism and true democratic choice would have to be sacrificed in a society that worshipped the mass organization.
Abstract This paper identifies the criteria of bureaucratic politics in respect to the current presidential administration and the politics of timber and oil harvesting, where the past business connections of George W. Bush and his cabinet reflect bureaucratic politics rather than policy created for the benefit of the general public
Abstract This paper analyzes the book written by Scott Gates and John O. Brehm, "Working, Shirking and Sabotage", and examines the factors that influences decisions made by bureaucrats. The paper contends that street-level bureaucratic decisions to work, shirk, or sabotage are based upon personal beliefs, the influence of peers pressure, the attitudes towards clients, and the nature of the specific jobs they are hired to perform.
From the Paper "In their book, Working, Shirking, and Sabotage: Bureaucratic Response to a Democratic Public, Scott Gates and John O. Brehm examine the factors that influences decisions made by bureaucrats. The authors argue that supervisors are essentially ineffectual in influencing the behaviors and attitudes of street-level bureaucrats. Instead, the decisions of street-level bureaucrats are influenced by their own beliefs, and by the peer pressure exerted by other bureaucrats. This contrasts significantly with earlier principal-agency models used to explain bureaucratic behavior which argued that supervisors significantly influenced bureaucratic behavior."
Abstract In this paper, the writer shows that Michael Lipsky identifies the primary area in which government bureaucrats have discretionary decision-making power. The writer looks at the processes upon which bureaucratic decision-making is heavily reliant.
From the Paper "In his analysis, Michael Lipsky identifies the primary area in which government bureaucrats have discretionary decision-making power. Bureaucrats exercise discretion in decisions about citizens with whom they interact. Over time the sum total of the exercise of this discretion and the decisions made by these bureaucrats becomes the agency's culture or behavior. Both Lipsky's and Brehm Gates' analysis demonstrates that bureaucratic decision-making processes are heavily reliant on two important factors. First bureaucratic decision making is dependent on the way supervisors filter agency policy down to subordinates. Second ... "
An in-depth analysis of the bureaucratic systems of government service operations and the benefits of restructuring the existing system of bureaucracy.
Abstract This paper reports that even though bureaucracy gives an impression of governmental departments like taxation, and welfare, it is actually found in almost every public spheres. Corporations, churches, the military, labor and trade unions, community centers, schools, hospitals all are essentially facilitated by certain bureaucratic components. Most people take them as important part of their lives, though not readily. However the best part of bureaucracy is that it provides a set of rules and procedures to set everything running in a proper order, transparently, and also ensures consistency and fairness acceptable to all. This paper focuses on evaluating the organizational and power structures while emphasizing the need for refurbishing Human Service Organization in Australia on the lines of bureaucratic organizations.
Introduction
Background
The Bureaucracy - Pros and Cons
The Power
Bureaucracy Concerns
Components of an Organization
Restructuring and Reengineering
Conclusion
From the Paper "One of the major administrative foundations for the creation of bureaucracy is the exception principle. Therein only important and complex problems reach the higher ups while trivial routine issues are solved by the people in the lower levels. Programmed decisions are implemented automatically in accordance with the predefined operating procedures and the unusual problems requiring major decisions are routed to the top. This should make the hierarchy more effective. However there are problems related to the delegation and motivation in bureaucracy; delegating authority and power is not an easy task. It requires immense confidence in sub-ordinates and an immaculate efficacy of the system."
Abstract The paper weights each of Graham T. Allison's three conceptual models against the decision to go to war in Iraq in 2003 in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the models. The paper explains the rational policy model, the organizational processes model and the bureaucratic politics model. The paper concludes that because the war is a subject of such recent history, and a variety of debates exist as to its actual cause, the conceptual models prove extremely useful in organizing and evaluating many of the war's proposed motivations. The writer of the paper therefore is of the view that although they were conceived over three decades ago, Allison's conceptual models remain relevant to today's foreign policy world.
Outline:
Introduction
Rational Policy Model
Organizational Processes Model
Bureaucratic Politics Model
Evaluation and Conclusion
From the Paper "In 1969, Harvard University's Graham T. Allison revolutionized foreign policy with his American Political Science Review article, "Conceptual Models and the Cuban Missile Crisis," creating three theoretical models that are still widely references in international relations theory today: Rational Policy Model, Organizational Process Model, and Bureaucratic Politics Model. While some have heeded the models as infallible, others have suggested their need for reconditioning. In their 1992 study, Jonathan Bendor of Stanford University and Thomas H. Hammond of Michigan State University found that "the models require substantial reformation" by subjecting them to a "systematic critical analysis" (301). Other scholars, like Andrew Farkas, have considered one of Allison's models--in his case Rational Actor Model--and critiqued the model based on other factors, such as psychological data (343)."
Discussion of the Holocaust centering on Hannah Arendt's "Eichmann in Jerusalem" examining both age old anti-Semitism in Germany and the banality or ordinariness of Hitler's bureaucratized system of annihilation.
1,535 words (approx. 6.1 pages), 3 sources, 2002, $ 50.95
Abstract This paper is based on Hannah Arendt's "Eichmann in Jerusalem". It discusses two views of the Holocaust: one that the perpetrators were Germans nurtured on a centuries old anti-Semitism tradition; and another that the perpetrators were ordinary people, caught up in a bureaucratized system of annihilation that encouraged unthinking complicity that made this evil seem banal or ordinary because everyone was going along with it. That these two views are easily reconciled is the thesis of the paper. Elie Wiesel's "Night" and Michael Dobkowski's "Genocide and The Modern Age" are used to supplement discussion of Arendt's treatment of the trial of Adolf Eichmann.
From the Paper "It is true that the Holocaust was perpetrated by Germans with a long history of pervasive inhumane anti-Semitic views. It is also valid to say that the Holocaust was facilitated by banal acceptance of a bureaucratized system of annihilation. With centuries of hatred, and barbarous treatment of Jews as precedent, it was easy for the Germans to move on to state sanctioned systematized slaughter. Those whose upbringing had taught them to hate Jews, might move quickly into positions of power in the Third Reich. Others who weren?t capable of thinking for themselves, saw everyone else, including those they respected and admired supporting Hitler's answers to the Jewish question. A long tradition of anti-Semitism joined with unthinking complicity to escalate the banality of evil. As evil progressed through stages of classification, ghettoization, deportation, and concentration to eradication, it was just another step in the progression of dehumanization for those who had forgotten the unity of the human community."
Abstract This essay discusses the reasons why Rome and Byzantium are linked together despite their great differences. The author explains the involvement of the Catholic Church in Byzantium.
From the Paper "This period was one of significant social and economic growth in Western Europe that was to some extent independent of the Crusades and to some extent caused by them. The religious and political effects of the Crusades on Europe can never be separated from each other. The Crusades tended to increase the power and prestige of Rome and the West while also making the West less parochial, so that by the end of the Crusades it might claim both Western power and Eastern knowledge, leaving Constantinople with little to call its own.
"The Crusades were one of the forces that increased contacts between Christian Western Europeans and both Muslims and Jews. Although it is a little difficult for us to believe this now, Jews actually were instrumental in helping the West to understand and appreciate Islam. Jewish thinkers often helped to transfer and explain the intellectual achievements of the Islamic world to Christendom, often creating a syncretistic blend of both Judaism and Islam. This introduction mostly as a result of the Crusades of Eastern philosophies into Europe was quickly seen as threatening and was met by a terrible backlash in the form of the Inquisition (created in 1231), which was a powerful religious institution designed to enforce religious and political unity. While at first it was turned against only Jews and Muslims along with those suspected of such heresies as witchcraft, in its later years it was also used to combat Protestantism."
This paper outlines the extent of bureaucratic complicity in the Holocaust, and attempts to explain why German civil servants, instead of obstructing the extermination process, only exerted themselves to ensure its success.
Abstract The following paper examines the extent of bureaucratic participation in the final solution in the Second World War in Germany. The second part of this paper seeks to identify the state of mind of German civil servants, which turned pen pushers, technocrats and professionals into earnest, but remote, agents of mass murder.
From the Paper "Reflection on the Holocaust invariably dwells on the subject of how it could have happened. This is, however, a dual question. In the first respect, it concerns the mechanical means by which the final solution was implemented, that is, the ways in which Jews and others were defined as destined for the death camps, physically identified, gathered for transportation to a relocation center, transported to the camps, processed upon arrival at the camps, murdered, and their bodies and belongings finally disposed of. Since it is almost inconceivable how such an operation could have been performed by people in dispassionate frames of mind - although it must have been, since it is impossible to kill so many as six million people in episodic fits of murderous rage - the question involves a second dimension, which is the nature of the mentality of those who participated, both directly and indirectly, in the extermination process."
Abstract This paper reviews the novel "The Ivankiad", by Vladimir Voinovich. A synopsis of the novel is given, highlighting how the plot illustrates the faults inherent in any bureaucratic system. An analogy about territorial claims is analyzed and the author's skillful use of humor, sarcasm, and satire to convey his feelings on his personal experiences is raised. Insights into human character and interpersonal relationships is also explored.
From the Paper "The Ivankiad is Vladimir Voinovich's semi-autobiographical, satirical novel about Soviet bureaucracy and interpersonal politics. Voinovich as the protagonist is a writer living in the Moscow Writers? Housing Cooperative, a profession-centered collective. When a member of the co-op moves to Israel, his empty apartment becomes the object of personal and political struggle. Voinovich, already hardened by the foibles of the soviet system, further exposes these bureaucratic improprieties to the peripheral characters as well as to the readers of the Ivankiad. The author does so with aplomb and good humor, never waxing bitter even in the face of these frustrations. Because no culture is immune to governmental deficiencies and corruption and because bribery and extortion are human, not Russian traits, all readers can relate to the Ivankiad. In fact, Voinovich deliberately makes references to American culture to emphasize parallels between the two societies"
Abstract This paper examines the social ramifications of police corruption as a suitable topic for investigation. It describes that numerous studies demonstrate that police corruption continues to be a significant issue in contemporary society. The author writes that integrity and social order go hand in hand, but human behavior can demean even the powers that be, e.g. police officers. The paper states that power can be a weapon and even among the law-abiding can be misused and abused. The paper analyzes the two types of corruption that are identified: monetary and bureaucratic corruption.
From the Paper "Since in any corrupt action the prospect, on the part of at least two actors, of a (personally defined) success of the interaction is what motivates the exchange to be undertaken, corruption is an attribute of a type of interaction. In corruption two or more people are involved who anticipate a successful outcome of the exchange relation. Since corruption involves at least one corrupter and one corruptee, it is the type of social action undertaken that constitutes corruption. This remark may seem rather superfluous. It is however important to keep in mind that corruption denotes a type of exchange relation because it explains one of its typical features in comparison with other (instrumental) illegal acts. Corruption is not a matter of 'partners in crime' but of 'criminal partnership' vis-?-vis a legal regulation of interaction. Consequently, the negative (victimization) effects of corruption are largely indirect. The victim of the corrupt interaction is often unaware of the harm done to him/her. However real the victimization as a result of corruption, it does usually not present itself immediately to the victim, but results 'secretly' in a loss of money or power (and is therefore often a source of fierce condemnation after the victimization has been revealed)."
From the Paper "Introduction
In The Bureaucratic Experience, Ralph Hummel is concerned with the human condition in today's environment. Hummel focuses on how humans behave in organizations, and, in turn, how those organizations shape them, but his emphasis is on the human condition as a whole, and he cites "experts" as diverse as Freud and Heidegger throughout the text. Hummel uses citations similar to those found in scholarly articles and books, but his writing includes more anecdotes than would typically be found in a strictly scholarly approach to the topic. At the same time, he has provided the research to support his ideas, and has done so in a rigorous manner; these two apparently contradictory factors may have contribute to a lack of acceptance of the work in either popular or scholastic circles. Hummel presents five different themes: modernity, bureau.."
Abstract The paper discusses how Loeb provides psychological advice in order to prepare people who are considering starting some volunteer work in the community. It shows how the bureaucratic system does not prepare one for the effects of volunteering and does not make it very easy for someone willing to give of their time and self.
From the Paper "To read or to write about something is not the same as to live it, in real experience and real time and space. Reading about volunteering is not the same thing as actually becoming a part of an experience and an experiment in community and giving of one's time, sweat, and soul. According to the text Paul Rogat Loeb's book, Soul of a Citizen, to serve one's community as a volunteer is to participate in something larger than one's self that permanently enriches the mind and the soul of the individual. The central theme of Loeb's book is that one is only truly fulfilled being part of a larger whole, fulfilling both personal ideals and individual ideals with an eye towards a greater goal of social change. In one's lived experience as a volunteer, one may find this kind fulfillment in service. But Loeb's words exist as a motivational bridge, rather than a blueprint for wider change to address the inequities of a bureaucratic system."
