GOVT2305: Federal Government
Lecture 12: The Bureaucracy

Bureacracy: Introduction

Bureaucracy

Bureacracy: Questions about the Bureaucracy

• What is Bureaucracy?
• Is bureaucracy necessary?
• Is bureaucracy efficient?
• How does the bureaucracy work?
• Who controls the bureaucracy?
• What are the dangers of bureaucracy?

What is Bureaucracy?

• Definition: A system of government in which most of the important decisions are made by career professionals rather than by elected representatives.

• Characteristics:

    - Hierarchical structure
    - Specialization
    - Rules and procedures
    - Impersonality
    - Expertise

• Purpose: Implementation, service provision, accountability.

Bureaucracy in the Constitution

• Constitutional Foundations

    - The word is never mentioned
    - Article II: President's power to appoint officers and to require reports from them. 
    - Political appointment was assumed

Origins and Evolution

• Key periods of growth and change.

    - Early Republic: Small, limited bureaucracy.
    - Civil War and Reconstruction: Expansion of federal agencies.
    - Progressive Era: Creation of regulatory agencies.
    - New Deal: Massive growth in response to the Great Depression.
    - Post-WWII: Continued expansion and specialization.
    - Modern Era: Focus on efficiency, accountability, and reform.

Who Does the Bureaucracy Answer To?

• Political appointees (~4,000; ~1,200 with Senate confirmation)
• Civil Service System (over 2 million employees)

Who Does the Bureaucracy Answer To?

Political appointees

    - President
    - Cabinet Secretaries
    - Agency heads
    - Political appointees are responsible for setting policy and direction.
    - They are also responsible for oversight and accountability.
    - They are not responsible for day-to-day operations.
    

Who Does the Bureaucracy Answer To?

• Civil service system

    - grew as reaction to 1800s spoils system
    - nonpartisan
    - professional
    - career employees
    - protected from political influence, firing for political reasons
    - merit-based hiring and promotion
    - Hatch Act: limits political activities of civil servants
    - Whistleblower protections

Question

Given that civil service appointees are exempt from firing or discipline for policy disagreements, how does this fit with the idea of the elected President as the head of the executive branch?

Bureaucracy and the Executive Branch

• Cabinet Departments: 15 Cabinet departments, each headed by a Secretary (or the Attorney General for Justice Department)
• Independent Agencies: Unique nature and relationship to the President.

Cabinet Departments

Cabinet Departments

Cabinet Departments: Structure Example

Labor Department

http://www.netage.com/economics/gov/catalog-org-charts.html

Independent Agencies

• Independent Executive Agencies
• Independent Regulatory Commissions
• Government Corporations

Independent Executive Agencies

• Part of the executive branch.
• Subject to (some) Presidential control
• Similar to Cabinet Departments (civil service rules, etc.)

Independent Executive Agencies: Examples

Independent Regulatory Commissions

• Created by Congress to regulate specific areas of the economy or society.
• independent of the executive branch
• Bipartisan boards or commissions
• Often have quasi-judicial powers
• Quasi-legislative powers

Independent Regulatory Commissions: Examples

Government Corporations

• Created by Congress to provide a service or product that could be provided by the private sector.
• Operate like a business
• Subject to some Presidential control

Government Corporations: Examples

Question

How do the independent agencies, commissions and government corporations fit in the Constitutional structure of three branches of government? Consider separation of powers and checks and balances.

Three Branches

Question

Given that independent agencies typically can’t be removed for political reasons, how does this fit with the ideals of democracy and accountability to voters?

Authorship and License

Cover image created with Imagen 3.0, part of Google’s Gemini.

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• Author: Tom Hanna

• Website: tomhanna.me

• License: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.