The Federal Bureaucracy What is it and how

The Federal Bureaucracy: What is it and how is it organized?

Bureaucracy: Definition • The government organizations, usually staffed with officials selected on the basis of experience and expertise, that implement public policy • Hierarchical organization into specialized staffs • Free of political accountability (non-partisan) – Still affected by Congressional budget and oversight • Ideal scenario?

Bureaucracy • What does it do? – From protecting the environment to collecting revenue to regulating the economy – American bureaucracies implement a $2 trillion budget – Vague lines of authority allow some areas of the bureaucracy to operate with a significant amount of autonomy

Growth of the Federal Bureaucracy • 1789 – 50 federal government employees • 2000 – 2. 8 million (excluding military, subcontractors, and consultants who also work for federal government) • Growth mainly at state and local level since 1970 – Federal government began devolving powers and services to state and local government • Total federal, state, local employees – roughly 21 million people

Organization of Bureaucracy • A complex society requires a variety of bureaucratic organizations • Four components of Federal Bureaucracy: – Cabinet departments (State, Defense) – Independent executive agencies (EPA) – Independent regulatory agencies (Federal Reserve Board) – Government organizations (USPS, FDIC, TVA)

Staffing the Bureaucracy • Natural Aristocracy – Thomas Jefferson fired Federalist employees and placed his own men in government positions • Spoils System – Andrew Jackson used government positions to reward supporters – Bureaucracy became corrupt, bloated, and inefficient

Civil Service Reform • Pendleton Act of 1883 – Employment on the basis of merit and open, competitive exams – Civil Service Commission to administer the personnel service • Hatch Act of 1939 – Civil service employees cannot take an active party in the political management of campaigns • Rutan v. Republican Party of Illinios (1990) – Court ruled that partisan political considerations as the basis for hiring, promoting, or transferring public employees was illegal

Political Control of Bureaucracy • Who should control the bureaucracy? – Bureaucracy should be responsive to elected officials (Congress, the President) • Members of the bureaucracy are not elected, and must be held accountable for their actions • Making them responsive to elected officials give the public a voice in bureaucratic operations – The bureaucracy should be free from political pressures • They should be autonomous

Theories of Bureaucratic Politics • Politics-Administration Dichotomy – Bureaucracy should be free of politics • Iron Triangles – Interest groups – Congressional subcommittees – Bureaucratic agencies • Issue Networks • Principal-Agent Model

Politics-Administration Dichotomy • Wilson: Bureaucracy is neutral and not political – Bureaucrats are experts in their specialties and must be left alone to do their job without political interference • However, people began to realize that politics and administration were NOT separate – Norton Long: “Power is the lifeblood of administration”

Iron Triangles • Reinforcing relationship between: – Interest Groups – Congressional Subcommittees – Bureaucratic agencies • Policy decisions are made jointly by these three groups who feed off each other to develop and maintain long-term, regularized relationships

Issue Networks • The relationship between bureaucracy is not as rigid as iron triangle theory would have us believe – Also, more than three actors involved in process • For every issue, there also a number of political elites who are involved (and who know each other via the issue) – Members of Congress, congressional committees, the president, advocacy groups, and “issue watchers” (like academics or highly interested citizens)

Principal-Agent Model • Who are principals, who are agents? • Principals and agents both seek to maximize their interests – Principals want to control bureaucracy – Agents want to have the least amount of control exerted over it • To keep agents in check, two possibilities: – Monitoring/oversight – Minimizing goal conflict