Bureaucracy and Development Administration

Bureaucracy and Development Administration

"This page is Intentionally Left Blank"

BUREAUCRACY AND DEVEWPMENf

ADMINISTRATION

Dr. (Mrs.) S.L. Das

SWASTIK

SWASTIK PUBLICATIONS DELHI (India)

BUREAUCRA.CY AND DEVEWPMENT ADMINISTRATION

© Reserved

First Published 2010 ISBN-978-93-80 1~8-1 0-7

[No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the publisher.)

Published in India by

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Preface

Bureaucracy represents political organisation, reflecting its very system and its philosophy. It might well be one of the most important if not the most important criteria against which examination of the political organisation could be made. Also, it could serve to examine "politics in action" or in other words political change. While some of the inherent characteristics of bureaucracy would be its political orientation, it does not automatically go the other way around. That is, it would not be necessary that bureaucratic phenomena should characterise every political organisation. It seems, however, highly likely that they would play an important role in political change. In many cases they would reflect the motivational drives of the political organisation and its structural restraints. Most bureaucracy promises new forms of strategic action which will assume a more creative and open form. Comment on hybrid political regimes and democratic hierarchies is centred on the long-standing question of how organisations combine centralised control and co-ordination of resources with the need for more flexible forms. The notion of organisational hybridity has a particular relevance for public sector organisations, where calls to reduce bureaucracy have been manifested in attempts to simulate market disciplines within the organisation. Two aspects of the post bureaucracy debate are of particular significance for the present study.

Bureaucracy is not as many critics assume a simple singularity. Rather, whatever singularity it is deemed to possess is multiple, not monolithic to be more precise bureaucracy has turned out to be less a hard and fast transhistorical model, but rather what we may describe as a many sided, evolving, diversified organizational device.

-Dr. (Mrs.) S.L. Das

Contents

1. 2. 3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14.

Preface v 1 Bureaucracy, Organisation & Political Change The Management of Change at the Bureaucracy 25 The Great Wall of Bureaucracy 41 Political Culture, Development Administration 45 The Bureaucracy and Governance in Developing Countries 50 Leading the Future of the Public Sector 80 The Challenge of Governance in a Large Bureaucracy 103 Governance and Public Bureaucracy 107 Coercive and Enabling Bureaucracy 123 The Mother of All Bureaucracy 138 Perfection of Meritocracy or Ritual of Bureaucracy 150 Bureaucrats or Politicians 190 The Future of Bureaucracy 217 The Revolution is Today: Bureaucracy is Forever 257 Bibliography 261 Index 263

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Bureaucracy, Organisation & Political Change: A Critical Analysis It is of rather common agreement that organisation, at least originally, was formed in order to pursue the common interests of specific groups. It is far from being agreed, however, what roles are played by various sorts of internal organisational structures, especially when somehow related to political change.

Weber, for example, perceived politics in terms of dispositions over weapons and over means of administration. This implies the existence of overt or covert political classification. The key to such a classification would be a certain formula by which organisational structure would be determined. It might resemble the supposed Marxist classifi,cation of economic epochs and the "economic" classes that feature in this type of classification. A question thus might arise. Why would Weber have to follow Marx in essence but still differ in as much as he chose to change the keys for classification. One, perhaps oversimplified, possible answer is that Weber simply does not see anything attractive in socialism. This is what Gerth and Mills had suggested, maybe because it was them who found socialism so unattractive. But as it

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were, the difference between Marx and Weber goes beyond this level of argumentation. It indicates their profoundly different concepts of what is politics. Both of them perceived and understood politics as a process that reveals itself and is reflected through organisation. But it was not the same organisation for these two thinkers. The difference was mainly in the way they viewed the structure of this process. Bureaucracy represents political organisation, reflecting its very system ru;ld its philosophy. It might well be one of the most important (if not the most important) criteria against which examination of the political organisation could be made. Also, it could serve to examine "politics in action" or in other words political change. While some of the inherent characteristics of bureaucracy would be its political orientation, it does not automatically go the other way around. That is, it would not be necessary that bureaucratic phenomena should characterise every political organisation. It seems, however, highly likely that they would play an important role in political change. In many cases they would reflect the motivational drives of the political organisation and its structural restraints. Within the political organisation, bureaucracy not only reflects these drives but it also possibly even more sharply indicates situational structures. It may thus be that organisations such as a revolutionary movement would tend to place limits on trends towards the development of bureaucracy, or even eliminate them altogether; at least during the time of struggle to change or purge incumbent regime. The shift would come, however, with the actual take over of political power and the establishment of this movement as the sovereign regime. It would be then, almost without fail that development of the new bureaucratic structure begins. The course of development of the new bureaucratic structure would indicate the direction of the political change. More precisely, it would indicate the

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interests pushed forward by this change. This observation may point at one of the significant differences between Marx and Weber. It is rather outstanding that the former examined bureaucracy - and organisation - mainly as they functioned in and related to economic interests. The latter placed much more stress on the judicial and administrative aspects of bureaucracy. These, for Marx, were means to the end of promoting economic interests. For Weber, they constituted the very end in itself. Yet, organisational inner structure may be viewed somewhat differently. It could well represent the result of an equation, the components of which are the different interest groups within the organisation. Certain roles within it would be especially sensitive because they could influence its development. For once, they might be able to determine the type of bureaucracy that would develop. Or they even might become themselves bureaucratic. In particular, the ability to exercise control over information and communications system seems to be crucial. This is so because those who control sources of information might be- even in a fully-fledged democracy the only ones who really have the accurate picture of the situation. If this were to be the case, they would be in a much better position than anyone else and retain a distinct advantage in the political game that takes place within the organisation. This factor, like other such factors pertaining to the inner composition of a given organisation would have direct influence on the prospects of political change. Moreover, as the process of change takes place, the inner structure may determine to a great extent the character and direction of the change. . The Cultural Revolution of China was possible because of the special inner structure that enabled Mao to "go to the people" while circumventing the regular procedures of mass mobilisation that normally practised in China. Liu

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Shaoqi, Peng Chen and others may have controlled the bureaucratic apparatus of the Party. They could manipulate the people only through the regular channels of operation that were available to them. These channels required certain complicated preparatory work in order to be effective. Mao, on the other hand, dissociated himself from the bureaucratic formation. He managed to establish himself as having" overbureaucratic" status. This allowed him an unmitigated access to the people and enabled him to mobilise them directly. This difference, between the tools that Mao had and those of his opponents, was the determinant factor that shaped the mode of the Revolution and, in fact, its results. Role distribution, value structure, authority and other components of political organisation may differ not only from one society to another. They can also change from time to time in the same society due to either internal or external reasons. Yet all of these phenomena, while placed in the timeless and space-less framework, compose a theoretical setting. in which generalisation of the relationship between the different factors can be observed. This is what Talcott Parsons called "total society." It might be very tempting to deal with generalisations of this sort. Due to their "theoretical level" they can afford to disregard "details" such as background, special socioeconomic realities and environment, religious pressures and so forth. But we must be aware of some essential and lingual restraints that have to be placed on such a procedure of investigation. These are not at all like mathematical models that so many social scientists favour maybe because they should be based on "closed sets." Here, in social and behavioural sciences the basic presupposition is open-ended since by definition it may assume unpredictable and constant changes. In this sense, attempts "to fill in gaps in different aspects of the total field which any future attempt

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to deal with a complex society as a whole" can never be satisfactory. It may be merely of a situational value within a certain unit of space and time. It is only with this in mind that the examination of the relations between bureaucracy and organisation and political change in their general aspects can be done. Organisation, we have seen, is really a function at least as much as it is a structure. Its existence depends on its participants and on a common goal they wish to pursue. It might be valid in some cases to argue that "the output of the organisation is, for some other system, an input." But it is not necessary that in its mere being, "organisation is a system, which as the attainment of its goal 'produces' an identifiable something which can be utilised in some way bay another system." Thus, it is not necessarily true that description of analysis of an organisation can only be done from "the cultural-institutional point of view." However, these two approaches to the examination of a given organisation are, presumably, very convenient and enable analytical coverage of the whole scope. The point of necessity, or the consistency of such a necessity, is further debatable. It was Parsons himself who questioned the internal consistency of Weber's ideal type of organisation (in regard to authority and obedience within organisations). His arguments repeated above tend to suffer the same sort of disadvantages. For Parsons, values of organisation function to legitimise its existence as a system and its main functional mode of operation. These, In Parsons' opinion, are necessary for the implementation of values. Such a legitimisation, he maintain, enables the organisation to determine the codes of loyalty to be demanded of members of the organisation. Yet, no solution is offered for cases where membership can be actively engaged in more than just one organisation. Organisations, according to Parsons, in their very existence,

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set obligations and demands. They are deduced from the values and goals (that are, as such, embedded in the values) of each organisation. These demands and obligations define and set limits for loyalty and attempt to direct it towards the organisation. But what if the organisation in question is a part of a larger one? Or, as may happen also, what if the organisation favours or prefers interests of another organisation to its own, as far as loyalty is concerned? The direct ratio loyalty value organisation cannot, therefore, be "total" and must be changed to an indirect one. Such a change could violate the placement of loyalty in the set of values by detaching the goals from these values. Then there will be room for arguing that values are related to the structure and the inner functions. Or logically, there will be rules for deduction and operation while goals are the presuppositions or the axioms of the system. Only when this consistency is attained and only in such an order can changes in goals precede structural changes of an organisation. The logical order makes the difference in the analysis of political change. It indicates the effect of processes on each other. The Parsonian "logic" enables merely a cause-effect" system in which the cause is structural change and the effect is the political change. This is unlike the philosophical-mathematical logic that begins in the change of goals as the indicator for political change. Here there is a process in which political change might have _an impact on the mode, direction and intensity of the entire social process; certainly as it pertains to organisational structures. II

Another poirit in Parsons that should be noted is associated with his approach to the problem of division of labour and its relat~d aspects. Parsons states: "In a complex division of labour, both the resources necessary for performing technical functions and the relation to the population elements on whose behalf the functions are

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performed have become problematical. Resources are made available by special arrangements, they are not simply 'given' in the nature of the context of the function. And who shall be the beneficiary of what 'product' or 'services' on what terms is problematical; this becomes focus of organisational arrangement of many different kinds. /

The core of the problems, according to Parsons, lies in the fact that beyond Ita certain point" of the progress of division of labour, decisions which determine the mode of this division are concerned more with the relations of the beneficiaries than with the technical employment of resources. The process of decision-making would be one of the essential modifiers of the organisation. It would thus be technically motivated and the organisational capacity to control the involved population would become the supreme criterion for distribution of goods or social amenities. But, distribution of goods is a function of the distribution of labour. Yet, the Parsonian formula, although perceiving this, detaches it from the VC! lues of the organisation of which the distribution of lapour is an inherent constituent. There is here a gross inconsistency, as the dependency is not expressed. Adopting Parsons' approach, one can logically draw a situation where distribution of work, which is a political reality, leads to a situational, non-politically motivated distribution of goods. This is a contradictory description and it is both logically and practically invalid. If such-a detachment of distribution of goods from values is assumed, then, an actual given division of labour could be treated as a value of the organisation. Its result, that is, distribution of goods, would also remain within the set. Both might thus be subject to modifications and re-modifications by virtue of them being situational variables. This, while the concept of division of labour is one of the constituents of the organisational goals. Employment of resources, preferences

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and technical functions as well as manipulation (mode and context) of population by the system are, in this view, reflections and expressions of both the given structural mode and ideological stage of the organisation. They are also a direct function of values and at the same time, indirect function of goals. In this sense, the former presentation [16] is inconsistent but there are examples that can be explained logically. Such are China's payment of interest to former capitalists as a compensation for their investment in enterprises prior to the take over of the CCP or the Israeli preference of non-developed and developing areas in erecting industry. The analysed relations are of vital importance for the understanding of the kind of organisations that develop (bureaucracy, in our case) and for the understanding of this development. S. N. Eisenstadt discusses several conditions that he considers necessary for the development of a bureaucratic organisation. These conditions basically represent differentiation in the social system. The bureaucratic organisation develops in relation to such differentiation because it can help coping with some of the problems arising out of such differentiation," especially hose whose main concern is the co-ordination of large-scale activities. Some of the conditions required for the development of a bureaucracy pertain to the differentiation between roles and institutional spheres. Allocation of roles not in accordance with natural groups (like kin and familial cells) but rather in accordance with artificial ones (like religious, professional and national groups) is an example of these types of differentiation. It could also result from the existence of many functionally specific groups" that do not operate within the 'natural' organisations. The common ground for these conditions lies in that they represent gaps between the two types of organisations. On the one hand, there is some kind of "natural" organisation (that can be described in biological terms, e.g., the blood relationships). II

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On the other, the "artificial" organisation in which the ties are based on specific interests that mayor may not be in contrast with those of the "natural" organisation. This sort of gap can be, in fact must be viewed as basically qualitative one. The other conditions brought by Eisenstadt seem to create gaps whose main characteristics are more of quantitative nature. In this range appear the differences between scopes of "natural" groups and cultural, social or national ones; of number and complexity of functions of these two kinds of groups and the complexity of ties that should be maintained by different groups. The last cond,ition, however, seems to involve both qualitative and quantitative characteristics. It is related to the extent of "free-floating" resources like manpower, economic resources, commitments and so forth. The development of these conditions, maintains Eisenstadt, may very well result in the development of a bureaucratic system. This sort of organisation is likely to be initiated as an attempt by role (and power) holders to mobilise resources and to resolve various problems that they may face. But it is not an isolated process that brings about the creation and development of a bureaucratic system. These things take place in a particular social organisation. For this reason, they would always also include conscious efforts to achieve equilibrium within this organisation. Equilibrium is needed not only to stabilise the organisation but also because it is a primary condition for the bureaucracy to maintain its autonomy and distinctiveness" as Eisenstadt puts it. II

Yet, according to Eisenstadt, there is also another process that may take place in such a situation: that is, debureaucratisation. He claims, and it appears to be a rather solid argument, that the tendencies toward bureaucratisation and de-bureaucratisation may, in fact, develop side by side. This is because the process of refining

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and definitions ~de by the bureaucracy as to its autonomy and goals may very well lead to the taking over of some of its very functions and activities by "other groups of organisation." This could happen "when some organisation (Le., a parents' association or a religious or political group) attempts to direct the rules and working of a bureaucratic organisation (school, economic agency and so forth) for its own use or according to its own values and goals. This approach towards the phenomenon of bureaucracy may seem contradictory. But given the conditions for the evolution of bureaucracy, it is in fact consistent one. The bureaucratic organisation in itself consists of well-defined groups of role holders. So constituted, any given bureaucracy seeks to refine the definitions for each role within itself. This contributes to further isolation of groups of role holders. Although this isolation is initially a functional one, it ,may extend itself to other spheres of life. Moreover, such a process that leads to isolation not only can be seen in itself as a process of de-bureaucratisation. It can also be perceived as a source of tacit or even open competition for power. During the stage of inception of the bureaucracy, there are attempts to make definitions of functions and group as accurate as the can be. The motivation behind this is the aspiration to increase and improve the co-operation and effectiveness of the different branches so they all would contribute to the consolidation of the bureaucracy in question. But now, once it is established and secure, the motivations change. The mere fact of progress along time span changes conditions. Gaps that could be ignored at the initial stages slowly enter the focus of the debate (either the internal one or even the publk discourse;. What previously had been regarded as organisational and or functional relations may now become political relations and struggle for power. On the other harld, the more the bureaucracy has been able to establish itself as a complex system, the greater would be the power

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required to operate and control this system. The intensity of the struggle for power also becomes greater and certain roles that involve functions of control and power could be used (and normally they are indeed being used) against or over opponents and or supporters in such areas as education, communications, information, etc. Accordingly, they also become. more and more important. The holders of such roles recognise the increasing importance of their roles. It would only be expected, therefore, that they would try to further promote such a definition of their role's that would help them to perpetuate their hold on this role. This would, in turn, increase the important of the role even further. But other role holders would do the same, at the same time and within the same bureaucratic framework. This creates an internal competition within the bureaucracy that paradoxically would create forces of disunity. Stress on competence and de-centralisation of power would be likely to follow and would contribute to the undermining of the entire system. At this stage it could be expected that various pivotal forces or it could be frustrated ones that would attempt to break the framework of the bureaucracy. Amongst those that would be likely to participate in this process we could find not only those in power, but also role holders whose roles are less important or under threat. The members of this last group wish, of course, to promote their position and the best way to do so would be to elevate the importance of their role. This creates tension because in effect, such a process is nothing less than a clear attempt to break the monopoly of the important roles and to actually neutralise them. The struggle might be focused on the issue of "what should replace the existing format of bureaucracy." Each contesting group would come up with quite different solutions, naturally. In light of this discussion, it seems that the presentation

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offered by Eisenstdt's would be not only useful but also consistent and valid. There might be an inference from this to the arena of political change. Political change, it might be argued, should be regarded simultaneously as input and an output of the process of bureaucratisation and debureaucratisation as described above. When analysing an organisation, it could be attached to the set as one of the essential values of the bureaucratic organisation. Not only philosophically to support logical validity but also practically. This attitude differs significantly from Weber's view of the ideal bureaucracy. Moreover, Weber stated that "when those subject to bureaucratic control seek to escape the influence of the existing bureaucratic apparatus, this is normally possible only by creating an organisation of their own which is equally subject to the process of bureaucratisation. That is to say, according to the approach presented, that Weber really failed to see the entire picture. While it may well be true that such a tendency (of bureaucratisation of the group) could exist, it is precisely this process that indicates the de-bureaucratisation of the roof organisation (of which this group has been or still is a part). Bureaucratisation of a sub-system implies a tendency to organisational and many times also ideological detachment from the system. The weakening of the bureaucratic system by one or more of its sub-systems cannot but result in the de-bureaucratisation of the system. Only in this way could a sub-system aspire and may achieve autonomy and 'create an independent bureaucratic structure. Equally, only by becoming more and more bureaucratic, can such a sub-system establish its autonomy and weaken the parent system to which it previously belonged. Another important difference lies in the possible answer to the question of "who controls the existing bureaucratic

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machinery. Weber maintains that such control is possible only to a very limited degree for persons who are not technical specialists." The other approach, that to great extent views bureaucracy as a reflection of political reality, tolerates the existence of non-specialist power and control. holders. Weber maintains that "bureaucratic administration means fundamentally the exercise of control on the basis of knowledge." Here, he mainly mean technical knowledge or more accurately, professional knowledge that was acquired through previous training. His model might be best fit the professional military. But bureaucracy could exist also in other organisations formal or informal certainly if perceived within a political context and even if modified by various changes. If we would stick to the model drawn by Weber, then no political change could result from the operation of the bureaucracy. This is because in his model the role holders can never control in a complete manner the apparatus, without which political changes could not happen. Theoretically, Weber's ideal bureaucracy is thus very static and as such tends to be practically impossible. It may seem permissible to say that political change would bring about bureaucratisation. But the opposite which is in fact what happens left, right and centre is not logically valid if we follow Weber's pattern and apply to it the sar~le rules of deduction that operate in his own theoretical system. According to the same theoretical process, struggle of role holders of different professions cannot exist once control has been established and practised. Moreover, use of roles by other role holders would be logically impossible. In this sense, most of Weber's followers, who may have suggested that such a possibility is implied in Weber's system, cOllllPitted a logical error, even if their argument as such proved to' be practically true. Indeed, as March and Simon have indicated, in many respects "Weber's essential

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proposition that bureaucratises are more efficient (with respect to the goals of the formal hierarchy) than are alternative forms of organisation" is as a matter of fact undeniable. The main logical and philosophical troubles with the Weberian perceptions are anchored not so much in his descriptive model as in the deterministic approach and the inflexibility of the model. While it might be in situational terms an accurate description of a given system, analysis of the bureaucratic phenomena in general should have rather focused itself on the process of change. A. Etzioni says: "Modern society is to a large degree a bureaucratic society Not only does modern society as a whole tend to be bureaucratic, but the most powerful social units of modern society are also bureaucratic. Yet, the Weber's approach and to a great extent also Etzioni's approach treat the social complex within a static framework and fail to capture its inherent element of dynamism and change. Thus, in light of these deSCriptions, it would be impossible to analyse quite a few political events as phenomena that belong in the framework of organisation and bureaucracy. For example, the Chinese protracted warfare prior to the 1949 take over, the Cultural Revolution or the Israeli Protest Movement that followed the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Furthermore, if the methodologies adopted by Weber, Etzioni and their like were to be followed, it would also be impossible to analyse, on their own terms, such phenomena as inner struggles within bureaucratic systems, like say the Soviet Communist Party to name but one. Etzioni points out the allocation of means and social integration as other "functional requirements" of society that are carried out and controlled by complex organisations. To him, this is the very bureaucratisation of society. It is true that many functions or roles in almost all societies are characterised by bureaucratic processes. But it would be false both methodologically and logically, as well

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as a practical error, to ignore the inter-relations of the different agencies between and among themselves and between these agencies and that centre that at least theoretically represents the source of power and control within society. An argument was put forward to "justify" or at least explain this type of false. Arguably, it stems from the fact that at the time when the main theories of bureaucracy and organisation were first formulated, such important factors (or means) as the mass media and mass communications did not exist or were not as central as they are today. Only when, in time, these factors grew more important and significant, could they also enter the theoretical setting as functional agencies rather than mere isolated factors. Factually, this is very true. But these factors must still be considered as independent factors at least as far as the interplay between the factors themselves takes place. There is no doubt that even in societies where the media are operated and controlled by the state they still influence significantly the system itself and ever, the entire society. If this is ignored, no real analysis can be offered that would be able to consider political changes particularly if and when these are somehow related to changes that the organisational system might be undergoing. Such omission is not unavoidable if the Weber-inspired methodology is employed certainly if without a measure of criticism. Indeed, it is not really surprising that the definitions of complex organisations tend to be somewhat fluid. We may find,forexample,thefollowing. The unit organisation exists at a point in time. It remains in existence and is operative only as long as the co-ordinated activity of which it is composed is continuous. Many unit organisations do come into existence, engage in activity and accomplish some unit objective, but they do so within the framework of a total pattern of activity and toward a common goal. Individuals

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also may engage mindividual activity that has as its purpose a fraction of some common purpose rather than a personal goal of the individual. This hierarchy of unit organisations and individual activity, all a part of some common design, may be said to constitute a complex organisation. The latter entity is not continuous and it may be seen as a time-lapse photograph of unit organisations and individual activity, all structured under some common purpose and contributing activity toward some common goal. Such a definition cannot hold philosophical validity from its very beginning. Firstly, limitation of time could not be detached from that of space. Secondly, a deterministic, total approach as taken here (It remains only as long as etc.) may easily be countered and upset by examples of deviation (e.g., when part or all of the constituents are changed or cease to operate while the framework of the organisation remains in existence). And once deviation occurs, a set of arguments could not be considered as a complete theory with a closed set of provable theorems based on agreed axioms and rules of deduction. At best, it might be a collection of suggestive arguments that mayor may not be true for a given and particular private case. If this is the case, emphasis should be placed on the causality of the arguments stipulated. It must also be noted that any particular description cannot be but a fairly loose proposition. Most of the arguments discussed above attribute some sort of "necessity" to their content. But this cannot be, of course, logical. In fact, it is not even relevant. The entire discussion could only remain within the boundaries of descriptive themes. Any attempt to claim otherwise defies logic and is thus misleading. Entirely differ~nt is the approach offered by G. L. Lippitt in his Organisational Renewal. Lippitt tries to examine organisations and behaviour of both organisations and their particles from a psychological point of view that weighs

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aspects that benefit the individual and group in the organisation. He maintains that the "normal" situation of a system is some sort of a status quo and that change is really a deviation from this status quo. He does not draw the limits or boundaries of this status quo and he refrains from a strict definition of the range of the possible changes and from a clear reference to such changes. The organisational world of Lippitt can thus be viewed as either being in total and perennial stability or as subject to total and constant change. Both are permitted if plain logic is applied to the drawn models of Lippitt. Definition of particles, or constituents and their roles cannot be found in his long book. The same is true as to possible indications of internal or external relations of organisational systems. Even his annotated bibliography that holds additional 9 pages and contains some 52 works seems to be one-sided and heavily biased and hardly usefuL The following short passage is a typical statement of this work: "Frustration is experienced by those who think success in mobilising human resources, or in initiating organisation renewal, is simply a matter of education and, perhaps, of using persuasive stimuli reinforced by annual picnics, newsletters and adequate coffee-breaks. This is so because Organisation renewal is the process of initiating, creating and confronting needed changes so as to make it possible for organisations to become or remain viable, to adapt to new conditions, to solve problems, to learn from experience and to move toward greater organisational maturity. Not only is the definition itself empty and of no use at all, in terms of the argument or for the examination of theorems (for example, what is "organisational maturity. The argument itself, that begins as highly deterministic one, fades and loosens so as to end as a rather simplistic" saloon talk" that cannot be taken seriously.

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Indeed, the Chinese situation under Mao is a clear blow to Lippitt's statement There, the system was anchored in the belief that success in mobilising human resources is simply a matter of education and the Chinese leadership who thought so did not seem to have been frustrated. But there is a crucial point that lies beyond this level. It must be referred to the logical structure of both definitions. These would serve in a logical model as the axioms while the argument would be, for all practical matters, the theorem. Lack of accuracy is not only a matter of aesthetics. It is precisely what determines the framework of the entire discussion. If any component of either the definition or the argument were to be removed nothing would happen. There is no close definition, nor any solid argument could be found that together might lead to any possible range of strongly based conclusions. This pulls away the ground from underneath Lippitt's structure, leaving him with no model what so ever. The tendency to observe the organisational phenomena from the viewpoint of a behavioural pattern is, however, interesting. It must be, of course, limited to either individual participants or to particular mechanisms (that are operated by individuals). Under the limit of this condition it might be interesting to examine possible relations between role holders and functions of the system, between and among role holders themselves, etc. Indeed, within this sort of framework, a discussion concerning the internal communications within organisations could be useful. The question of whether or not some undefined individual is frustrated or why could not be traced and answered in general terms. On the other hand, it would be certainly possible to observe the behavioural patterns that result from a specific position of individual within the system. Questions that seek answers as regard to the extent or mode of change that results from the exercising of a particular role in the system that enable

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its holder to manipulate other people are certainly legitimate. But such questions cannot be found in Lippitt's work. Also, open-ended or multi-ended answers could be useful, but not if they fail to be within any logical context. A mere collection of statements without foundations and directions cannot replace a serious discussion and analysis. Organisations are important as they appear to be because as March and Simon say "people spend so much of their time in them." This is rather a superficial answer, as they admit themselves. But the importance of organisations or the understanding of them is embedded in the fact that distribution of wealth, labour and power, as well as the well being of each of us and the prospects of change are all related functions of organisational patterns. This in itself means that limitations are placed on the possibility to understand and or to describe the core of the organisational activity. This is because the means to do so, that is language, is by itself a related function of organised patterns. Hence, the only open field of understanding is that by which we try to describe through definitions and deductive rules some of the mechanisms of organisational activity. We cannot break out of the framework by merely providing suggestive formulas that can only refer to situational realities. In this sense, the attempt made by March ~nd Simon to seek explanations that could correspond to the most basic and simple questions arising from the observation of the organisational phenomena, is fruitful. It is so because in this way a methodology for such an observation can be developed. Albeit it is still more inductive than deductive, this type of observation is a key for the understanding of the processes that take place within a given organisation. Furthermore, it serves as a basis for correlating such processes to political change or other activities that are associated with the observed organisation, even if they are

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not an integrated part of it. Adopting this policy of observation, March and Simon can cover a relatively large number of viewpoints while not slipping too much to the absolutist approach" that characterise quite a few other works in the fie!d of organisation. An important aspect covered by them is that of the relations between the motivational setting of an organisation and the alternatives open to it. This is a question that, as they rightly mention, "has not been examined in any detail in the literature. The way in which they bring forward this issue is typical of their work and it is certainly worthy of praise. First they suggest a hypothesis while using theorems based on a set of previously formulated definitions. They refrain from falling into the trap of the determinist and absolutist approach and thus they keep from merely offering baseless suggestions. They put forward a series of examples taken from different private cases and make sure to comment on each of these. Only then they attempt to draw a framework for conclusions, while not ignoring that these could only be suggestive in their nature. When dwelling on the questions of motivations an,d alternatives they suggest the following: "In general, the greater the objective availability of external alternative, the more likely that such alternatives will be evoked. The terms are well defined and the problem of the intentions" of the authors is avoided. These relations seem to be crucial. They correspond to the previously mentioned inter-relations between the components of the bureaucratic system. They also have much to do with the source of political change that may occur within, or in connection with, a certain bureaucracy. Availability of alternatives, as March and Simon indicate points at two kinds of ranges. One is the objective range of alternatives. The other range is that of what seem to be as alternatives to various participants within the system. Considering the

Bureaucracy, Organisation & Political Change

21

interplay of groups of interest within a bureaucratic set, the distinction between the two ranges tend to be associated with and influenced by the structure of the set. This is also true for the attempts made by the set or its leadership to materialise such alternatives in the least disharmonious manner. The motivational factor must therefore be closely associated with the identity of the players. It would be so both in the realm of individual-group relations and in the realm of inter-group relations. There seems to be an identification mechanism" that works within the system. Also, even in the absence of positive identification, the strength of group pressures as the uniformity of group opinion increases. It therefore seems to be valid to assume that "the perceived consequences of alternatives are, at least partly, a function of the strength of group pressures and the direction of these pressures that stem from sub groups and extra-organisational groups." The structural organisation of a given set of groups is influenced by the alternaHves both real and imaginary. Simultaneously, it influences the range of possible and desirable alternatives. It is impossible to determine exactly where the starting point lies. But it is quite obvious that this complex of factors, namely, group identity and pressures, the nature of the structural organisation and the existence of several ranges of alternatives, are all, in fact and when they interact the <;ore of any possible political change. This basic assumption must be acknowledged when dealing with any of these factors. Otherwise, the analysis will be incomplete and rather arbitrary. There is an inherent essential difficulty that attempts to analyse bureaucracy or even organisations in general face. Such attempts could basically be either descriptive or theoretical. Yet, a descriptive attempt, particularly if it would also try to be accurate, must refer to particular phenomenon (or phenomena) that only exist in exact and

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particular frame of time and space. It would then be confined to inductive suggestions that may only concern some aspects of the general phenomena. It cannot state absolutely proven theorem and remains logical at the same time. Moreover, if accuracy is to be maintained, it should also refer at least to the previously mentioned factors. At the same time, it cannot confine itself merely to the structural aspects. Motivations, alternatives, technical operation of the system, definitions of power for the various levels of hierarchy and other such factors must also be referred to. The theoretical type of attempt is even harder to pursue. For once, it has to cover all of these aspects that must be included in the theoretical setting. The main factor, however, is the theoretical "backbone" on which the entire movement within the suggested system depends. It must remain open-ended and in a constant flux so as to enable changes in the forms and or essence to enter the set, either as new givens or as renewed or unchanged ones. These act and perceived in accordance with the changing conditions. The effort here must include, therefore, a logically closed theory of dynamics as well as techniques that allow the work in several levels of definition that may vary according to different natures of the qualitatively different components of stich a theoretical setting. In order to deal with the complexity and to study the phenomena of bureaucracy, organisation, political change and their like, some of the logical and philosophical strict limitations must be sacrificed. Thus, some of the observations and theoretical relations between components of a given theoretical setting would be treated out of the frame of the formal logic. Yet the demand for examination of such relations must not e neglected altogether. It is still of great importance.

Albrow in his Bureaucracy reveals many of these. He also tries to analyse them and to seek justification for them.

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23

Thus, when touching the relations between bureaucracy and ideology he suggests that" some justification for paying even slight attention to the concept of bureaucracy in ideological contexts appears to be necessary." There are three reasons for this. Firstly, while ideologies are designed to incite men to action, this does not mean that their content is wholly emotive. On the contrary, it is a feature of modern ideologies that they purport to be based upon an objective view of the nature of man and society. Secondly, it is notoriously difficult for the social scientist to remove all traces of ideological commitment from his or her work and it is therefore important to be aware of the nature of the ideological concepts of bureaucracy. Thirdly, Marxist or self-proclaimed Marxist) and to a lesser degree also Fascist ideologies claim to erase the distinction between ideological and scientific thought at least as far as their own doctrines are concerned. Political leaders set themselves up as arbiters of scientific truth and academicians avowedly direct their work to political ends. That the scientific element in this conflict of ideology and knowledge cannot be lightly disregarded is obvious when we consider the high prestige as a political scientist that Karl Marx, the most successful ideologist of all time, has in non-Marxist circles. Albrow's approach is highly advantageous. Not only tendency that characterises many of the writers dealing with the discussed phenomena. While examining some of the literature, he tries to gain access to pieces of information that could be consulted when pursuing the study of related subjects. In this he uniquely achieves a degree of reliability that many works fail to maintain because they do not concede the possibility of open-ended changing relations. do~s he lack the absolutist

Adhering only to a one-way solution, as is the case with many of the works in the field (and most of those mentioned

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here) tend to culminate in the construction of static models and limited understanding not only of bureaucracy and of organisation in general. But also, it confines and limits the discussion of political change and only allows for a static model and formulas to be presented. This is inadequate logically and academically but even more so it is entirely unrealistic and untrue. It must be noted, however, that such works can still benefit their readers even though they suffer from such important shortcomings. If not with insight, they can at least still provide us with information pertaining to bureaucracy, organisation and political change and to their inner and inter relations.

2

The Management of Change at the Bureaucracy

Introduction Comment on the end of bureaucracy is derived from the view that bureaucratic rationalisation can no longer provide a viable basis for organising in the current context of radical uncertainty and turbulent change. Advocates of post bureaucracy argue that organisations are becoming more decentralised, loosely coupled and likely to foster the empowerment of employees. The overview provided by shows that there is a very considerable overlap between the "post bureaucratic turn" and "the new public management" (NPM). The latter emphasises cost control, financial transparency, the atomisation of organizational sub-units, the decentralisation of management autonomy, the creation of market and quasi-market mechanisms andthe creation of performance indicators. Post bureaucracy promises new forms of strategic action which will assume a more creative and open form. Comment on "hybrid political regimes" and "democratic hierarchies" is centred on the long-standing question of how organisations combine centralised control and co-ordination of resources with the need for more flexible forms. The notion of organisational hybridity has a particular relevance

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for public sector organisations, where calls to "reduce bureaucracy" have been manifested in attempts to simulate market disciplines within the organisation. Two aspects of the post bureaucracy debate are of particular significance for the present study. The first concerns the large volume of comment which has challenged the substantive claims made for post bureaucracy and NPM. The second relates to the idea that the post bureaucratic turn is embedded in an over arching "discourse of endings" whose leitmotiv is that the advanced industrial societies have now entered a definitively new epoch. Thus, as has argued: a neo-liberalist economist such as Schumpeter, a social democrat such as Schumacher, a neocorporatist such as Elias, a technological determinist such as Bell or Castells, and a theorist of radical participatory democracy such as Illich, can all agree that the underlying currents of history, will, eventually make bureaucracy an obsolete form of administrative power and organisation. Whilst the "permanent structure of anti-bureaucratic thought" continues to exert a pervasive influence on organisational analysis, recent empirical work paints a much more complex picture than would be implied by the binary oppositions which appear in many accounts of the post bureaucratic organisation. Some scholars working in the Foucauldian tradition of organisational analysis have argued that market-oriented policies and managerial discourses may act to "capture" and fix the ways in which the world is seen by public sector professionals. But there is now a very substantial body of work which shows the ways in which these discourses have been contested and "displaced" by public sector professionals. A recurrent theme in these critiques is that the new forms reflect not the "end" of bureaucracy but a complex, and often highly unstable, bifurcation of the bureaucratic form which

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27

devolves operational responsibility whilst attempting to extend the controls exercised by senior management. A growing number of scholars have argued that the epochalism" promulgated by the anti-bureaucratic turn has produced a' highly restricted, caricatured and an historical view which detaches analysis from the relevant organisational contexts, interests and social choices has argued. II

Bureaucracy is not as many critics assume a simple singularity. Rather, whatever singularity it is deemed to possess is multiple, not monolithic to be more precise bureaucracy has turned out to be less a hard and fast transhistorical model, but rather what we may describe as a many sided, evolving, diversified organizational device. In the analysis which follows we question epochalist assumptions of the post bureaucratic organisation. Following the recent historiographical turn in organization analysis, we present an organisational counter-narrative which highlights key elements of reflexivity and cultural continuity in the 'bureaucratic form. The substantive basis for this is provided by our work on the putative "fall" and subsequent "reinvention" of the BBC during the 1990s. Our analysis is based on both primary data gathering and the use of selected secondary sources particularly seminal account The BBC: Public Institution and Private World, but also Uncertain Vision: Birt, Dyke and the Reinvention of the BBC. The BBC and the anti-bureaucratic turn Founded in 1926, the BBC is funded by a licence fee levied on all UK households in possession of terrestrial television receivers. A Royal Charter, reviewed by the government every ten years, specifies the corporation's public sector responsibilities, functions and financial operations. The corporation is formally self-regulated and

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independent of government controls. Successive governments have, however, succeeded in using the charter renewal procedures as a way of exercising political control over the content of BBC broadcasts, particularly in news and current affairs. Once revered as the apotheosis of the public service tradition, the BBC has also been described as a "cultural dictatorship" and it has long been noted for its elitism, financial mismanagement and quasi-monopolistic hold on the UK broadcasting industries Home Office. Burns depicted a deeply segmented organisation which separated "creative workers" such as TV and radio producers from "managerialist" administrators. Burns also noted the "quasi-tribalist" rivalry between the various production departments or "baronies as they competed for status and programming resources. The BBC retained many of its "bureaucratic" features as late as the early 1990s. By the mid-1980s, however, the belief that markets were replacing hierarchies as the fundamental principle of economic management had come to dominate public sector reform in the UK. The Thatcher government, seeking to encourage liberalisation, market competition and media convergence, found an obvious target in the BBC. One government commission considered the possibility of outright privatisation, but this was averted when the 1990 Broadcasting Act ruled that 25 per cent of BBC output should be sourced from independent producers. In the White Paper "Serving the Nation, Competing World-wide", John Major's government indicated that the BBC should enter the competitive market, whilst retaining its public funding. The BBC response to these developments was to initiate an extensive programme of organisational change. The highly bureaucratised "command economy" was to he replaced by an internal market which would eventually separate purchasers (commissioning executives) from

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29

providers (television producers and technicians). As noted in the introduction, these features are cognate with both post-bureaucracy and the NPM. The BBC and the "end" of bureaucracy: the case of producer choice . Producer choice was the title given to the trading system, designed around an internal market, which was first introduced in 1991. Described as a "new way of managing resources" the term "producer choice" refers to both procedural changes, and to changes in professional norms which would deliver a more decentralised BBe. As in other public sector settings, managerial rhetorics of transformation featured as a strategic resource deployed in support of institutional change. Producer choice placed a key emphasis on external accountability, continuous monitoring, and institutional auditing but the political rationale for the initiative was that the process of self-reform would secure the renewal of the Royal Charter in 1996, thus ensuring the continued existence of a publicly funded BBe. Producer choice was often described in terms of detailed operational changes but its dominant rhetoric drew heavily .on two mutually reinforcing manifestations of the "epochalism" which has dominated comment and debate on post-bureaucracy. The first relates to the notion that the BBC had to shake off the bureaucratic excesses of the past and redeem itself as a worthy recipient of public funding. The other was a pervasive sense that UK broadcasters were entering a radically new technological future. Producer choice was framed around the notion of organisational salvation the belief that the had to be saved from the threats posed by the onset of technological and regulatory change. Key features of this new environment were that there would be a convergence of previously

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separate broadcasting, computing and telecommunications industries; a globalisation of "infotainment" industries; increasing reliance on joint ventures, and more flexible forms of digital production. Phrases summing up the new environment included "the status quo is not an option" and we must get lean and fit for the new world of digital convergence. The producer choice initiative was introduced by John Birt then Deputy Director General in Autumn 1991. Staff guidelines promised new freedoms and responsibilities for television producers. Funding for programmes was, however, to be earned by bidding to deliver an agreed strategy. When Birt became Director General in January 1993, he described producer choice as akin to a powerful locomotive shining a searchlight into every area of our activities. Statements of this kind stru.:k many our respondents as inconsistent with the culture of segmentation and quasitribalist rivalry noted above. The engineering metaphor was, however, an apt one not only was Birt himself a trained engineer, but also producer choice had been heavily influenced by the doctrine of reengineering and the belief that the organisation could be treated as a tabula rasa which could be reinscribed without regard for history or legacies of the past. Birt repeatedly described the "old" BBC as a "command economy" thus powerfully scapegoating the BBC's past, promising to create an institution: in which baronialism and bureaucracy are dirty words, ""here fudge and fix-it, hostile leaking and secretive and manipuiative behaviour become techniques and tactics of the past. In a statement which attacked the long established practices surrounding the funding of new programme ideas, ~stated that decisions in the "new BBC" would be made on the basis of high quality management information, and not on: "the skills of supplicants at some Byzantine court

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where no-one knew what anything actually cost. The analysis of producer choice which follows refers to two key elements of change management which are relevant to our earlier discussion of post bureaucracy. First, the implementation of the internal market via the new trading system; and second, the managerial controls imposed on the previously devolved process of programme commissioning.

Implementing the producer choice trading system Under the command economy, BBC production units had no means of charging for their technical and craft services. The intention of the new trading system was that production resources, once allocated to particular programmes, could be transacted in ways which reproduced market conditions. As the internal market was established across the five output directorates of the BBC (network television, network radio, news and current affairs, regions, external services), the idea of "a single BBC" was displaced by notions of fragmentation, competition and diversity. Trading negotiations now took place between production units located within the BBC and between BBC facilities and external purchasers. Nearly 500 separate profit centres were created between 1991 and 1993. Far from clarifying the use of resources, the volume of transactions was such that management subsequently cut the number of trading units to approximately 200. Our original fieldwork shows that a small number of BBC producers adopted the calculative norms and enterprising attitudes associated with internal markets. However, the broad thrust of our findings is that the initiative was much more effective in achieving what one senior manager described as a oneoff hit on capacity" than enduring changes in the buying and selling behaviour of producers. Resources were used in ways which consistently undermined the market rationality of "spot pricing". Both the supply and demand II

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for production resources were biased in favour of bulk purchasing from preferred sources. One producer stated that. No one gives a stuff whether the producer is theoretically free to appoint the wardrobe mistress and catering company he wants, when the truth is that the system is so inefficient, he can't contract them until a fortnight before the shoot, and so he has to take whoever happens to be both available and cheap.

The centralisation of programme commissioning Criticisms of the producer choice trading system were by no means restricted to "creative workers" such as TV producers. Senior management were also concerned about the effect of internal trading on the creativity of in-house departments. The head of finance at the engineering (later resources) directorate took an equally sceptical view. Resources had to be reduced because of the 25 per cent quota and the mechanism chosen to do this was Producer Choice. It's easier to control resource provision than idea creation in the old days the resources were there to develop the ideas, now you have to make a case to use them, and they won't be there if they have to earn return on capital employed. Some of our respondents acknowledged the political necessity of producer choice, assuming that the point of showing transparency of costs was to focus the corporation's efforts to secure Charter renewal on the overall value and quality of the BBC's programme output. But others argued that the initiative was only peripherally concerned with business procedures, its actual purpose was the recentralisation of programming strategy and an end to the practice of devolving the process of programme commissioning. Some key insights on programme commissioning emerge if we return briefly to account of the BBC during the early 1970s.

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33

Burns highlighted the growing scale and sophistication of BBC programming at a time when successive increases in license fee revenues allowed the rapid expansion of the various output departments. Producers' demands-for ever more elaborate and expensive programming led BBC senior management to develop a new two year" planning cycle" which sought to fill schedules by means of continuous production lines (known as programming" strands"), whose costs could be predicted and controlled. Resource allocation was organised around biannnual" offers" meetings in which channel controllers, administrators, and accountants would determine which programmes should be funded. These meetings were concerned not so much with the conventions of "resource allocation" as with negotiating the ways in which the BBC's public service tradition should be maintained: channel controllers arbitrated the rival claims of particular genres and programme ideas, each which had a particular ethical and aesthetic claim on the public service tradition. Crucially, and in spite of the centralising tendencies 1nherent in the new planning cycle, these meetings w~re managed "by people who claimed the same professional identity and interests of producers themselves". In one key passage cites a channel controller who characterised the "offers" system as "a combination of authoritarianism and permissiveness". This system was still in place in 1996, when John Birt announced that the BBC's broadcasting and production functions were to be split into separate directorates. One result of this split was that controllers located in the newly established Broadcast Directorate could now commission programme ideas from independent producers. The split was accompanied by a "tariff-based funding model" designed to harness the output of the BBC television and radio networks to the centralising logic of financial planning and market research. As Born remarks, Henceforth, responsibility for

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commissions lay solely with the controllers, marketing executives and corporate strategists. The result was a less distributed and devolved structure of decision making, with little space for the particular expertise of genre production to flow up the hierarchy and be nurtured through dialogue The BBC now acted as a broadcaster not a programme maker, with channel controllers abandoning their former role as creative arbiters. One of our interviewees observed that. Creativity has been marginalised. Amateurish but enjoyable collegiate discussions no longer happen. An underclass of jobbing producers, or even totally casualised researchers doing the hunting and gathering, are hired at short notice to deliver to a brief using their own recording equipment it's a new type of alienation in the production process. The goal is for the BBC to be a global software house based on strong relationships with the gateways, not the workers. Post bureaucracy and digital broadcasting Greg Dyke, appointed as Director General in 2000, inherited a BBC whose public funding had been secured for the statutory ten-year period of Charter renewal in 1996. However, the terms of the Charter settlement left unanswered fundamental questions about the role of the BBC in the emerging" digital environment" . As noted above, the early 1990s were dominated by the view that the technological future of UK broadcasting would be assured by a strong commitment to deregulation and free markets. The BBC rejected the dominant pay TV model of Rupert Murdoch's BSkyB, arguing that digital programming should be delivered on a non-commercial, free to air basis. The late 1990s saw a shift in the doctrine of consumer sovereignty in UK broadcast policy. In 1999, the Department of Culture, Media and Sport published a White Paper which reflected a quintessentially "hybridised" commitment to free markets, coupled with a strong sense of their limitations (for a full

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35

account of this shift. The White Paper argued the need for UK broadcasters to embrace the cultural and economic opportunities provided by digital technologies but it also stated that public service broadcasting should be central to the UK's digital economy. The BBC response was predicated on the view that there was a need to provide increasingly fragmented and pluralised UK audiences with access to a range of formats in digital television (DTV) and other new media. The cost savings produced by the Birt reforms had helped to fund the earliest digital services but the cost of establishing a more comprehensive range of complementary digital channels was such that Birt and his senior executives sought an increase in the level of the licence fee in their submissions to the Davies Committee of 1998. Born notes that three factors distinguished the BBC's approach to DTV first, that all digital channels would be free to air and without advertising; second that a high proportion of material would be originated in the UK, with programme budgets higher than the norm for DTV; third, that each of the new channels would contain a range of genres in contrast to the niche broadcasting favoured by paytelevision operators. Dyke and the demise of producer choice Greg Dyke continued the Birtist policy of lobbying the Blair government to support the BBC's digital ambitions, whilst amending or reversing many of the organisational changes imposed during the Birt period. The internal market was curtailed, with approximately 200 trading units reduced to around 50. Dyke rejected the doctrine of internal markets, reasserted the strategic importance of in house production and increased spending on programming by £450M between 2000 and 2002. Dyke stated in 2000 that his intention was to. Take out internal trading look again at how much money we're spending hiring outside resources when we've got

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resources lying idle inside give our programme makers more security and make the BBC less internally competitive and more focused on the outside world. Dyke also revised the commissioning process which had been centralised under Birt by appointing senior producers to act as creative experts whose job was to maintain an overview of production in each genre. These "genre commissioners" held the budgets in drama, factual, entertainment and arts programming. However, Born has also shown that: all commissions had to be agreed by a controller making a "dual tick" system. The precise balance of forces in each genre was decided pragmatically; in some areas such as Current Affairs and Drama Serials the same person acted as both head of production and genre commissioner, restoring the putative conflict of interest that the Birt reforms had been elaborately and expensively desigr.ed to avoid. The revalidation of in-house production under Dyke thus appears to have been accompanied by the emergence of a new hybrid organisational form which combines central control of programme commissioning with a substantial measure of producer autonomy. This is in line with recent critical thinking on organisational hybridity but this "new" form, based on a "conflict of interest" between the expertise of producers and managerial control of resources is also redolent of the authoritarian permissiveness" noted by Burns almost 30 years previously. This suggests that there is a need for the changing dynamics of organisational control within the BBC to be located in a wider historical perspective, and it is to this that we now turn. II

An historical reading of producer choice and anti bureaucracy The paper has examined the putative "fall" and subsequent reinvention" of the BBC during the 1990s, II

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showing the ways in which "epochalist" public policies affected the BBC and its place in the wider UK broadcasting industry. We have also highlighted the managerial rhetorics of transformation which pervaded the Birt reforms, contrasting these with the broader institutional tensions and dilemmas which beset the BBC as it sought to redefine its role as a public provider in the context of deregulation and digital broadcasting. Producer choice resonates with the idea that managerial discourses of marketisation may act to "capture" and "fix" the ways in which the world is seen by public sector professionals. However, efforts to impose the producer choice trading system failed to secure a cultural shift in the buying and selling behaviour of producers. The initiative did not displace the "tribalist" loyalties which segmented the BBC, and nor did it usurp the ritualised "supplicancy" of the commissioning process. This is consistent with the view that "heterogeneous, rivalrous and recalcitrant" public sector professionals have successfully resisted the discursive capture" associated with thp. doctrines of enterprise and marketisation. However, the longer term view developed in this paper points to a more fundamental contradiction that management themselves (or more specifically, BBC senior executives) turned away from internal markets and centralised control of programme planning towards the end of the 1990s. . II

The main power effect of producer choice was not "the reduction of bureaucracy" but the need to build the broader political case for the 1996 Charter renewal. Anthony Smith, an ex-BBC producer and former head of the British Film Institute, told us that: Producer Choice was a very ingenious device of change similar to that which happened in Hungarian State Television, where getting rid of the old communists involved exploiting the tool of the marketplace. But as with the McKinsey reforms of the 1970s, the BBC

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continued to operate as a well-run bureaucracy, adjusting itself, as it has always done, to prevailing enterprise orthodoxies. These comments have been corroborated by archival research carried out by Wegg-Prosser, who has shown that producer choice was anticipated by a much earlier series of organisational changes known as "the McKinsey reforms". Producer choice was redolent of these reforms in a number of specific ways, "change management" was initiated in response to the political and fiscal uncertainties associated with the ten-year cycle of Charter renewal; production departments were scrutinised by external change agents who sought to clarify financial information, and "organisational change" was implemented on a highly centralised top down basis, with highly equivocal results. As in the 1970s, the Birt "reforms" created a plethora of new controls in the run-up to the 1996 Charter renewal, only for these to be relinquished at a later date. Taken together, these features point to the idea that managerial discourses of enterprise and marketisation were undermined, as it were, "from within" an inherently bureaucra tic BBC but it can also be argued that the "counter reformation" which occurred under Greg Dyke was rooted in a much broader reflexive shift away from the doctrines of consumer sovereignty, debureaucratisation and internal markets. Virtually all of our respondents agreed that the centralisation of programme planning had undermined the creative assets of the BBCs in house output departments the reversal of these policies indicates that senior management viewed the centralisation of programme commissioning as a pyrrhic victory. However, the reversal of centralised planning reflects not just a revalidation of "producer power" but also a more general process of rethinking UK public sector broadcasting. This latter aspect suggests that the "hegemonic sway" of

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39

marketisation may be contested and displaced in ways which reflect the broader "conditioning structures" operating outside the organisation. The BBC's raison d'etre was threatened by the new context of deregulation and technological change in the early 1990s but subsequent events showed that the BBC retained its critical mass of production capacity, whilst the discourse of public sector broadcasting moved on from relatively simplistic notions of consumer sovereignty to more pluralized and diverse notions of public broadcasting. Conclusions

Producer choice can be understood as a strategic change narrative which drew heavily on rhetorics of marketisation and disaggregation, whilst centralising programming strategy .. The epochalist rhetoric of transformation promulgated by the Birt regime drew heavily on the notion of organisational salvation the belief that the BBC had to be saved from the threats posed by the onset of technological and regulatory c}:tange. These features are consistent with the idea that large-scale organisational change may be framed within a utopian "politics of forgetting" whose main purpose is to delegitimate the institutional past. The rapid technological and regulatory changes of the 1990s signalled a radicaIJy new, discontinuous future for the BBC. The changes which occurred within the organisation were, however, conditioned by key elements of cultural continuity and by a recursive tendency for old struggles to be periodically revisited as evidenced, for example, by the changing dynamics of control in programme commissioning. As in the 1970s, BBC senior management imposed a plethora of new controls in the years prior to the 1996 Charter renewal, only for these to be relinquished at a later date. Taken together, these features suggest that the historiography of the BBC should be understood not in

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terms of decisive organizational changes" or transitions, but with respect to recurrent surges" of managerial control which are interspersed with periods of creative autonomy. The BBC is currently experiencing a renewed phase of managerial control triggered by the Blair government's manipulation of foreign news coverage in the wake of the Gilligan affair. The years since the appointment of a new Director General in 2004 have seen renewed efforts to manage change on a top-down basis, indicating that the long-standing cultural antinomies noted by this paper are likely to pervade the BBC for some time to come. 1/

1/

3

The Great Wall of Bureaucracy The problem is one of attitudes, attitudes like Wu Ming's. I think we all understand now that politics is the enemy of economics. Unfortunately, politics is the very essence of Chinese life at every leve1. There is hardly anything else. In particular, Chinese culture is profoundly hostile to all forms of enterprise except the politica1. The simplest principles of rational economics for example, the notion that one might get ahead by hard work seem, to ordinary Chinese people, as bizarre as the tenets of some Polynesian cargo cult. To get ahead in ChiJ;lese society you cultivate "connections", trade favors and suck up to the Party mafiosi. In short, you play politics. Hard work has nothing to do with it. In China, wealth and success have always been inseparable from politics. Tsai Shen, the Chinese God of Wealth (whose picture can be seen pasted to doors in Hongkong at Lunar New Year) wears the uniform of an Imperial bureaucrat. Message the only proper path to wealth lies through power. I know a number of capable and ambitious young citizens of the People's Republic. They fall into two groups those trying to get into the Party, and those trying to get out of the country. A reader familiar with the Far East may object that these remarks do not at all describe the Chinese he has met in

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Hongkong and Taiwan. That is quite right; but Hongkong and Taiwan are very peculiar places. In both of them a large part of the population was long excluded from politics. In Hongkong there has never been any point in politics at all. In Taiwan, for most or the past 40 years power has been a monopoly of Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist Party, which recovered the island in 1945. The native Taiwanese (85 per cent of the population), having no advantage to hope for from politics, turned their energies to making money. Meanwhile the power of the ruling Nationalists was itself much qualified by social reforms forced upon Chiang at the point of a United States aid budget.

There is another difference, too, between the mainland Chinese and their offshore cousins. Even before their economic triumphs, these other Chinese had been deprogrammed (so to speak) by foreign rule, the Taiwanese by 50 years as a colony of Japan, the Hongkongers by a century under the Crown. Even Chiang's Nationalists, though they would not have won any prizes for parliamentary democracy, had been softened somewhat by contact with the West. Chiang, himself, for example, was a Christian. None of this has any equivalent on the mainland. Mao's Communists were an entirely Chinese phenomenon. Whatever Western influence existed in China when they came to power was expunged with terrible ferocity over the following quarter-century. Looking back at the tumult of those years, it is hard not to think that it was all done with the deliberate aim of re-Sinifying the Chinese, of restoring them to their ancient condition: a race of apathetic serfs, ruled over by an infallible bureaucracy. To think that China might "do a Taiwan" is preposterous. The people of Taiwan are free to come and go, to buy and sell, to pray and publish. Mainland China

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might be on another planet. There, a citizen may not even change his place of work or residence. these are, in fact, usually the same place. A Chinese factory is essentially a sort of open prison. Is this one of the things Teng wants to reform? It is not. He wants the Chinese richer, but he does not want them freer. Rather the contrary. One of his new measures will halve food subsidies. The authorities seem well aware that the resulting price increases might cause great discontent. It would be wildly out of character for them not to anticipate this unrest by tightening social control. The main instrument of control is, of course, the Party. The Party is most of China's problem. What Teng is seeking is economic vitality; but that can only exist when people are left to their own devices in matters of work, movement and property. Leaving people to their own devices is, to put it very mildly indeed, not the Chinese Communist Party's strong point. I hope that Teng's goulash communism will make the Chinese better off and I believe there's a good chance it will. But no, China is not going capitalist; for an essential component of capitalism is liberty. Compounding Teng's difficulties is the fact that he cannot sell his reforms direct to the masses. Between China's leaders and China's people stands the biggest shock absorber known to man, China's bureaucracy. People who live in free countries have quite the wrong idea about totalitarianism. Confusing absolute authority with absolute power, they imagine that the autocrat has only to stamp his foot to set the whole nation a-tremble. In fact Chinese history is rife with examples of emperors who stamped their Celestial feet until the cows came home, to no effect at all.

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Every society has its own equilibrium state. China is in equilibrium when the people are getting along well enough with the bureaucracy. Once that state has been reached it was reached by about 1980 in Communist China real change is exceedingly difficult. Let Teng huff and puff as he will; in a hundred thousand dozing towns and muddy hamlets the people of China will come to their own arrangements with the local despot and the factory Party secretary. "Heaven is high, the Emperor far away, sighed the Chinese of old. I happened to be in China last year when a new set of regulations on the hiring and firing of workers was announced in Peking. These reforms were not as drastic as those now being mooted, but they seemed to me quite daring. I asked a colleague, a low-level cadre, what he thought their effect would be. He shrugged. "Oh, you know, it's just another policy." There is the obstacle in Teng's path. For us in the West it seems astonishing to hear leaders in Peking speaking warmly of "capitalism". To the shell-shocked, enervated workers of China, snug now in their quilted winter jackets, secure with their siestas and "iron rice bowls" and familiar poverty, it may, after all, be just another policy.

4

Political Culture, Development Administration The Vantage Point In the past half century and more Southeast Asia has experienced radical change. The watershed decade 194050 saw the change from colonialism to Japanese wartime occupation to independence. From about 1950 a pervasive aim of Southeast Asian governments and people has been for economic development and welfare, raising human productivity and along with that human welfare, or the quality of life. The ensuing half century has seen some remarkable movements toward those general aims. It has also seen great variance in both the extent and character of that mcvement. Some states .have done very well in promoting development and welfare, a few have done very badly, and others are somewhere in between. With a half century of variance we are now at a useful vantage point from which to survey the process of economic development and welfare to ask the two basic question, how has the quality of life changed in Southeast Asia? And what are some of the conditions responsible for that change? Let me start with the outcome: the changing quality of life. From there I shall go backwards to ask what seems to

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have caused the variance. And from my title, you will know I shall pay special attention to the varying political cultures and to the varying performance of the development administrations that all countries have attempted to build. There are, of course, many complex conditions that have interacted to produce the varying outcomes of the quality of life that we see in the region. Initial resource endowments are important and the varying patterns of intrusion of the outside world have also played a critical role. I shall note some of these as we go along. Yet, important as these things are, I have the sense that something underlying each society, which I shall refer to as the political culture, has been of especial importance. And one of the ways this condition has been manifested and worked itself out is through the specific organizations that each society has created to promote economic development and social welfare. These organizations are what we collectively refer to as the development administration. Changing Quality of Life I: The Population

Here we can best begin with a view of population changes in the region, since these show us some fundamental aspects of both the quality of life and how it is affected. Population has grown rapidly from 178 million in 1950 to 522 million in 2000, and is projected to grow to 661 million by the year 2020. In this, the region is similar to the entire Less Developed Regions, which showed rapid population growth in the past half century, and led to fears of a "population bomb." As is well known, and illustrated in the two lower panels of Figure I, the rapid population growth resulted from a dramatic decline in mortality. Mortality fell quickly, while fertility remained at higher traditional levels, giving rise to a great increase in the growth rate of the population. At its highest in 1965-70, Southeast Asia's popUlation was growing at a rate of 2.5 percent per year, implying a

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doubling time of a mere 28 years. Then fertility began to fall after 1970 to approach the mortality levels by the year 2000; and fertility is expected to continue falling. This is what is kn
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argument of the organizational implications of the new technology. Think of DDT and Malaria eradication. Here was a new chemical that could kill mosquitoes in large numbers, precisely where they did the most damage, in human habitation. The WHO launched a world wide campaign against Malaria, a well known killer of children, transmitted by the now vulnerable mosquito. Governments created new armies of eradicators, organized in the fashion of modern military bureaucracies. Their foot soldiers marched through the country-side, guided precisely by statistically determined pathways to cover all households throughout the country. No military campaign was better directed or more successful. Houses were numbered, mapped, and sprayed. The mosquito vector was reduced dramatically and consequently malaria and infant mortality fell with it. This was all on the organizational blueprint of a modern bureaucracy. The same kind of approach was used with Smallpox, Yaws, Diarrehal diseases and a host of other infectious diseases. In effect, the technology of mortality control was bureaucratically portable. The same was true of the new contraceptive technology, generally available only after about 1965. The Intrauterine Contraceptive Device (IUCD), Oral Contraceptive Pills (OCP), Deproprovera injections, new condoms, subdermal implants, safe surgical sterilization for both men and women, and finally new and very safe abortion techniques became widely available in the decade after 1965. Like the mortality controlling technology, this fertility controlling technology was bureaucratically portable. It could be set in large-scale bureaucratic type organizations and applied in a relatively non-personal manner to very large numbers of people. Like the mortality controlling technology it did not require widespread changes in human behavior. It could be applied more or less impersonally.

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This takes us to the critical issue of Political Culture and Development Administration. Here we have two modern technologies to control both mortality and fertility. Each can improve the quality of life immeasurably. Moreover, each can placed in, and carried by, modern development organizations. Finally, those modern organizations are created and controlled by the state, which reflects the underlying political culture of the society. This is where we establish the link between political culture, development administration, and the quality of life. Where the political culture values the welfare of its people, it should be expected to create organizations that will produce a rapid decline in both mortality and fertility. Where a politic culture values other things, for example, the wealth and power of the wealthy, or of the "politically correct," or the conquest of others, we should not expect it to place high priority on creating organizations that can spread the new mortality and fertility reducing technologies. To use this argument to judge both the political culture and development administration of the countries of SE Asia. How do the states differ on their increases in the quality of life, or on the rates of mortality and fertility decline? And what does this say about their political cultures and development administration.

5 The Bureaucracy and Governance in Developing Countries Introduction

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has stated that good governance is perhaps the single most important factor in eradicating poverty and promoting development. If governance matters, so does the need for more reliable and valid data on key governance processes. Many analysts believe, however, that current indicators provide inadequate measures of key governance processes. Based on the perceptions of experts within each country, governance assessments were undertaken in 16 developing and transitional societies, representing 51 per cent of the world.s population. The aim of the World Governance Survey (WGS) was to generate new, systematic data on governance processes. To facilitate cohesive data collection and analysis, the governance realm was disaggregated into six arenas: (i) Civil Society, or the way citizens become aware of and raise political issues;

(ii) Political Society, or the way societal interests are aggregated in politics; (iii) Executive, or the rules for stewardship of the system

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as a whole; (iv) Bureaucracy, or the rules guiding how policies are implemented; (v) Economic Society, or how state-market relations are structured; and, (vi) Judiciary, or the rules for how disputes are settled. The project identified 30 indicators based on widely held principles of good governance, participation, fairness, decency, accountability, transparency and efficiency with five indicators in each arena. In each country, a national coordinator selected a small panel of experts 35-40 wellinformed persons (WIPs) to complete the assessment. The panel included, amongst others, government officials, parliamentarians, entrepreneurs, researchers, NGO representatives, lawyers and civil servants. Respondents were asked to rank each answer on a scale from 1 to 5; the higher the score, the better. In addition, respondents were invited to provide qualitative comments. The total governance scores have a very robust correlation with the country scores in Kaufmann et al.s aggregate governance indicators, indicating the validity of the results. Previous discussion papers looked at the issues of Governance and Development and Assessing Governance: Methodological Challenges. This paper focuses on the bureaucracy arena. Bureaucracy Arena The bureaucratic arena refers to all state organizations engaged in formulating and implementing policy as well as in regulating and delivering services. While issues of bureaucratic governance are not constitutive of development per se, they are seen as crucial determinants of the degree to which a country makes social and economic progress or fails to do so. This set of issues has been of

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concern since the advent of centralized administration, but they have taken on particular significance to academics and practitioners alike since the work of Max Weber some hundred years ago. In recent years, there has been increasing evidence, from case studies and cross-country empirical analysis, that bureaucratic performance is important for development performance. The literature on the role of the bureaucracy during the period of rapid growth in East Asia supports the view that the bureaucracy was a key ingredient of the miracle. At the same time, a substantial literature argues that the weakness of bureaucracy in Africa helps explain the poor development performance of many countries on the continent. Governance issues in the bureaucratic arena take on special significance given the massive pressures that have been placed on public agencies in recent years to become leaner, more efficient and bring services closer to the people. In many developing countries, in particular often as part of structural adjustment programs there have been pressures to dramatically reduce the role of the state in relation to the market and cut the size of the civil service (the numbers of employees and wage bill). Lack of economic and social progress in these countries has also led to many calls for improving the managerial efficiency of bureaucracies. The bureaucracy, however, should not only be studied in the context of implementation of individual policies, but also in terms of governance. The rules that determine procedures in the bureaucracy, whether formal or informal, are especially important for public perceptions of how the state operates. As we know, many contacts that citizens have with government are with first-level bureaucrats responsible for processing requests for services and assistance. The recent Voices of the Poor study provides a demonstration of the importance of this set of issues the poor highlighting that their experiences

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with bureaucrats are often unpleasant, unfair and corrupt. The implication is that the way countries organize relations within the bureaucracy and between the bureaucracy and Evans and J.E. Rauch, Bureaucratic Structure and Bureaucratic Performance in Less Developed Countries., other arenas in the public realm . may make a substantial difference when it comes to policy outcomes as well as the legitimacy of the regime. But, what rules matter? Following the work of Weber, the view that bureaucratic rules must be legal-rational has dominated. Others, however, have perceived bureaucracies in negative terms, highlighting the problems of combining formal rules and procedures with positive substantive outcomes. Much of the evidence has been limited to case studies and exploratory survey work. The lack of systematic data, both over time within countries and between countries around the world, means we remain uncertain as to what kind of bureaucratic structures and processes in different contexts lead to better bureaucratic performance. What rules matter most for efficiency and legitimacy? Are there tradeoffs involved? Are certain issues more important at different levels of development? Our study cannot provide full answers to these questions, but is meant to offer insights into the importance of the rules that guide policy implementation. The paper is set out as follows. It begins by providing a literature review around the key issues relating to the bureaucracy and development. It focuses primarily on the links between bureaucratic rules and bureaucratic performance, but sets it in the context of development performance as well. Following the analysis of the aggregate findings, we continue, as in previous papers, with a discussion of the findings in relation to each individual indicator. The concluding section discusses the implications for research and practice.

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Main Themes in the Literature There is a growing literature in the field of public administration that deals with governance. Much of it, as indicated in Working Paper One, is focused on the specifics of inter-agency cooperation given that problem issues are perceived as increasingly cutting across administrative jurisdictions. While that section of the literature is important, we will not engage it here, but rather focus on writings that bear directly on the issues facing developing countries, notably how bureaucratic performance can be improved and how such performance relates to development outcomes. We will begin with the latter. Bureaucratic Rules, Performance and Outcomes The relationship between bureaucratic performance and economic growth and development outcomes has been a subject of interest to the international development community as well as scholars for quite some time. Some forty years ago, it centered on the role of development administration., an approach to public administration that was meant to differ from a more conventional bureaucratic approach. More recently, some of the same assumption has reappeared with the additional insight that the quality of bureaucratic rules is essential for understanding how bureaucratic performance relates to developmental outcomes. The current assumptions may be summarized, as follows: Bureaucratic Rules ! Bureaucratic Performance ! SocioEconomic Development For instance, t."'1e current focus on governance in institutions like the World Bank and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) is almost exclusively on finding the links between improved government performance and development outcomes. Using the tool of regression analysis and a conception of governance that is primarily associated with

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qualities of state institutions, Kaufmann and his colleagues have created six scores for six dimensions of governance, of which the dimension. Government Effectiveness is particularly relevant to the discussion in this paper. This dimension includes ratings on such issues as the quality of the bureaucracy, the quality of service provision and the competence of civil servants. They find that government effectiveness is positively associated with per capita incomes and adult literacy and negatively associated with infant mortality. Kaufmann argues that the evidence suggests that the level of economic development does not necessarily lead to better governance and that the causality runs from good governance to better growth and development performance. The team at the World Bank is not alone. In recent years, a growing number of other actors have begun to rate the degree of bureaucratic performance in different ways (as part of broader assessments of country risk). For example, the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) provides ratings on various aspects of regulatory quality, rule of law, and corruption (among other issues) from a global network of national information gatherers reviewed by regional panels. The International Country Risk Guide, produced by Political Risk Services in New York, provides a direct measure of bureaucratic quality using a variety of indicators. Transparency International issues its annual Perception of Corruption Index. In sum, these agencies provide subjective assessments on some of the key issues of bureaucratic performance including government efficacy, red tape, and corruption among public officials. There have been a number of important studies that have used these data sets in empirical work investigating the importance of different aspects of bureaucratic quality for development outcomes. For example, using EIU data,

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Mauro found that the efficiency of the bureaucracy was associated with better rates of investment and growth whereas corruption was negatively related. Relying on ICRG data, Knack and Keefer found that bureaucratic quality, being used as part of a broader governance index, was positively associated with improved investment and growth rates. Chong and Calderon have reported a similar positive relationship between institutional quality and economic growth, although they also conclude that the reverse is true economic growth leads to better institutional quality. In going through the contemporary literature and also look at the contributions made in the past by others, who have studied the role of government in development, a theme that goes all the way back to Max Weber and his contemporaries, we were of the opinion when designing this study that it was necessary to go beyond the limits of cross-sectional studies using regression analysis. We commend the important work that Kaufmann's group makes in aggregating data and developing a stronger statistical basis for further analysis, but we also believe that their kind of data should be allowed to be only source of judging the role of governance in development. For instance, differences with regard to such key functions as (i) collecting revenues, (ii) providing public services, and (iii) regulating the economy cannot be measured only in statistical terms, especially if the objective is to identify ways of improving performance. The answers to such questions lie in the more qualitative sphere of data. As Evans and Rauch have put it, while the cross-country statistical evidence reinforces the idea that differential governmental performance may have an impact on economic growth, it tells us little about what kind of institutional characteristics are associated with lower levels of corruption or red tape. It is to this set of issues that we now turn.

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What Rules Matter for Bureaucratic Performance

There are a number of ways in which bureaucratic incentives and structures are thought to affect bureaucratic performance again with much of the theoretical support from the classic work of Weber. The main argument, articulated most clearly in Evans and Rauch, is that replacing patronage systems for state officials by a professional bureaucracy is a necessary (though not sufficient) condition for a state to be developmental. Public servants should act in the public interest. Weber argued that a key aspect was the distinction between public moneys and equipment and the private property of the official. Evidence from the miracle era in East Asia highlights meritocratic recruitment and deep bureaucratic traditions as crucial to their development success.

In contrast, it has been a standard theme in the literature on African states that public officials serve their own interests rather than that of the public. Much of the literature on how bureaucracies perform, centers on this fundamental issue. More specifically it deals with themes such as merit in recruitment and promotion, adequate incentives, rule orientation, and accountability. The need to have objective entry requirements or an independent body on public service employment is a key concern. Competence, and thus better performance, is seen as stemming from competition based on merit rather than personal contacts or illicit payments. Governments e.g. in Africa, have been accused of being more preoccupied with securing public employment than promoting the quality of the civil service. Even in the face of fiscal pressure, public employment has often been maintained and even expanded at lower skill levels. The World Bank has put it quite starkly. African governments have become employers of last

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resort and dispensers of political patronage, offering jobs to family, friends and supporters. This is not necessarily exclusive African problem, so we decided to focus on this issue in our study. Paying reasonable wages should encourage talented people to enter and remain in the civil service. In East Asia, adequate compensation of civil servants has been used as one means of attracting and retaining competent staff. It is not clear, however, how far better pay makes a difference when it comes to better performance and less corruption. For instance, most studies conclude that there is no positive link between higher salaries and lower levels of corruption, one exception being a study by Van Rijckeghem and Weder. Another important issue in the bureaucratic arena is the extent to which officials follow rules. Gear rules relating to how decisions are made and how civil servants conduct themselves are important for performance. Although the existence of clear rules is often related to how the public views the bureaucracy, it is also linked to how efficient it is. Clear decision-making rules are typically seen as enhancing efficiency. The risk of misuse of public office and poor decisions is seen as higher, the less clear rules are. Probing how our respondents experience the decision-making rules in the bureaucracy, therefore, is another indicator in our survey. Rules are also important for holding officials accountable. Rules internal to the bureaucracy may not be enforced unless there are control mechanisms and watchdog organizations. Audits, ombudsman institutions, anticorruption commissions, public censure or courts are mechanisms that have been used to hold civil servants accountable. Given the significance attached to the accountability issue, it is also included as an indicator in the WGS. Policy issues in society are typically complex and multidimensional requiring the insights of civil servants with

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professional and specialized competence. Structuring the policy formulation and implementation process such that government operations can benefit from the advice of professionals is seen to be an important issue affecting bureaucratic performance. The extent to which authority is given to specialized agencies to formulate policy indicates a strong role for bureaucrats. The existence of deep layers of political appointments in the bureaucracy would indicate a lesser role. The finding that the depth of political appointments was low in East Asia has been cited as one important reason for that region's economic success. We have opted to include the issue of professional influence in public policy-making as yet another indicator in this arena. Although there are varied opinions about the extent to which participatory 'approaches can be accommodated with bureaucratic decision-making, bureaucracies need a definite measure of autonomy from both politicians and the public. It cannot afford to be responsive to every demand placed upon it. A degree of autonomy, therefore, seems to be helpful when it comes to formulating and implementing development strategies. On the other hand, links to certain groups in society are common and sometimes institutionalized, as, for example in Japan and Korea, where relations between bureaucrats and business people have for a long time been quite close. On a .Weberianness. scale, such as the one produced by Rauch and Evans, these two countries would not score high on the autonomy measure, but they do have other qualities that place them high on such a scale. Comparing 35 countries largely from Asia and Latin America, they concluded that Weberian characteristics of the bureaucracy are positively correlated with economic growth even when controlling for level of development and human capital. They also found that the bureaucracies of

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Asia are more in an additional twenty countries in Africa and compared with the original data set from Rauch and Evans study. The original results were confirmed, better bureaucratic performance is associated with greater power and autonomy of agencies to formulate policies, good career opportunities in the public sector and good pay of public servants. Countries with a merit-based bureaucracy perform better, have lower corruption and higher efficiency in their service delivery, and provide a better framework for the private sector. A final issue for discussion here concerns public access to the bureaucracy. While autonomy may be important for its functions, it must be tempered by som-:! degree of accessibility. Without the latter, the legitimacy of the rules guiding this arena may be in question. This is particularly the case since some groups in society are more powerful than others. In our survey, we were interested to know to what extent efforts were made by state officials to ensure equal access to public services. WGS Data on the Bureaucracy: Aggregate Findings The framework for implementing policy is very important. Day-to-day management of government operations affects the impression citizens have not only of individual departments but often the regime as a whole. In other words, how policy-implementation is structured constitutes an important aspect of governance. The specific questions we used in the WGS were: 1.

To what extent are higher civil servants a part of the policy-making process?

2.

To what extent is there a merit-based system for recruitment into the civil service?

3.

To what extent are civil servants accountable for their actions?

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4.

To what extent are there clear decision-making processes in the civil service?

5.

To what extent is there equal access to public services?

As reported in Working Paper 3, there is clearly much discontent about the bureaucracy in many countries. The aggregate scores are among the lowest of all the different arenas. The bureaucracy also records relatively modest improvement over time. There are plenty of references in the commentaries that nepotism and various forms of corruption continue to affect the civil services in many countries. This section looks at two issues: (i) the aggregate scores for the countries, and (ii) the changes over time and some of the reasons behind these changes. Aggregate Findings The most important aggregate finding about the bureaucratic arena is that respondents rate performance considerably lower than in other arenas, especially civil society and the executive. Also interesting is the diversity of the top-scoring group of countries. It includes for year 2000, long-democratic India, Southeast Asian tiger Thailand, very poor Tanzania, Islamic Jordan and middleincome Chile. It suggests that bureaucratic performance is not necessarily dependent on level of GDP, type of regime or a particular culture. It can make a difference to the better in different economic or cultural settings. The five countries that score particularly low on this dimension. Togo, Kyrgyzstan, Indonesia, Philippines and Argentina are perceived to suffer from prevalent political patronage and the lack of transparency and accountability. It is worth looking at some of these high and low scoring countries in more detail.

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The reputation of the Indian civil service being the backbone of the country's government is generally confirmed. Indian respondents do recognize the bureaucracy's input into policy and its recruitment on the basis of merit criteria (although the overall rating fell marginally between 1996 and 2000). Both in international comparison and compared to the ratings for other arenas within India, the bureaucracy scores relatively well. In Mongolia respondents indicate that the power given to specialised agencies to formulate policy is very limited. The excessive role of political parties in bureaucratic appointments at all level of public administration contradicts the principles of a merit-based system of recruitment and equal access to public service. Since the structure of accountability at all institutional levels is underdeveloped, 'the transparency and responsiveness of the public administration is low. Bulgaria provides an interesting case of the challenges of reforming the bureaucratic arena after the shift to a market economy. Commentators noted that this was the most difficult arena to reform in the years of transition and the low average scores reflect these difficulties. The small improvement witnessed is attributed to the Law on Public Officials, elaborated and enacted by the government in power in 2000. This new legislation has reduced the number of political appointees and defined in no uncertain terms what the rights and obligations of civil servants are. Some parts of the old Communist order, however, are ')till present. Corruption is seen as widespread and accountability is still almost completely absent. Given that the survey was conducted before the financial crisis in Argentina, it is a little surprising that its scores in this arena are so low. The country has been undergoing public sector reform for quite some time with support from the international finance institutions. Our respondents

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indicate that there is little evidence of improvement in spite of these hefty investments in reform. They are very critical of the rules relating to good governance within the bureaucracy. i.e. with regard to hiring, transparency, and accountability. . Another surprise is Pakistan, but for the opposite reason. While governance in Pakistan is generally rated low, respondents are more appreciative of the rules applying to the bureaucratic arena. This seems to reflect the decline in other arenas. Party politics in the late 1990s was both chaotic and corrupt, eventually causing the military to step in and take over power. In this situation, the civil service has looked like a strong backbone, capable of getting the things done that other institutions have failed to do. While the civil service has appeared in increasingly favourable light in Pakistan, the opposite applies to Togo. President Eyadema.s long-standing rule himself a military officer has politicized public policy-making to a point where professional expertise is no longer valued as much as before. As one commentator put it, policies are implemented in compliance with the interests of the ruling group in power. Since civil servants are seen as essentially incompetent and corrupt, the low score is no surprise. The reasons for the low scores in Indonesia seem to vary from 1996 and 2000. In 1996, the main concern was the hold that President Suharto and his immediate associates had over the public service. Corruption was seen as widespread and even if it functioned, it did so in an arbitrary fashion that left large segments of the public dissatisfied. In 2000, it was the uncertainty associated with the transition from the Suharto era that explains the low score. Our respondents indicated that the situation after Suharto's resignation was characterized by confusion. Old

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rules continued to exist, but many of them had lost their credibility. New ones had yet to be agreed upon. Management of public affairs had suffered in quality. Changes over Time Five countries are rated considerably higher in 2000 than in 1996: Peru, China, Thailand, Tanzania and Indonesia. The reasons behind these perceived improvements differ. In Indonesia and Peru, they seem to be spillover effects of the regime change that took place as Presidents Suharto and Fujimori were forced out of power. In the other three, however, ratings seem to reflect a genuine satisfaction with improved public sector performance. That Thailand scores well in this arena is not a surprise. The bureaucracy in that country has generally been viewed as a key contributor to its economic growth and tiger status. However, more specifically, Thailand experienced significant institutional changes over the five-year period with the aim of balancing the power between the legislative, administrative and judicial sectors. Although these reforms do not explain everything behind the high scores in Thailand, they are an integral part of the sense among our respondents that governance in this arena has improved considerably. For those who have studied Tanzania, the scores in this arena may at first be a surprise. It has not been known for an effective or efficient public sector. The noticeable improvement in scoring, however, is a genuine reflection of the appreciation that respondents have of the implementation of public sector reforms since President Mkapa took over as head of state in 1995. This progress is now broadly acknowledged in the international community. In recent years, Tanzania has often been held up as a success story when it comes to getting public finances and operations in order. Among a range of

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governance reforms that have taken place in Tanzania are five major components, organization and efficiency reform, personnel control and management reform, capacity building, local government and regional administration reform, and rationalization of government employment reform. The successful implementation of these reforms is evident in our data: although still short of target, accountability and transparency are on the increase in Tanzania; greater equality of access is noted; appointments are increasingly based on merit and, expertise is now more appreciated. That pressures from the international community have played their part in this process should not overshadow the appreciation that the Tanzanian respondents have with the progress that'their country has made in this arena. Like Tanzania, China has long suffered from a bureaucracy with little autonomy of its own. During the heyday of Maoist rule in the 1960s and 1970s, party leaders made all decisions of importance with little regard for costs and benefits or feasibility. Professional expertise was scorned. This has changed subsequently, but to this day, the Communist Party of China has remained the principal policy-making organ. Nonetheless, with economic reform since 1978 has come an incremental change in the way civil servants contribute to the country,s development. Several public organs, not just enterprises, have received a greater degree of autonomy. Our respondents acknowledge that China has a long way to go with regard to opening up its bureaucracy to greater public scrutiny, but they also note ,that reforms keep occurring. In their view, changes in the governance of this arena are in the right direction. We cannot rule out the possibility that the marked improvement in Peru is a reflection of the euphoria that

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the end of the Fujimori regime brought to large segments of the population in that country. Our respondents note that the bureaucracy had little, if any, input into policy-making in the Fujimori days. Moreover, civil servants were hired, fired or promoted with little respect for the rules that are supposed to guide public employment. Even though, things remained somewhat uncertain in 2000, respondents reported significant improvements in public sector institutions and regulatory agencies. Especially appreciated is the rising level of professionalism. Another important improvement is the increased bureaucratic accountability. Holding the public service accountable was in the Fujimori days under the control of the government. It now lies with an independent judicial authority. Among countries registering a decline between 1996 and 2000, the Philippines exhibited the biggest fall. Respondents attributed this primarily to the corrupt and clientelistic rule of former president Estrada. His patronage system diluted the accountability of civil servants and transparency of bureaucratic processes. As one respondent put it, One good indicator of the strength of accountability mechanisms is the number of top public servants who have been sent to jail. There has been none in the Philippines. All these issues negatively affected the effectiveness of the system. In Kyrgyzstan, the bureaucracy received the lowest average score of all arenas and there was a noticeable overall decrease of the aggregate scores since 1996. This decline was present in all indicators, although it was especially noticeable with regard to meritocratic recruitment and equality of access to public services. One reason for this may be that administrative authority is so highly decentralized that civil servants easily end up in the hands of local political patrons. Reform of the civil service system is being attempted, aimed at increasing central direction and control, while also strengthening its transparency and

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the professional competence of individual government employees, but it seems that conflicts within the government about how the reform should be implemented have prevented much progress. Analysis of Individual Indicators

As suggested above, each indicator included in the WGS reflects a major focus in the vast literature on bureaucracy, but also a contemporary concern with how public services should perform. It is possible that additional relevant indicators could have been included, but we believe that we have captured the most significant determinants of bureaucratic performance: (1) Influence, (2) Meritocracy, (3) Accountability, (4) Transparency, and (5) Access. We shall now examine each one of them more closely. Influence

We were interested here in the extent to which higher civil servants were part of the policymaking process. Three main issues deserve attention. The first is the broad agreement among respondents across countries that higherlevel civil servants have influence on policy, albeit not just as experts. Pakistan and India stand out in this regard. In both countries, respondents quite strongly point out that civil servants are an important part of the policy making process. The same is true for some other countries, including Russia, but respondents there mention that only some top bureaucrats, notably those in the President's Office are really influential. Higher civil servants in sectoral ministries are much less influential. The second observation is that many respondents see politicization of top positions in the bureaucracy as inevitable and not necessarily harmful. The point that respondents are making in e.g. Chile and Thailand is that reliance on public servants who are first and foremost technocrats may make the bureaucracy less sensitive to

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public interests and, by extension, less concerned about issues such as accountability and transparency in the service. There is also a question of where to draw the line of responsibility between elected and appointed officials. In countries with relatively stable bureaucratic structures, such as Chile, there is a tendency among respondents to argue for more input by elected political officials. Respondents in the Philippines, however, harbor the opposite view. As one of them noted, The more personalized and populist the leadership, the more diminished the role of technocrats and professional civil servants. Indonesia provides an interesting case of change and complexity. By the end of the Suharto regime, the policy making process was highly centralized. Some higher civil servants had a significant influence on policy, but only those advisers who formed the inner circle of his government. On other issues such as public finance, technology, and public health, Suharto was more dependent on his ministers. Thus, even though higher civil servants in some policy areas, their ability to influence policy-making was not universal, nor guaranteed. It depended on personal loyalty to the president. It is interesting that, according to our respondents, Suharto's departure has not increased the influence of civil servants. On the contrary, because of the introduction of a more genuine multi-party democracy than in the past, elected politicians demand to have more influence than the experts in the puhlic service. The third issue that emerges is that respondents acro~s countries believed that bureaucrats were more influential in the implementation rather than the formulation of policy.

Interestingly, this issue came out most repeatedly and strongly for China. Respondents noted that the influence varies from one sector to another. For instance, local

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bureaucrats often have enough discretion to twist central government policy in directions other than those originally intended. Comments by respondents also in other countries tend to confirm Lipsky's point that policy implementation in the end boils down to what street-level bureaucrats decide to do. The conclusion to be drawn is that top bureaucrats do not always have as much influence of what really happens in the end as is often implied in the analysis of the role that this group plays in the policy-making process. Meritocracy The rules guiding recruitment have long been regarded as a key issue for successful policy implementation, regulation and provision of services. We refer not only to formal issues such as the existence of an exam. but also the ways that they operate in practice. Our survey, and comments by our respondents accompanying it, makes it clear that very fe~ countries have a merit-based system for recruitment. India stands out as the main exception. Merit recruitment prevails in India, although respondents indicate that scheduled castes and tribes are not able to compete with other groups in society. None of the other countries scored above 3 for this indicator except for Tanzania, which reflects, as indicated above, its improvement in recent years. For most countries, commentators seem to agree that recruitment is done arbitrarily, with little or no reference made to merit. Qualifications are not taken into account in an objective way in choosing bureaucrats. Many commentators point to the lack of a proper exam or that exams are seen as a sham. In Togo, there used to be an exam, but it has now been stopped. In Jordan, one commentator lamented that the main problem is that government agencies are overstaffed and that employment rules in the public sector

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needs improvement, giving priority to qualifications. The most commonly used reference is to political interference in civil service appointments. Having the right personal connections is important, as the respondents in the Philippines suggested. Nepotism is an issue also in countries like Indonesia and Togo. The situation in Latin American countries also seems problematic. In Argentina, most experts noted that there is no merit-based system for recruitment into the civil service. This means that family members and friends are recruited into the government. Suggestions for bureaucracy reform included the introduction of a more competitive recruitment system in order to increase the number of professionals in the civil service. Even in Chile, which is a country generally scoring quite high, the ratings of the bureaucratic arena is lower than the country average. Our respondents complain about the immobility of the civil service and need for new statutes to reduce politicization of appointments and to attract more professional staff. In Russia too, recruitment of bureaucrats is a major problem. One respondent after another noted that there is little use of merit criteria. Recruitment depends on personal ties. The result is that people without training or experience often get to fill high posts. Although merit-based recruitment to the bureaucracy is only one of five indicators, our survey suggests that the lack of it in most countries is a serious shortcoming. Not only does it affect performance, but it also calls into question the role that government plays in development. The sense of unfairness and discontent that it breeds, adversely affects the whole regime on which governance rests. Accountability Civil servants often have a degree of discretion in their work and the way they implement rules and provide

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services can have significant impact on citizens. Therefore, systems of accountability are considered important to reduce corruption or other forms of misuse of public office. We asked respondents to consider the degree to which civil servants were accountable for their actions. As can be seen, the accountability scores are generally low, indicating that this is another problem area. The main issue here seems to be that institutional mechanisms, although they exist, don.t really work. The main exceptions are Thailand and, interestingly, Pakistan under military rule. Administrative reform in Thailand has been far reaching and has included the establishment of a range of institutions aimed at holding bureaucrats publicly accountable. These include an Anti-Corruption Commission, a special Administrative Court, and an Ombudsman institution aimed at providing a forum for launching complaints against administrative decisions. Implementation of these reforms has been facilitated by the fact that all government officials also those elected must declare their interests and show their private assets and liabilities. These steps are quite bold and have, as indicated by our respondents, changed the overall perception among the pUblic of the civil service in a positive direction. Accountability of civil servants in Pakistan has improved since the military took over. This is the message from our respondents. In fact, they argue that even though they don't know for how long this will last, accountability of the public service has become a major priority of the military government. Several civil servants have been dismissed and some have been prosecuted for abuse of public office. These steps have been in response to the soft nature of the state apparatus during the previous democratically elected government. Laws and institutional mechanisms for holding public officers accountable existed but were not systematically enforced, leaving the public with the

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impression that the system was quite corrupt. Civil servants took advantage .of the corruption at ministerial level, allowing it to become institutionalized from top to bottom of the government. It is clear that behavior in the civil service is very much dependent on how the political leadership behaves. If the elected politicians are not corrupt, they tend to set an example that is emulated in the bureaucracy. If, on the other hand, they are corrupt, this tends to spread to the civil service too. The cases of the Philippines and Russia highlight this.

Cronyism and political patronage set the stage for underrrining both merit-based recruitment and efforts at holding civil servants accountable. The latter often use their offices to get rich and promote their own interests at the expense of the public. The conclusion that we like to draw from this study is that holding civil servants accountable is a complicated issue. Establishing institutional mechanisms, such as the Ombudsman, Auditor-General's Office, or onetime commissions aimed at curbing corruption, is only an important first step. The real challenge is to make these bodies use their teeth. Our respondents in most countries indicate that these specific institutions have been largely ineffective. Instead, accountability has come from demands made by the media or, as in Indonesia, pressures exercised by members of the public. Although the media cannot really be described as the fourth estate in the countries included in our study, we believe that when it comes to holding officials accountable, they are at least as effective in many countries as other mechanisms in place. Transparency Although transparency is a controversial issue in some governments around the world, there is an increasingly

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widespread view that clear rules and openness reduce the risk of misuse of public office. Similarly, if the public is not adequately informed about how decisions are made, this adversely affects the image of the bureaucracy. Our survey investigated to extent to which there are clear decisionmaking processes in the civil service in the sixteen countries. The overall results are worrying. The scores for this indicator are generally low for each country and are among the lowest obtained in the whole survey. Clearly, many WIPs believe that the operations of the civil service lack real transparency. There was some variation with Tanzania, Thailand and Jordan scoring a bit better and Argentina, Kyrgyzstan, Indonesia and Togo scoring more poorly. That Argentina was the lowest rated country will raise some eyebrows, but the respondents were extremely critical of the situation there. Generally, however, it is interesting that many respondents comment that they do perceive a public demand for greater transparency. Not surprisingly perhaps, the scores for transparency tend to be quite close to those recorded for accountability. One tends to go hand-in-hand with the other, the only exception being Pakistan. While accountability improved notably with military rule, transparency deteriorated marginally. Commentators note that decision-making rules became more obscure and consultation with the public less frequent. It is worth mentioning that transparency is an issue that cuts across regime type. We find this being a source of disaffection in Argentina and Peru countries with a democratic legacy. as well as in China with its long tradition of Communist rule. This is not to imply that the issue of transparency is the same everywhere. We find that some countries try to introduce it, while others do not even try. The country coordinator for Bulgaria may have stated the problem better than anyone else when he commented that

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this is definitely an issue that takes time to deal with. It involves an attitudinal change not just among bureaucrats but also among politicians and the public at large. The important thing is that any measures taken, enhances the degree of legitimacy of the regime, even if it is only incremental at a time. Although progress is slowly being made, not the least thanks to organizations like Transparency International, judging from our study, much more needs to be done to enhance the legitimacy of bureaucracy, in particular, and the regime, in general. Access The final indicator in this arena concerns equal access to public services: This is seen as an important issue for the legitimacy of the civil service as well as for development outcomes. Given what has been said about the bureaucracy already, it is no surprise that access to services is perceived to be unequal in many of the WGS countries. The scores for most countries are low, with the exception of Thailand, Jordan and Chile. They are particularly low in Pakistan and Kyrgyzstan. The reasons for the scores seem to vary along four different lines. The first is the recognition that a country.s size complicates access. This comes across in comments made by respondents both in China and Indonesia. The vast expanses of western China are definitely handicapped compared to the eastern coastal belt of the country. In Indonesia, respondents point to the outlying islands as having more difficulty of taking advantage of public services than the main island of Java. Smaller countries like Jordan and Togo score comparatively better on this particular indicator than on others, confirming the thesis that geography matters. In Jordan, for instance, the new Civil Service Bylaw of 1998 goes quite far toward local district control of both government services and human resource development. The second point that comes out of

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our study is that urban residents are favored over their rural counterparts. This is no surprise given the cost of extending infrastructure to' the countryside as compared to urban areas. Respondents in the Philippines, for example, note that residents of the metropolitan areas, especially Manila, are much better served than other parts of the country. By and large, therefore, these people have easier access than those in the villages, especially on the outlying islands. Respondents in Chile, India, and Russia also make this point. The rural population is seen as being at a disadvantage when it comes to access to government services, whether welfare provisions or extension advice. ,'" The third point regards differential access and social stratification. There are surprisingly few references to unequal access being the result of social or economic inequalities in society. The observation that it matters, however, comes out in the comments provided by Indian and Pakistani respondents, in particular. Access to public services among the poor in these countries is low. Thus, even if the bureaucracy is meritocratic and civil servants have an influence on policy, this seems to make little difference on the ground for the poorer segments of the population. Respondents in our study also suggest that the better off in society often have privileged access to services as a result of being able to pay bribes. In sum, the inclusion of the access variable has convinced us that changes in the governance of the bureaucratic arena are difficult to achieve from within and may be more easily facilitated by thinking of how its relations to other arenas, notably government and civil society, are constituted. The fourth point concerns the fact that even if there is officially equal access, the quality of services differs from one area to another. As indicated above, wherever demand is high, such as in the urban areas, quality tends to be better than in those places where demand is low. This type of

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difference may also stem from political favoritism. The quality of public services in areas where government ministers come from is often better. As indicated above, the issue of access to public services is important. Unequal access is the result of more than one factor. Often geography, demography and social stratification coincide to make greater equality in access to public services ·a very complicated and costly issue. Mustering the political will to achieve such a transformation is not easy. One can expect, therefore, that overcoming the deficiencies associated with this indicator may be more difficult than those identified in relation to the other four indicators in this arena. Implications for Research and Practice As in previous papers, we will first make our main conclusions from the analysis in this paper. Four observations stand out as especially important. The first is that bureaucracy is one of the more problematic arenas of governance. Respondents in most of the WGS countries were little impressed with governance of this arena. Hiring is rarely on merit, bureaucrats are seldom seen to be accountable, and the operations of the civil service often lack real transparency. The WIPs rated these issues lower than most other indicators in the survey and commented extensively on their frustrations in this arena. It is clear that issues of bureaucratic governance affect the legitimacy of the public realm. and that this is the case for all the indicators we focused on. The second point is that the relationship between rules and structures, on the one hand, and performance, on the other, is difficult to establish. It is not that the link is unimportant. It is, but even disaggregated, it is hard to know what rule has what kind of effect. Our third observation is that reforming the bU1'ectucratic arena is really difficult. One

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of our country coordinators summarized it well when he said. This arena has proved hardest to reform in the years of transition and the average scores are just another evidence of these difficulties. It is clear that reforms take time to implement and even longer to have an impact on development outcomes. Above all, it must be recognized that it is not merely a technical. issue. The bureaucratic arena cannot be treated in isolation from other governance arenas, although public sector reform efforts have tended to do so. Our findings indicate that a pure public administration perspective may be too narrow and technical in many cases and fail to focus on the real problem. The fourth observation we want to make is that reforming the bureaucracy requires sensitivity to regimespecific issues. Context matters, but it is encouraging that level of development, according to our study, is not a critical issue. It is possible for poor countries to improve bureaucratic governance. Socio-economic conditions are not necessarily impeding reforms in this arena. Tanzania and Thailand are two very different countries where reforms have been undertaken and progress has been registered. Given the dominance in this research field of the work done by the World Bank team, led by Daniel Kaufmann, it may be especially appropriate that we discuss the implications for research in conjunction with their work. We are hesitant to make a direct comparison between our study and theirs, given differences in conceptualization and operationalization of the concept, but by choosing our access indicator and comparing it with the World Bank's Government Effectiveness measure, we find quite a high correlation coefficient 0.658.36. When examining the relationship between the other four indicators and bureaucratic performance, we found that the findings are more ambiguous as the relationships vary considerably.

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Meritocracy seems to be the least significant. Although qualitative comments by our respondents indicate that merit criteria in appointment and promotion are important for the credibility of the civil service, there is no clear link between this indicator and performance. Participation by higher civil servants in policymaking is another enigmatic indicator. We found little evidence to suggest that participation of higher civil servants in policymaking is necessarily a good thing in and of itself. Our respondents make comments to the effect that a certain degree of politicization is not only inevitable but sometimes a good thing. This indicator, therefore, is highly regimedependent: the strength of expert advice works well in some regimes but may be less valued in comparison to other criteria, such as political loyalty, in others. This is where we recognize that the purely quantitative analysis of governance shows its limitations. Additional case sbdies may be needed in order to throw more light on the issues where there is a deviation from the ideal model advocated by agencies in the international development community. In our study, transparency and accountability proved to be the indicators where there is some evidence of a correlation with performance. Comparing our average scores on this indicator with the Bank's Government Effectiveness scores for 2000/01, we found correlation coefficients at 0.48 and 0.49 respectively. Even if we allow for problems with comparability, our study indicates that these two variables seem to be more important for improving bureaucratic performance. Given this finding, we also carried out a simple additional piece of analysis by comparing the two indicators with the access indicator. What we found is that, (a) if both transparency and accountability are low, service performance is rated low;

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(b) if either transparency or accountability are low and the other is rated high, service performance is likely to be in a medium-low range; (c) if both transparency and accountability are medium, service performance is also rated medium. This gives us an additional indication that transparency and accountability do have a potential influence on performance. Th~ is obviously an interesting and important finding for all those who are in the business of improving public administration or public sector performance. Our study suggests that these are issues that should be given primary attention. This study also provides encouragement for organizations like Transparency International that is in the forefront of combating corruption by working practically on issues such as accountability and transparency.

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Leading the Future of the Public Sector: The Third Transatlantic Dialogue To the best of my knowledge, this is the first paper of its kind to analyze the gender representativeness of bureaucrats cross-nationally. It discusses the dearth of comparative representative bureaucracy literature and places this paper within the context of American scholarly literature on representative bureaucracy. After commenting on the disconnect between these literatures and the broadbased international developing literature, it uses panelcorrected time series data in attempt to narrow these scholarly divisions through representative bureaucracy research. My analysis finds that higher levels of income per capita are statistically significant predictors of the percentage of female civil servants at the central government and sub-national levels while greater fiscal decentralization and the percentage of female parliamentarians are also statistically significant predictors at the central government level. It concludes by noting that the commonality discovered across countries of women serving more frequently at the sub-national than central government levels requires further investigation. The act of participation in government itself is the vehicle for empowerment". In a 1999 article on India and South

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Africa, Milton Esman declared that bureaucratic representativeness is an important tool for increasing government legitimacy. Despite this observation from one of America's top comparative public administration scholars, it remains empirically unexplored cross-nationally. By analyzing the representativeness of female bureaucrats at the national and sub-national levels, this paper begins to bridge that gap. It asks whether proxies for the structural, political and economic features of a country have a bearing on the gender representativeness of female civil servants at the national and sub-national levels. Beginning first with an overview of what is understood within the American representative bureaucracy literature before attempting to link this understanding with broader international currents, the paper will then delve into a discussion of the variables of interest, the empirical analysis, findings and suggestions for further research. Representative Bureaucracy: An American Project? There is remarkable agreement about whom to credit the discovery of representative bureaucracy. In 1944, J. Donald Kingsley coined the term "representative government" in a" study of British civil servants. Observing gender and class distinctions within the British civil service, he noted that as British society became middle-class, its civil service might also become inhabited by the middle-class. Unlike later research that normatively explores both gender and ethnic representation within the civil service, Kingsley merely argued that "representational participation" should lead to functional effectiveness. Nevertheless, his observations launched a field of inquiry intu representative bureaucracy. In 1948, Dwight Waldo's discipline-changing argument that there was no dichotomy between politics and administration implied that civil servants are political creatures. As one modem-day author

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wrote, "If bureaucracy were always neutral in its values, always obeyed elected superiors, and always limited its activities to the enforcement of public laws and rules, then most controversies surrounding bureaucracy would melt away. This departure from the earlier public administration orthodoxy made it possible for public administration scholars to consider that the sociopolitical appearance of civil servants also mattered. In other words, bureaucracies, their civil services and the civil servants themselves are not apolitical machines. Civil servants perform inherently political tasks and discretion is utilized in the performance of the tasks. The idea behind representative bureaucracy research in America was two-fold. If we encourage representative bureaucracy, the policies that 'bureaucrats help design and then later implement will better reflect the citizenry they serve. And second, that it we wish to better understand the discretionary outputs of civil servants, we should study the sociopolitical and socioeconomic characteristics of those who filled the civil servant shoes. On a more theoretical level, if one allows for the fact that representativeness matters within an administrative structurethis implies one's agreement that civil servants are not apolitical actors. In contrast, the belief that the Weberian model is either normatively ideal and or is empirically most efficient suggests that the administrative structures are uniquely apolitical facilitators of policy; separate from the politicized legislative or executive leadership positions. Analysis of bureaucratic systems in other countries indicates that among the non-politically appointed civil servants, this assumption of American public administration may not hold cross-nationally or even whether this dichotomy is uniquely American. While this concept cannot be studied in detail within this paper, we can begin to attack this problem by looking at how gender is distributed within

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the civil services in other countries. Nevertheless, by the 1950s and 1960s public administration scholars began to normatively argue that it mattered "which set of bureaucrats" controlled the policy process. Intellectual jumps were being made from the assumed political nature of civil servant work to determining whether these bureaucrats were themselves representative of their broader public. Bureaucratic representativeness was pertinent since it" provided a means of fostering equity in the policy process by helping to ensUre that all interests are represented in the formulation and implementation of policies and programs. By the large, over time, scholars came to agree that representative bureaucracy increases government legitimacy, accountability, effectiveness, and participation. For the purpose of this paper, it is assumed that representative bureaucracy a priori is beneficial. Passive and Active Representation: Civil Service and Legislative Literatures Scholarly research has differentiated two types of representative bureaucracy passive and active. Using gender as an example, passive representation occurs when the number of female civil servants mirrors the ratio of employment-age women within society. Active representation occurs when female civil servants use their position to affect policy options favorable to women. While few would argue that a civil service representative of the gender, religious or ethnic differences of the citizenry is an unworthy objective, disagreements exist about if and when these civil servants become active representatives of their sociopolitical traits. It has been argued that a passive representation of women can affect the public organization, but that it need not lead to active representation. Others hypothesized that what mattered was not which societal group the bureaucracy represented but that what was important was the power of the agency itself, as an entity, to influence

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policy outcomes favorable to the groups represented in society. Moving to active representation, American scholars ask "when are female bureaucrats merely standing for women and when might we expect them to act for women. 1/

Keiser, argued that not only bureaucratic structures that influence civil servants, but that the civil servants themselves symbiotically influence the structure. The researchers found an empirical link between passive and active representation, in particular in relatively flat institutional hierarchies. Furthermore, men and women react differently to their roles as administrators and that specifically, women "devote more time on both developing policy and garnering public support. In a study on the impact of minority teachers on the standardized test performance of Texas students, it was determined that increases in minority teachers lead to increased performance for both minority and Anglo students. The study concludes" representative bureaucracies are more effective at meeting their goals than nonrepresentative bureaucracies in similar circumstances. Within the American legislative branch literature, scholars have found that women seek office and are elected to office more frequently at the sub-national level than the national level. Once in office, female legislators often view policy issues differently from men and are more likely "act for" women by creating policies beneficial to this constituency. A study of female appointees to public office in the late 1970s and early 1980s confirmed these observations for the highest levels of public service. The author found that appointed women more often held feminist views and were inspired and assisted by other women. Representative Bureaucracy Cross-Nationally, Why it N ever Became a Priority Where does representative bureaucracy fit into broader comparative tren4s of comparative research? The disappointing answer is that it

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is not a priority for either comparative public administration scholars or among those international financial institutions and aid agencies' that influence civil service development of dozens of developing nations. This paper posits that the reason for the first omission has been a historical lack of data and the reason for the second is related to first along with an acknowledgement that the neoliberal agenda and its efficiency-first method espoused by these international institutions overlooks the politics that drive bureaucratic decision-making and implementation. The fact that comparative public administration has long suffered from deficient data is not new. The case study movement that spearheaded the 1950s era in American public administration would be transferred to comparative public administration in the 1960s and 1970s by such comparative leaders as Fred Riggs and Milton Esman. These case studies, following the methodological trends of the broader social science community, were predominately qualitative with descriptive statistics included as available and on an as-needed basis. The trend for one-country case studies or one-country studies of aspects of administrative system has continued today. Broad-based data gathering objectives on public administration systems, functions, or processes have been, and continue to not be, scholarly priorities. Instead, comparative public administration scholars sought to use their case studies to create administrative typologies that modeled bureaucracy and/ or its functions and processes. Others trained developing country public administrators on how to Westernize their local bureaucracy and civil service. American scholars busied themselves listing normative reasons behind the "failures" of public administration in the developing world, and as importantly, repeatedly trying and failing to implement a Weberian ideal":type bureaucratic system within the

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developmental context. Conspicuously absent was an emphasis on representative bureaucracy. Further hampering discussion of representative bureaucracy is the fact that the bureaucratic unit, as a whole, has been and continues to be favored unit of analysis. As a result, comparative investigations of even civil service systems and much less, their. representative aspects, remain at best "unavailable or tentative". At the same time, scholars in the field of comparative politics were making scholarly contributions that would change the field of focus for internationally oriented public administration scholars. In 1960, Walter Rostow argued that all countries could be placed along one of five stages of economic development: the traditional society, the pre-conditions for take-off, the drive to economic security, and in the stage where most . Western nations fell, the age of mass consumption. The common policy denominator was that modernization could be achieved through economic reform. Certain comparative public administration scholars and political scientists who concerned themselves with study of bureaucracy found room for modernization theory in their studies but more generally, the comparative politics scholars were organizing around another trend whereby the primacy given to politics and administration for solving problems of development would soon become eclipsed.

Rostow's work would lead to the primacy of a new group of social scientists the economists. And here is where the separation between comparative public administration and international development would see its first fissures. At the 1968 Minnowbrook Conference at Syracuse University, public administration scholars found themselves frustrated observers of the political and social changes occurring in America. Viewing the field of public administration as still unable to build a theory of public administration, and worse, after years of case studies, unable to predict or solve

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the then present-day social movements, the scholars sought to create a "new" public administration. This "new" focus asked public administrators to involve themselves in an inherently political task improving social equity. For these scholars, their tools included decentralization and representative bureaucracy. Decentralization "was viewed as one means of clarifying and strengthening the link between the bureaucracy and the citizenry". While this focus on decentralization as a method for improving policycitizen linkage would resurface years later among World Bank economists, the field of American public administration would tum inward and begin, in earnest, a research agenda that considered representative bureaucracy in greater detail. More recently, the evolving re-interest of comparative politics scholars in the "state" and of international donor agencies in "governance" has led us to the early stage of broader-based dataset development. Many of these datasets only began their active life in the early to mid-1990s and as such, their usefulness beyond small-year studies is not yet upon us. Even though this study will draw from the more established Government Finance Statistics compiled by International Monetary Fund (IMF), this study would not be possible without use of the newly compiled governance database of the World Bank. More detail will follow in the Methodology nad Data section. Representative Bureaucracy: StiU Not an International Priority The resulting fascination within the development community over economic theory led to fiscal reform, trade liberalization, and privatization policies (implemented via "structural adjustment" packages) to dominate international development from the early 1980s to the mid-1990s. With many developing countries facing high debt GNP ratios and low or inconsistent- annual growth, structural adjustment was viewed as the cure and

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necessary condition for further international assistance. By 1989, the development community had put together a list of ten lessons learned from these development practices. If this socalled "Washington Consensus" incentivized the fiscal and market structures of an economy, the newly emerging second-generation reforms of the mid-1990s would focus on just the opposite, incentivizing and reforming institutions. This rediscovery of governance was brought about by new analyses indicating that structural adjustment reforms, while reducing inflation and overall economic uncertainty, occurred at a cost an increase in poverty and inequality. The primary tool for rediscovering governance and the importance of the state and its institutions was decentralization. According to one author, this conception of the state and its institutions exists because international financial institutions like the World Bank see "no solid line connecting citizens and government appointees, only elected officials, not bureaucrats, represent citizens. The adherents of this interpretation seek the protection of democratic values from an assumed influx of "bureaucratic despotism" . Among World Bank policymakers, decentralization is policy tool considered capable of promoting newlyimportant propoor development policies such as increasing political legitimacy, empowering disadvantaged groups (by ethnicity or by gender), and strengthening local community participation. Its familiarity to scholars supportive of the social equity movement within public administration should recognize familiar ideas, even if they disagree with the Bank of the proper solution. Unlike "representative bureaucracy," there is little agreement as to how to define decentralization. Since the decentralization data for this study are from the IMF and the World Bank, their definitions are utilized. Most broadly

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stated, decentralization is a multi-dimensional process that involves the transfer of political, fiscal and administrative responsibilities and powers from the central government to intermediate and local governments". 1/

There are three generally agreed-upon types of decentralization political, fiscal, and administrative. Fiscal decentralization is defined by the World Bank as the transferring of expenditure responsibilities and revenue assignments to lower levels of government". In practice, the World Bank only publishes cross-national data on the share of sub-national expenditures and tax revenues as a percentage of national expenditures and tax revenues without referencing the authority or ability of the subnational governments to collect, spend, or manage these monies. The authority to do that task at the sub-national level requires administrative decentralization while merely having a jurisdictional area below the nation-state requires political decentralization. Due to data limitations, this study focuses only the linkage between fiscal decentralization and civil servant gender representativeness. 1/

Reforming the governing institutions of developing countries has been a long-term focus of the World Bank. The decentralization of those institutions along nea-liberal lines is a newer occurrence. Given World Bank leadership in international development policy and practice, its projects are an indicator of development priorities. The World Bank approved its first project with a decentralization component in 1975 and 12 more projects would be approved in the 1970s and 1980s. Between 1990 and 1997, 151 projects with a decentralization component were deployed. With the World Bank's publication of Beyond the Washington Consensus: Institutions Matter (WorldBank, 1997), approval for projects with a decentralization component doubled. Since 1998, over 300 more have been approved at a rate of 37 projects per year and total cost of $23 billion. Even

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though the World Bank relates decentralization and public administration within the projects, civil service representativeness is infrequently discussed. Instead, civil servant (re) training, (re) appropriation of their functions, creating effective processes, and improving bureaucratic outcomes are goals. These topics are also key components of U.s.-based public administration research. Yet, a primary difference between u.s. research and the work of the international development community is the inattention of the latter to representative bureaucracy. In conclusion of this section, we must come to this "rediscovery" of the persistent, long-term, multidimensional nature of poverty. In response to this observation, over 190 countries agreed to eight development goals, which they insist will reduce world poverty in half by 2015. The third of these socalled Millennium Development Goals is the empowerment of women and the promotion of gender equity. The quantitative measures for determining progress include measures of literacy, the percentages of women serving in parliament, and shares of wage employment. Arguing that these measures of empowerment are important, but not sufficient, this study goes beyond calls for increased gender equity in the legislature to explore gender equity within the civil service. Measuring Passive Representation Cross-Nationally Even though the debates on active representation are more" current" within the U.S.based public administration literature, this paper cannot make the assumption that active representation of civil servants is of sociopolitical importance cross-nationally in part because available data do not allow individual-level or agency-level analysis. In other words, data limitations shunt our ability to study representative bureaucracy crossnationally in any form other than passive representation. This is a similar starting point to where representative

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bureaucracy began its own research in the 1970s, that is, only focused on passive and not active, representation. In the 1970s, this literature frequently looked at the political and economic backgrounds of civil servants. Able to use individual or agency-l~vel data, variables explored included: age of civil servant, ethnicity of civil servant, previous civil service employment, father's occupation, political views or political activity of civil servant, salary level, educational specialization, region, hours worked by civil servant, regulatory and redistributive functions of agencies or work habits, gender of mentor, organizational factors. It is important to note that none of these variables are currently available cross-nationally. Several of the above variables attemptto understand the work environment and past experiences of the civil servants. Others, more relevant to this study, are exploring sociopolitical and socioeconomic perspectives. In 1976, Meier and Nigro explored the regional origin of civil servants to see if there was a urban-rural bias. In contrast, this paper explores geographical space quite differently. If, in the legislative literature, women are more likely to seek political office at the subnational (i.e. state, province, city, town) levels, we should if they also more likely to serve as civil servants at the sub-national level as well?

Looking at data from the International Labour Organization (ILO) shows that indeed, more American women served as civil servants at the sub-national levels (58.7 percent) than at the national level (42.7 percent) between 1996 and 2004. If it is true that women do serve more frequently' at the local levels, what might be the reasons? One option is structural. That is, due the federalized nature of the American system, there are opportunities available for women to serve at the local level. These opportunities may not be available in countries either where the central government drives policy and action and/

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or there is no decentralization of policy-making, implementation or even tax and spend authorities. This lack of U.S. based research on this topic is primarily due to the relatively unchanging federal nature of federal, state and local structures as well as the fact that comparative research has not, until recently within the international development arena, considered a decentralized structure as a prerequisite to greater accountability, representativeness and government effectiveness. With the unit of analysis for this study remaining at country and sub-national levels, v available proxies for measuring political and economic opportunities include both measures of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita (US$ 2000), a voice and accountability index, and the percentage of female parliamentarians. The proxy variable for understanding structural differences will be a measure of fiscal decentralization. Each of these variables will be discussed in greater detail in the next section on Methodology and Data. METHODOLOGY AND DATA Method Two sets of panel-corrected time series model are analyzed. The units of analysis are countries and the time period under consideration is 1996-2004. This time period was selected not only for where and when the data is most complete, but as importantly so as to include the voice and accountability index which only began data collection in 1996. The differences between the two models are its dependent variables. The dependent variable for the central government model is the percentage of female civil servants within central governments while the dependent variable for the sub-national models is the percentage of female civil servants within sub-national governments.

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Each set of models includes three versions of the model (sub-models). All six sub-models include a transformed income variable of gross national product per capita. Following trends elsewhere, this variable was transformed into a log. Each model also includes a proxy for political rights a voice and accountability index. This index required no transformation. All models also include a version of the key structural. variable, the percentage of fiscal decentralization. Due to missing data, two of the three models required that the mean level of fiscal decentralization (averaged among available years) be included instead of each value per year. The third sub-model within each level of government adds a fourth variable: percentage of female parliamentarians, which was also transformed by a log. Dependent Variable Data

There is no singly accepted measure of representative bureaucracy. The first widely discussed measure was the Nachmias-Rosenbloom Measure of Integration. This index postulates a mathematical formulation whereby integration is the total number of social characteristics (say, gender or ethnicity) and the frequency of those characteristics within the group you are measuring. This measure has been praised as having significant measurement validity, but, in measures with just two variables (such male female) it leads to questions over its linearity. Another common measure is to determine the percentage of target group in a bureaucracy (say Hispanic women) and divide that by the percentage of Hispanic women in the surrounding community. However, as Meier and Stewart point out, this measure can be sensitive to extreme values. Others measure female representation by dividing the percentage of working age women in the population by the percentage of female civil servants. This

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latter option appears most reasonable, however, given the paucity of data cross-nationally on the numbers of working age women, this paper instead divides the number of women in the civil service by the total number of civil servants. The resulting variable is the percentage of female civil servants at the central government or sub-national government levels. This measure has the advantage of being more robust cross-nationally as it diminishes any differences in the number of civil service positions as a percentage of employable positions within society. A country where onethird of all employment is in the state sector will be equalized to a country with five percent of available employment occurring within the civil service. There are two dependent variables in this study percent of female civil servants at the national and percent of female civil servants at the sub-nationallevel.vi The employment data is available from the International Labor Organization's LABORSTA database (ILO, 2004). Even though data is available from 1985 to 2004, for this paper the range utilized is 1996 to 2004. The data is an interval variable with a scale of 0 to 100 percent. The closer a percentage is to 50 percent, the more gender-equitable is the subnational or central government under discussion. Three notes of caution are required for the dependent variable data. First, not every country surveyed has both regional and local political jurisdictions. If a country has both regional and local jurisdictions, the employment data was added together for each gender before creating the dependent variable. Second, none of the countries included had dependent variable data for all years. Independent Variable Data

Fiscal Decentralization There are several potential measures of fiscal

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decentralization. Operationally, fiscal decentralization involves differing expenditures and revenue-collecting responsibilities between levels of government, intergovernmental grant systems, and monitoring of flows between government levels. Not all governments apply the same operational mechanisms and some countries may have regulatory rules on the books, but their practices may differ. Other scholars measure fiscal decentralization as fiscal transfers. For this paper, the fiscal decentralization data is from the IMF's 2001 Government Finance Statistics. It is reported as an interval variable ranging from 0 to 100 percent where 100 percent means complete fiscal decentralization. Fiscal decentralization is measured as subnational expenditures (as % of total expenditures) in order to equalize legal and regulatory differences across countries. The practice in other scholarly papers has been to report expenditures as an average over the years in which data is available. This practice is continued in two of the submodels (C2, C3 and SN2, SN3) for each of the central government and sub-national models. As a point of comparison only, the non-averaged scores are included in models Cl and SN1. As it turns out, the mean level of fiscal decentralization per country versus the inclusion of each fiscal decentralization indicators per country is highly correlated at 0.9905. This high correlation underscores a reason behind earlier authors only reporting this value as a mean. However, given that one research question of this paper is whether greater fiscal decentralization impacts gender representation and thus, we may find differences across years, my models reflect both calculations. It is expected that higher levels of fiscal decentralization

(or fiscal mean) will be positively related to the number of women employed at the sub-national level. It may be that

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the more money subnational governments have to spend, the greater the opportunity for increased civil service employment opportunities and by extension, more opportunities for female employment. In contrast, we expect to find a negative relationship between fiscal decentralization (or fiscal mean) and the percentage of female civil servants at the central government level. This relationship is expected for different reasons than the subnational model. While national governments generally have more money to spend than sub-national governments, national governments are located in capital cities where women have other employment opportunities. In addition, at the subnational levels, women who wish to serve as public servants can do so more easily without moving themselves and their families to the central seat of government. To summarize HI: There will be a negative relationship between percentage of female civil servants at the central government level and higher levels of fiscal decentralization. H2: There will be a positive relationship between percentage of female civil servants at the sub-national government level and higher levels of fiscal decentralization. Voice and Accountability

The Voice and Accountability Index is from the World Bank's Aggregate Governance Indicators database (19962004). The governance indicators were compiled from nearly three-dozen sources including survey institutes, think tanks, non-governmental organizations, and international organizations and measures political, civil and human rights. The index was created biennially from 1996 until 2002 and then annually thereafter. It is a continuous

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variable with each country given a value between -2.5 to 2.5. The highest value (2.5) is for countries with greatest amount of voice and accountability while the lowest value (-2.5) is for those with the least. This range of scores is equivalent to z-scores where a score of 2.5 indicates that a country is 2.5 standard deviations away from the mean (Kaufmann, 2005). The greater the freedom available for women to express their opinion, the more likely they are to not only be eligible for outside employment, but, if they chose a civil service career, believe they can express their opinion within the civil service environment. It is expected that countries with greater voice and accountability will positively related to the percentage of female civil servants at the central and subnationallevels. To summarize: H3: There will be a positive relationship between percentage of female civil servants at the central government level and higher voice and accountability scores. H4: There will be a positive relationship between percentage of female civil servants at the sub-national government level and higher voice and accountability scores. GDP per capita (US$ 2000)

The gross domestic product (GDP), measured on a per capita basis is our income variable. This data is from the World Bank's World Development Indicators. All data is in 2000 US$ and is logged, as is the custom with crossnational income variables. Rises in income have long been considered important drivers for international development and gender equity. Lower-income countries tend to have greater gender inequality while within countries, those are the poorest are also often suffering from gender barriers. Thus, it is expected that higher incomes will lead to societies where not only women will enter the formal economy, but

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where it is reasonable to expect that women may also feel free choose civil servant employment opportunities. To summarize: H5: There will be a positive relationship between percentage of female civil servants at the central government level and higher incomes. H6: There will be a positive relationship between percentage of female civil servants at the sub-national government level and higher incomes.

Female Parliamentarians The percentage of female parliamentarians is the final variable. The data for this variable is from the World Bank's World Development Indicators. It is an interval variable reported as the percentage of parliamentarians. As far as this author is aware, there is almost no theoretical or empirical research linking the number of female parliamentarians to the number of female civil servants despite numerous articles discussing each literature separately. While certain countries advocate that a minimum percentage of seats are reserved for women, it is not expected to impact whether a woman decides to run for office or to serve in office as a public servant. This is assumed despite the fact that others have observed limited talent pools for female parliamentarians.

It is expected that female parliamentarians are influenced by similar political and economic conditions as female civil servants and therefore, we expect a positive relationship between the number of female parliamentarians and the number of female civil servants at the central sub-national level. To summarize: H7: There will be a positive relationship between percentage of female civil servants at the central government level and countries with higher percentages of female

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parliamentarians. H8: There will be a positive relationship between percentage of female civil servants at the sub-national government level and countries with higher percentages of female parliamentarians. It is clear from the above findings that there remain more questions than answers. This appears to be a reasonable conclusion given that this is the first time any cross-national study on representative bureaucracy has been undertaken. From a practical standpoint, there further data collection is required.

Data collection was hampered not by insufficient data on my political or economic indicators, but on the fiscal decentralization and the percentage of female civil servants. Both of these data points require more intensive data collection with more emphasis on record maintenance than the other two variables. With voice and accountability indexed based on what not just in-country, by external to the country assessment, its reliance on local data collection is less pronounced than the other variables. Even income per capita is relatively simple to collect. Today, countries have excellent notions of what their earned income was, is and will be. Financial transactions, loans, exports, imports, all rely on the same accounting techniques. In contrast, fiscal decentralization requires more complex data collection. Its primary units of data collection occur at the sub-nationals levels where accounting knowledge and expertise can vary widely or even, in some cases, be little emphasized if there are few if any expenditure or revenue responsibilities. Similar logics exist for collecting gender data. Interestingly, this paper was originally planned to be a discussion of ethnicity within civil services around the world. However, to-date, I have yet to find one reliable measure of ethnic representation and thus, turned

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my attention to women where data is relatively, at least, more plentiful. Moreover, the value that Western cultures place on workplace diversity is written in laws and regulations. If countries do not hold similar values, the notion of even collecting this type of information would not even be considered. Beyond these practical difficulties is a much broader and more international problem. When we look at the Millennium Development Goals, one of the eight goals is to improve gendet-'-equity by 2015. Rightfully, one of the indicators for measuring progress toward this goal is increasing the number of female parliamentarians. The assumption that women, once in parliament, are more likely to act for women is ingrained within this measurement. However, there is no such priority for female representation within the civil services. Whether this is because the neoliberally minded policymakers stop their understanding of the bureaucracy at Weber or if representativeness is considered more valuable legislatively than bureaucratically or even if the notion of diversity law is infrequently studied crossnationally, it is uncertain. Moreover, my data indicate that more women are serving in central government and even sub-national government in many cases than they are in parliaments. The implications of these trends remain unstudied. Despite this con:dusion, with there is no international agreement behind an idea, there is no data collection. Just fifteen years ago, the idea that" governance" mattered for economic development was not broadly accepted within development circles. Today, you cannot read an article about international development without some mention of a project, agency or national governance structure, function, process or interaction. Data discussing various aspects of governance, including its effectiveness and efficiency are found nearly everywhere. Discussion about

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its representativeness is not. This is a problem that requires more practical and theoretical highlighting. The paper indicates that across countries there is a clear preference for women to encompass a larger percentage of the subnational workforce than at the national levels. This observation, while noticed within the U.S. based literature, requires further international attention. Its parallel with studies on the legislative branches in federalized countries may provide an additional avenue of study. Considering these outcomes from a social perspective, what is it about local or state provincial civil servant positions that are more appealing to females. Is it a question of policy impact. Do women feel that have more impact within their home regions as opposed to working at the national levels? Or perhaps it is a question of family. Is it because civil service jobs are closer to the home that women feel more able to work within the sub-national level public services? Or maybe it is about job stature. Are the civil service jobs within sub-national governments more likely to have administrative roles, roles that women are more likely to fill? Or perhaps there is even a linkage between female parliamentarians and job opportunities for women within the civil service? Or that localleve! agencies tend to be more human and social service oriented and thus, attract more women employees. More specific to the representative bureaucracy literature in the United States, none of the available cross-national data is able to even being to answer many of the questions currently researched within representative bureaucracy. Does the passive representation that I profiled in this paper lead to active representation? When and where might this linkage be made. Looking at the national and subnational agency leadership, do we find more male agency heads at the national level than the state or local levels and thus, more men than women working within the national level

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agencie. These questions required further in-country research for the answers to be found. And finally and perhaps more relevant for this paper, do levels of representative bureaucracy vary across cultures or over time. Does the premise that there is no politicsadministration dichotomy have to hold before representative bureaucracy considered a valid concept on its own? If indeed, there is a dichotomy then it may matter little how representative our bureaucracies are or are not. What about cultures where bureaucratic positions are held in high regard and are given only to the very best students? Would those countries still value representativeness over some measure of intelligence or fit? What about the opposite scenario? In countries where bureaucratic jobs are generally considered the least desirable, would that impact representativeness? Would countries where bureaucratic jobs are given out by political leaders to ensure political stability or support have different results from the other type of countries .. Looking more sf;ructurally, do societies with high ratios of executive to legislative power view representativeness differently from those where the legislative branches hold significant power? These are just some of the questions that can be raised when one undertakes cross-national research on representative bureaucracy.

7

The Challenge of Governance in a Large Bureaucracy ABSTRACT

How do you manage governance in a large, unwieldy bureaucracy the largest in the Philippine governmental structure - that has been under-performing for years? How do you manage quality outcomes in a structure that is largely dispersed, relatively delinked, and of low-level managerial talent? How do you ensure that standards of quality and directions set by policy are uniformly understood and, more importantly, implemented? The new mantra in the Department of Education (DepED) is "school-based management" (SBM). Yet the way DepED is managed is largely central office-driven, not from the ground-up (i.e. at the school and schools division level). This is a result of decades of compliance with centrally-mandated policy driven by centrally-provided resources. 1bere are three contradictions that need to be worked out given this new thinking. The first contradiction: Structural rigidity versus a new mandate. SBM has shown better results than centrallymandated policy in specific programs. Yet, there is a structural rigidity in the bureaucracy that maintains central control over processes despite these findings. This makes

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SBM more an idea than a fact. On the other hand, there are innovators within the bureaucracy that are working very hard to change this mindset and to introduce a whole new way of thinking and managing. This might be part of a steep learning curve. But it could also be a structural divide that isn't easily overcome. The second contradiction: Central control versus decentralization. Despite almost two decades of decentralization efforts at the national level, central control over education is still very much the norm. The national budget is one manifestation of central control over a highly dispersed education system. The way the national budget is programmed, local innovators have very little room to maneuver and manage day-to-day quality service, much less reforms. The third contradiction: The need for field managers to govern a system that has very little managerial talent on the ground. This is a function of how little focus is given to the training of education managers in the system. The key to change in the governance structure is embedded in the Basic Education Law but which needs to be internalized by the bureaucracy. This is best laid out in a schema first introduced by the "Schools First Initiative", the fore-runner of the current Basic Education Sector Reform Agenda (BESRA). INTRODUCTION

A System in Crisis Philippine education is in crisis. This is manifest in performance indicators that reveal high rates of drop-outs across the system, poor performance in national and international achievement tests, poor reading abilities and functional literacy of older students, lack of student preparedness for study in high school and university as revealed in diagnostic tests and entrance exams, and the

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recognition by the business community of declining abilities of Filipino workers in language proficiency, technical skill and ability to think and solve problems. Numerous studies of the problems in Philippine education lead to predictable and oft-repeated conclusions: the school system has gotten too large, too unwieldy and too difficult to manage; shortages in classrooms, teachers, textbooks and material resources are at the heart of the problem; teachers are poorly trained despite having passed a licensure examination; there is little or no in-service training to improve teachers once hired; oversized classroom sections, multiple shifting or both undermine student learning to occur. The list goes on and on. The continuing situation begs the question: Is Philippine education being governed properly or is the system so structured that regardless of reform it cannot change for the better? Further, can proper governance and leadership improve performance of the system overall as measured by indicators? Or is the opposite true: That the poor performance of Philippine education, as a whole, is a reflection of poor governance (at worst) or of a governance structure (i.e. institutional arrangements) that cannot perform as mandated (at the very least)? Governance Defined Governance is the system by which organizations are directed and controlled. The governance structure specifies the distribution of rights and responsibilities among different participants in the organization, such as the board of directors, managers, shareholders and other stakeholders, and spells out the rules and procedures for making decisions on organizational affairs. The World Bank applies a functional framework in defining governance the balance between economic and social goals and between individual and communal goals.

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The govern~nce framework is there to encourage the efficient use of resources and equally to require accountability for the stewardship of these resources. The aim is to align as nearly as possible the interests of individuals, organizations and society. For individuals, these interests are schooling, employability, careers and family. For organizations, these are about relevance (e.g. beyond survivability) and valuecreation (e.g. profit for business corporations; public service for public sector organizations and agencies). For societies in the 21st century, the goals are increasingly about global competitiveness, improved quality of life and political stability. In public education systems, all three goals matter and

are related: Educated individuals must be able to function as active citizens and contribute to society with positive qualities required of participation; The education system must be able to transform young individuals into quality human capital through schooling and education processes; and, Society must be competitive and provide that which can contribute to a better quality of life for its people. One of the factors that ensures the competitiveness of a society is an education system both public and private that can continually produce educated individuals and a competent, skilled workforce.

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Governance and Public Bureaucracy Support for reforms in the public sector has been premised on their capacity to enhance the efficiency and the demc .:racy of public administration. This article questions in particular the democratic implications of reforms, even some participatory reforms that would appear on their face to have a significant capacity to enhance participation. There may be more participation, but that participation is limited to the social organisations and individuals immediately concerned with the policy area By according those groups enhanced control over policy, these reforms may in fact diminish the accountability of programmes to more general and public controls. Introduction

Governments have been the target of numerous reorganisations and reforms during the course of their long existence. From the perspective of public administration, the principal target of those reforms has been the efficiency, or lack of efficiency, of the public sector, and the perceived inability of government to manage itself as well as other organisations in society. As important as efficiency is for any set of organisations providing the range of services that contemporary governments do, the responsiveness of

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government to the demands of the public is an even more crucial value. Thus, any number of other reforms of government, especially in democratic regimes, have been directed at enhancing the capacity of governments to process demands from their citizens and to be more responsive to those demands. Reforms over the last two or three decades, usually described as "new public management" (NPM), have instititutionalised management techniques that make the public sector function much more like the private sector, and have stressed the role of government as a provider of services to its customers. The reforms have stressed the capacity of customers to make individual choices about the specific services they will receive from government. The good news is that in many ways the reforms have been successful and it is difficult to argue that governments in 2004 are not more efficient than they were in 1984 or even 1994.'

The Asia Pacific Journal of Public Administration A related aspect of reform has been the attempt to involve

the public more directly in governing and in the choice of policies. This style of governing as been long-established in many countries, especially those of Northern Europe, but has become a conscious reform strategy in many other countries. For example, in the United States many of the recommendations advanced by the National Performance Review (1993) were directed at enhancing the capacity of both ordinary citizens and lower echelons of the public service itself to influence policy and the style of administration. In Canada, a programme entitled PS 2000 (Tellier 1990) and later the Program for Citizen Engagement have provided greater opportunities for active involvement of the public. Even those countries of Northern Europe that

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have long practiced corporatism or corporate pluralist modes of relationships between state and society have enhanced the opportunities for citizens to involve themselves in governing, and also have attempted to empower lower echelons of the public bureaucracy. A general label for these changes in the public sector has been governance, with other names also being "empowerment" and "participatory governing". The basic logic of the governance approach is that greater participation will enhance the quality of governing. This logic is based in part on democratic assumptions and in part on assumptions about administrative efficiency. The democratic assumption undergirding governance is that the public should have greater influence over the policies being adopted in its name. In a representative democracy there is some influence by citizens, but that influence is indirect and sporadic, coming primarily on election day. Further, advocates of greater participation would argue that public organisations themselves can be made more democratic and that the average worker can be given greater influence in defining both the nature of his or her own job as well as the policy directions of the organisation as a whole. The administrative logic undergirding the reforms in the emerging governance tradition is not dissimilar to the democratic lOgic. First, there has been a very longstanding argument in the management literature that if organisations can be made more open and participative then the workers will be more motivated to invest their time and energy in the organisation. Likewise, those lower echelons of the organisation have a great deal of information about the clients and their real needs, and being able to tap that information resource more readily will also improve the performance of the organisation. Similarly, the clients of public organisations themselves are the repositories of a great deal of information,

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if nothing else about what they need and want from government. Thus, as the governance argument goes, the public sector will perform better if clients, and perhaps the general public, become more involved.

The increasing involvement of the public and of members of the organisation can also be seen as a means of developing trust and legitimacy. There is substantial evidence that citizens around the world have lost confidence and trust in the public sector. The World Values Survey data, for example, indicates a substantial average loss in the confidence that citizens have in government in democratic regimes, and for many governments that level of trust was already extremely low. In part, the loss of trust has resulted from the perceived remoteness of government from its citizens, so that developing means of engagement and empowerment may help to overcome that loss of trust. Further, even within the organisation itself, the empowerment of the street level bureaucrats will give greater power to that part of the organisation that is closer to the public. The development of legitimacy has a strong link with the now popular conceptions of the importance of civil society in governing. The assumption is that to be effective, and especially to be effective in a democratic manner, government must be supported by an active civil society. The assumption is that having active social groups in the society provides the means for political representation, but more importantly perhaps, enhances levels of bocial trust and cooperation. Governance models of public administration require an active population that can be mobilised and encouraged to become involved in the public sector. The assumption of this approach to public administration is that administration cannot function as well independently, in either legitimacy or effectiveness

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terms, as it can by working in conjunction with actors from civil society. As~I continue here to examine the role of governance-style reforms in the public sector, I will first provide a brief discussion of how the concept of governance has been evolving in political science, and to a lesser extent in other social sciences. I will then examine some of the specific reforms that have been introduced in the name of governance, and their implications for public management. I will conclude with a more careful and critical examination of the democratic and effectiveness assumptions behind governance models than is usually presented by the advocates of that emerging approach to the public sector. Governance and Governing

All societies require some level of governing. That is, there must be some means of deciding upon and implementing collective goals for the society. The root word in Greek for government and governance implies some conception of steering and control, and it is sensible to think about the steering capacity of the political system when thinking about governance. Further, as governments attempt to attain the goals that they have set for themselves and for the society they need to be cognisant of the consequences of their own prior actions and to utilise feedback from each round of policymaking as a significant part of the input into the next round. The traditional pattern of governing, whether in democratic or nondemocratic regimes, is to concentrate on the hierarchical authority of governments and the steering from the center of government. In democratic regimes that authority derives from elections, while in non-democratic regimes it may derive from control over the instruments of force in the society, or perhaps simply from tradition. In either the democratic or nondemocratic cases, the public

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bureaucracy is conceptualised as being responsible to its nominal political masters, and the exercise of accountability over the civil servants is also hierarchical and largely political. Further, this style of governing tended in practice to locate most of the governing capacity in the central institutions of the state, and thereby to create as much coherence in governing as is possible, given the inherently fragmented nature of the public sector in most countries. The NPM reforms, and to some extent neo-liberal approaches to governing in general, have placed greater emphasis on the role of the manager in governing, thereby reducing the dominant position of politicians in governing. The public manager, often recruited from outside the career public service in systems adopting this mode of governing, is conceptualised as being capable not only of managing public programmes but also of being something of a policy entrepreneur. Further, accountability in the NPM model of governing has become based more on performance and less on political criteria, again devaluing the political foundations of governing. The devolution of authority to managers and to autonomous or quasi-autonomous organisations has also tended to exacerbate some of the problems of coordination and coherence found in governments. Governance as an alternative approach to the public sector, and more specifically public administration, represents an attempt to involve the society more in governing and to reduce the hierarchical elements of the system. The basic diagnosis of the ills of government is that hierarchy has led to wasting the talents of people inside government and has alienated the public. At the extreme, some scholars have argued that there can be governance without government" and that the networks in society are capable of organising themselves and providing direction to particular segments of the society. 1/

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Given that those networks involve the major actors in the policy fields, they will have greater legitimacy than will a more remote government. Networks are generally conceptualised as a central component of the capacity for governing within the governance framework. The fundamental assumption is that surrounding every policy area there are a set of organisation~ ilJ ttl actors, generally including a number of government organisations, that shape the politics within that policy area. It is assumed that these networks are largely self-organising and are capable of making and implementing decisions for themselves. The networks provide a link between state and society that is different from the familiar corporatist linkages, in that the network linkages are not formed in reaction to the demands of the public sector but rather are constituted more autonomously, and exist in large part to circumvent or even elude the state, rather than to serve it. Crucial questions concern the nature of the networks involved and particularly how open they are both to a variety of different types of actors and to a variety of different views on public policy. On the one hand, networks may be rather open structures that will accommodate a wide range of views and will seek to include all interested parties. On the other hand, they can be exclusive and define membership on the basis of having certain types of skills or knowledge, or they may be defined more by agreement with the particular approaches to policy that dominate the area. Obviously these alternative forms of networks will have different capacities to make decisions and to influence policy. As well as varying in the extent to which they are open to multiple viewpoints, the mode of linkage to the state and to policy may vary. Rarely are networks quite as selfreferential and as autonomous as some of the network theorists assume, and to be of relevance to policy they must have some reasonably close connection to the authority of

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the state. To the extent that networks are linked to government, they are likely to be more effective in the long run in getting what they want from government. On the other hand, the linkages with the state may mean that the networks lose some of the autonomy that is important for their claims of legitimacy, and are coopted by the public sector. Indeed, there may be some element of mutual cooptation between public and private sector actors, with each side of the policy equation needing the other in order to be successful. Although networks are the usual rubric applied when thinking about governance, it must be remembered that the idea in some ways is more fundamental. The need is for some form of openness of the public sector to influences from society, and from the lower levels within the organisation itself. The basic idea is to alter the domination from hierarchical superiors and to enhance opportunities for choice. In this case, however, unlike the NPM version of governing, the choice that is exercised is more collective and political, rather than individual and economic. The citizen to some extent becomes a citizen again rather than a "customer", and is expected to be an active participant in the political processes that determine the shape of policy. The citizen may be involved with government as an individual or as a member of a group that in turn is organised into some form of network, but there is an interaction between state and society that is more symmetric than that characteristic of conventional', hierarchical government. Given the above considerations, the governance approach to administering the public sector and to public policy is even more decentralised than that of NPM. NPM advocated primarily the decentralised implementation of policy, while governance models advocate to some extent making policy in a more decentralised manner as well. Given

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that hierarchies are to be flattened, and to some extent almost reversed, this model of governing depends heavily upon steering from the bottom rather than from the top of government. Indeed, at the extreme the governance concept can become anti-statist and almost extra-legal. Leaving aside the normative concerns raised, the perhaps extreme decentralisation implied by this approach to the public sector will produce difficulties in creating coherence and coordination. In summary, governance as an approach to the public sector and public administration poses some fundamental ,challenges to both traditional forms of government and to NPM. It represents an attempt to overcome hierarchy and top-down control within the public sector itself, and between the public sector and the society. These intentions are, of course, laudable in any democratic context. They should contribute to the legitimacy of the public sector, and also may actually enhance the capacity of government to be effective in reaching its goals. While those are all possible positive outcomes, some questions should also be raised concerning the real possibilities of reaching all those goals. Further, it is necessary to question whether too high a price might have to be paid in other ways for achieving those goals, as important as they may be. Governance and Democracy The primary claim that the concept of governance in public administration can make as an approach to steering the fates of states and societies is that it provides a means of enhancing the democratic content of that steering. Associated with that greater openness is the claim that governance approaches can promote public involvement and trust. These claims are based in part on the perceived failure, or at least perceived weakness, of conventional forms of representative democracy. They are also based on the assumption that the building of participatory structures that

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are more closely related to the day to day lives of citizens and especially their interactions with the public sector, can improve trust, involvement and the capacity of citizens to influence government. Democracy in this model is not something that happens once every few years at an election booth, but rather is an ongoing activity relating the public to a government. The above arguments, implicit or explicit, on behalf of the governance approach are important for several reasons. They tend to shift the locus of citizen involvement, and to some extent legitimation, from the input to the output side of the political system. Governments in the perspective of NPM are legitimated almost entirely on the basis of their outputs to their customers. In governance there is a more democratic and political element involved in legitimation, but that political legitimation does not flow through political parties and elected legislatures but rather is derived from more direct citizen contacts with government, and particularly with government bureaucracies. This conception of legitimation may make a great deal of sense given that most interactions citizens have with the public sector are with the bureaucracy in its many and varied forms, rather than with elected officials, but it does shift the terms of discussion on legitimacy and democracy. There is substantial evidence that the interactions that citizens have with public bureaucracies are not as negative as the usual negative characterisations of those public organisations would have us believe. In many instances the public perceive their treatment by public employees to be as good, or often even better, than that received from private sector firms. Thus, these contacts between citizens and their administrators should.help to create trust in the system of government.

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The effects of these interactions with government as individuals may be generalisable to the interactions of social groups with government, so that greater involvement of the public in any way with the public sector can be hypothesised to promote more positive perceptions of government and its role. While the interactions between state and society may help to legitimate the state, some questions must be raised about the genuine democratic impact of these linkages. It is not clear that the networks at the heart of much of the governance argumentation are necessarily the solution for the problems of democratic government. These structures may be rather exclusive, especially when they are" epistemic communities" based on the possession and control of a certain type of knowledge. Communities of this sort (eg, physicians involved in shaping health care policy) may claim to function in the public interest, but in reality a great deal of private interest can be involved in their actions as well. Certainly groups of patients, or even other medical professions such as nurses, will find it difficult to counteract the control exercised by the closed community. Another question about the democratic nature of the governance approach is relevant even if the networks involved in governance are inclusive. Even if those networks do include all interested actors surrounding the policy area, they can at best hope only for a solution that is acceptable to all these actors. Such a solution will still almost certainly exclude actors not active in that policy arena. Thus, rather than fulfilling the aspirations of governance to set and implement societal goals, this notion of governing provides for solutions that may well meet the demands of particular groups but not the society as a whole. Therefore they may produce policy choices that would not be acceptable in a rt'presentative assembly. Decentralisation and devolution have become part of a

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mantra of governance, but in the process some considerations of broader social goals may be lost; and, at the extreme, the governance solutions have the potential to become profoundly anti-democratic. That is, by having policy implementation and/ or policy making determined largely by the beneficiaries of the policies, the fundamental democratic concept of accountability may be undermined. For public administration in particular there has been the notion that its actions always need to be reviewed elsewhere and some independent judgment applied, but that separation of decision and review is not present in this decentralised model of governing. Very much as Lowi argued about some aspects of American government, this manner of governing can become the appropriation of the public sector for private interests, and a notion of the broader public interest may be undermined. Networks depend upon the level of organisation of social and economic groups, and therefore the democratic success of the governance arrangements depends on the extent to which the universe of groups is representative of the interests involved. A network may include all the available social organisations, but if certain elements of society are not adequately organised then those groups almost certainly will not be effective in the political process. Given that organisational skills are far from evenly distributed across socie:ty, then the governance model may have a substantial class bias, and will disadvantage groups such as the unemployed and the less educated who lack organisational resources. These same problems arise in attempts to create more deliberative models of democracy, and scholars such as Hirst have argued strongly that inclusivity is a crucial criterion in assessing movements away from representative democracy. The social capital argument for improving democracy through the involvement of social organisations

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depends crucially on the presumed relationship between social organisation and trust, meaning both interpersonal trust and trust in government. rpe logic is that if people are willing to join organisations they become more trusting of others and hence are better democratic participants and thus more likely' to be positive and trusting toward the public sector. In reality, however, group memberships may simply reinforce differences that the members feel from the remainder of society and make cooperation among various segments of society in solving policy problems more difficult rather than easier. In summary, these changes in the public sector that empower clients and lower echelon workers appear to democratise the public sector and to open government to a wider range of influences than in the past. In some ways, by emphasising the role of groups in society this emergent model of governing legitimates direct involvement of the society in making and implementing policy decisions. On the other hand, however, tile type of involvement that is created tends to be narrowly defined for the participants in the policy area, rather than for the citizens in general. Thus, governance paradoxically may result in a set of programmes that are accepted by and legitimate to their participants but also in a government as a whole that may be no more legitimated than the representative model. Governance and Effectiveness Democratisation and legitimation are the principal justifications for the governance approach to public administration, but the literature on management and organisation theory has also long offered an effectiveness justification for participatory approaches to management. Although hierarchy has been the natural reaction in most societies when confronted with the need to manage large numbers of people and multiple tasks, more participatory

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modes of management may be as effective, or more effective. The virtues of participation may be greater for a work force that is educated and professional, but even for more routine machine bureaucracy tasks involving employees at all levels. It may increase their commitment to the goals ofthe organisation and therefore their effectiveness. The involvement of clients and the public may also have some positive consequences for the effectiveness of public programmes. This effectiveness can come in large part through the ability to off-load some tasks onto network organisations. The idea of steering not rowing" is often associated with the NPM approach to solving problems within the public sector, but by using network rather than contract devices to involve non-state actors in the public sector governance style, reforms can accomplish the same basic reductions in the day-to-day administrative responsibilities of the public sector. In the case of governance solutions the economic savings may be even greater, given the tendency to involve voluntary and not-for-profit organisations rather than the economically based contracting in the NPM solution. /I

The contribution to effectiveness of networked governance solutions to the effectiveness of programmes may go beyond simple cost-savings. The private organisations involved may have greater legitimacy than their public counterparts, and hence be able to work more effectively with social groups. This greater trust and legitimacy for the private sector may be especially evident for programmes dealing with minority and disadvantaged groups, and even more especially when working with groups such as immigrants who may have something to fear from revealing too much about themselves to a public organisation. Even when not dealing with disadvantaged groups, the not-for-profits may have greater flexibility in dealing with the public and be able to satisfy the public

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more readily. From the perspective of management, a central question that the governance approach raises is the extent to which uniformity of administration is important. Empowering lower levels of the bureaucracy to make more of their own decisions will almost certainly result in greater variability of the decisions made. Likewise, empowering clients to influence those decisions will also increase variability in the choices made, with those clients capable of influencing their own outcomes. In some public programmes, such variability may be desirable and will enhance the service being delivered to citizens. In other programmes, however, especially those concerned with the basic rights of citizens, any substantial variability may deny some fundamental protections to citizens. Thus, even if the governance approach does have substantial benefits for the public sector in general, there may be a number of situations in which it may be inappropriate, even on grounds of effectiveness. The tendency in administrative reforms is often to assume that one size fits all, but a more careful consideration of the nature of programmes may be required. As well as the extent to which basic rights are involved, governance models might be more acceptable where there are multiple well organised interests so tha t some degree of countervailing power can be used to adjust for ceding substantial powers to nongovernmental actors. Further, such models might be applicable when the policy areas can be made sufficiently transparent for oversight organisations to be able to assess the extent to which public powers may have been misappropriated. Summary It is difficult to argue against the virtues of a participatory governance model of the public sector that has been emerging over the past few decades. The virtues of this model are especially evident in terms of the apparent

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enhancement of democracy. In this new pattern of governance, a great deal of the legitimation of the public sector will derive from the quality of services and the manner in which those s,ervices are delivered, rather than from political parties, voting and elections. Bureaucracies may not usually be considered the natural loci of democratic action, but in reality they are becoming more central to that process, especially given the declining public involvement in traditional forms of democracy such as voting and political parties. The linkage of state and society that is central to a governance approach offers a great deal to government, but the gains available may have to be purchased at a price. In particular, potential gains in efficiency and in legitimacy among some groups proximate to the delivery of the services may be purchased at the cost of some lost influence from other segments of society. That loss of influence may be most important from a democratic perspective, but may also have some consequences for the effectiveness of government. The effectiveness will not be of individual programmes, but rather will be of government taken more generally as a problem-solving system for society as a whole. Thus, a governance model of the public sector may substitute strong versions of localised democracy (more in policy than geographical terms) for representative democracy that may extend across broader segments of society.

9

Coercive and Enabling Bureaucracy No doubt this phrase is familiar to many colleagues in the human services. For example, bureaucratic organization is the reason for sub-optimal performance. It's the reason why helping professionals cannot practice in accordance with their training and professional standards. It's implicated by helping professionals as the cause of mind-numbing routines and meaningless paperwork. It accounts for clients' alienation as they stand in lines, endure long waits, and experience impersonal, client processing" procedures. It also is invoked by human services professionals when they lament the lack of time as well as the resources needed for every client. Bureaucracy is the reason for avoiding favoritism, and it means standardization in the name of equitable, fair treatment. In this line of thinking, bureaucracy is the primary cause of countless problems. Many of these problems cannot be solved because the bureaucracy cannot be changed. Just as the sun rises daily in the East and sets in the West, bureaucracy's constraints and problems are predictable, inevitable, and impervious to change. For human services workers, the implicit message may be something like this. "If you want to do this kind of work,

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you'll need to adjust to the bureaucratic system. You must change you must adapt to the way things are done here. It won't change, and you can't change it. So, if you're not satisfied with the way things are done here, you may wish to look for another job and another line of work." Obviously, messages like this encourage workers to leave. Moreover, these messages may convey four related impressions. First: Nothing can be done to improve the organization and its operations. In other words, "look around you because this is as good as it gets." Second: The primary responsibility of supervisors, managers, and commissioners is to enforce rules and seek compliance with the system (even when they may not agree with them). Third: The pathway to promotion in the bureaucratic hierarchy is to follow the rules and conform to the system. In other words, once you're promoted, you're obliged to defend the system. And fourth, front-line workers who seek and promote changes in the organization are destined to experience conflict with their supervisors, managers and commissioners. Thus, for front-liners, "it's them versus us," and adversarial perceptions and conflict-ridden relationships abound. Such is the context for a fresh line of interdisciplinary research and development. Individuals and teams of researchers and practitioners are examining bureaucracy anew. Here are a few examples of the kinds of questions they are addressing. Is employee well being one of the inevitable and unavoidable costs for the efficiency bureaucracy provides. Are supervisors, managers, and commissioners in effect sentenced to policing rules and regulations, which they inherited from their predecessors? Are people in need destined to receive rule-driven, rationed, and impersonal services. Is it possible to change large scale, public sector bureaucracies and the working conditions they provide? What changes improve system performance and

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accountability? Which changes reduce undesirable, preventable worker turnover? Several lines of research and development can be traced back to these questions. As requested, I'll sketch one line below. Two Kinds of Bureaucracy The main assumption in this line of work is that it's not bureaucracy per se that is the main problem; the main problem is the kind of bureaucracy that's developed and maintained. According to this line of thinking, a bureaucracy can be either coercive or enabling. Because coercive bureaucracy breeds the several problems noted above, it is the problem. An enabling bureaucracy comprises the main solution. This latter kind fosters creative, informal relations among workers at all levels. The implication is that commissioners, managers, supervisors, and caseworkers are able to exert influence and control over the extent to which their agency is a coercive bureaucracy or an enabling one. The more that the agency bureaucracy is enabling, the greater the benefits to workers and clients. Salient details follow . . Bureaucracy's Defining Features In the classic view, bureaucracy is the ideal form of organization for coordinating, supervising, and managing the work of specialists. In a bureaucracy, work roles, functions, and flows are specified, and responsibilities are fixed. In other words, work is formalized. Procedures are standardized and specified, and functional differentiation follows. Differences among front-line workers are accompanied by differences among supervisors, managers, and other officials in the administrative hierarchy. In the classic view, bureaucratic organizations are hierarchical,

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and a triangular shape mirrors differential power, authority, and expertise. Bureaucracy also offers a system of norms, and it encourages a way of thinking and acting a so-called "cognitive style. These norms may become behavioral rules. Key examples of these norms a~ provided in Figure 1 (attached at the end of this brief). Here is a key point: There is nothing inherently bad or wrong with some, or even most, of these norms and rules. (Anonymity and mechanistic relations are obvious exceptions in caring-oriented, human services work.) The main issue is how they are interpreted, implemented, evaluated, and improved. In fact, there is an accompanying rationale that recommends them. This rationale emphasizes merit; it includes fair, just, and equitable treatment of everyone, including every employee and every client. This rationale and the accompanying norms and rules were developed in response to forms of organization and practice that permitted favoritism, nepotism, greed, injustice, and "lining one's pockets" at the public's expense. Introducing Coercive Bureaucracy To reiterate, in this line of thinking, the difference between a coercive bureaucracy and an enabli...lg one lies in how these norms and rules are interpreted, implemented, and evaluated. It matters whether they are flexible and amenable to adaptation. It also matters when caring relations are not permitted. In a coercive bureaucracy, norms and rules are not flexible or amenable to adaptation. The adjective "mechanistic" is applied to such a bureaucracy because the entire organization runs, more on less, on automatic pilot. Few, if any, people claim to be at the controls. All

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emphasize faithful implementation and proper procedures, often claiming "I'm just doing my job." Everyone is expected to conform to the norms and follow the rules. Only the people at the top of the bureaucratic hierarchy (the top of the triangle) are able to see lithe big picture" regarding the work needing to be performed and its relation to societal expectations and needs. Arguably, the central task for the leadership hierarchy (commissioners, managers, and supervisors) is to gain compliance from workers through the strategic use of surveillance and sanctions, especially punishment. In a coercive bureaucracy, workers are viewed as entities to be motivated, supervised, managed, and controlled. Their superiors assume that workers show up and perform their designated tasks to secure their salaries and benefits. Salaries and benefits are the only incentive to work effectively. Furthermore, in a coercive bureaucracy workers have little expertise to offer to their superiors. They cannot be trusted to make good, solid decisions, and they require close supervision. Expectations and standards associated with professionalism, especially discretion and some autonomy in decision-making, are among the casualties in coercive bureaucracies. Workers experience supervision and management routines as "looking over my shoulder" and "constantly second guessing me." In response, workers may develop their own coping strategies. Some may do "undercover work" (where they do things without informing supervisors) and CYA work where workers hide and cover problems and mistakes. When these coping strategies are detected, and it becomes clear to the leadership hierarchy that workers are not following the rules, the supervisory and managerial grip tightens. In this fashion, coercive bureaucracies become even more so. The agency's climate deteriorates as the

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quality of treabnent and interaction worsens. In the worst case scenario, there is with little relief in sight because the attendant processes and dynamics are self-reinforcing and self-sealing. No one, least of all front-line workers, are able to effect meaningful and effective improvements. This is why a coercive bureaucracy is called "mechanistic, it appears to run on automatic pilot. Enabling Bureaucracy

The leadership hierarchy in an enabling bureaucracy operates with the different assumptions about the workforce and the priorities of commissioners, managers, and supervisors. In this kind of bureaucracy, the workforce is an asset or a resource to be maximized. In contrast to the assumptions held by leaders in a coercive bureaucracy, leaders in an enabling bureaucracy operate with a different knowledge base about their workforce. They support and promote norms and standards of professionalism. For example, leaders know that workers enjoy voluntary commitments to their jobs. They know that workers' identities are intertwined with their jobs (i.e., who workers are and what they do often are intertwined). Leaders know that workers have reasons other than pay and benefits for doing their jobs, including the fit between their personal lives and their jobs. For this reason, leaders know that these workers want and need their work to be enjoyable and meaningful. Leaders also know that, with training and supports, workers can be trusted to make good, solid decisions. They view competent, supportive supervision as a support system for workers. In other words, the supervision and management system dovetails with training, and both are designed enables the development of expertise and mastery. Furthermore, leaders solicit workers' input on decisions, rules, norms, and practices because they know that working conditions (including the agency's culture and its present climate) exert a powerful influence on workers

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efficacy, effectiveness, and their decisions to stay or leave. Enabling bureaucracies, like all bureaucracies, formalize work. Work formalization is an indispensable organizational technology. It prevents the inefficiencies and ineffectiveness indicators of trial and error routines and learning systems. In other words, reasonable, justifiable rules, norms, routines, and behavioral prescriptions are valuable when they contribute to the achievement of desirable outcomes and benefits. In short, it's not a bad development when organizational routines and rules develop, and when one way of doing things becomes the way. To the contrary, these developments are indicative of an organizational technology. Technology is vital to agencies. It is the organization and formalization of knowledge and the organization and mobilization of people to achieve practical purposes. Enabling bureaucracies develop technologies for achieving practical purposes and for learning and improving as they do.

Enabling Bureaucracy's Key Features Drawing on the aforementioned assumptions that leaders have about workers, enabling bureaucracies exhibit and promote the following key features. Global transparency. Everyone in the organization is privy to the big picture. It's not restricted to the leaders at the top of the organizational triangle. Furthermore, information is public, readily available, and testable. In contrast to coercive bureaucracy wherein some things are not discussed and the fact that they can't be discussed is not discussed everything can be discussed, and errors are viewed as opportunities for learning, improvement, and capacity-building. Interdependent relationships are emphasized and

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rewarded. Everyone knows how the specialized parts of the organization-jobs, functions, rules, and norms-fit together. Everyone knows how they contribute to the agency's missions and functions. Clarity and unity of purpose. Thanks to an agreed upon mission (e.g., protecting children by supporting families and strengthening communities), everyone is lion the same page. Everyone knows how paperwork, rules and regulations, and other kinds of requirements are related to the achievement of this mission. A coherent, effective system for recruitment, training, and organizational initiation-induction. This system is inseparable from the working conditions provided. The initiation-induction component is vital. It is a determinant of the transfer and maintenance of training, and it is a driver for the organization's culture and climate. Voice, involvement, and genuine say so. All organizational members are viewed as "experts" with a valuable perspective to contribute. The search for better ways is a constant in listening and problem-solving circles. Some employment security. Honest, frank, and open communications are vital to enabling bureaucracies. Staff at all levels, especially new, front-line staff, must perceive that their views are welcomed; and that they are able to offer them without risking their jobs and careers. Minimize asymmetries of power and authority. In other words, do your best to flatten the bureaucracy, making it less of a triangle. Equity and equitable relations are important here, and so are impartiality, fairness, and justice. Power and authority differences do not vanish; they take a baCK seat to processes and dynamics that signal"we're all in the same boat here. Clear norms and rules, both formal and informal. These

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norms and rules operate in formal and informal relations and operations. Everyone agrees to steward and help enforce them. They are associated with positive interactions and a high quality of treatment among workers and among workers and clients. Procedures and criteria for balancing workers' discretion, autonomy, and authority with organizationalbureaucratic accountability. According to Lipsky (1980): "Managing discretion is the heart of the problem of streetlevel bureaucracy. Furthermore. The key is to find a correct balance between compassion and flexibility, on the one hand, and the rigid, fair application of rules and procedures, on the other. Where bureaucratic accountability is concerned, Lipsky provides these specific priorities: 1.

Agencies must know what they want workers to do.

2.

Where multiple priorities exist, agencies must be able to place them in rank order

3.

Agencies must know how to measure workers' performance

4.

Agencies must be able to compare workers to one another to establish a standard for judgment

5.

They must build shared responsibility and mutual accountability among workers; and between workers and clients.

6.

They must encourage clients and workers to become more effective advocates for change.

7.

They must find ways to reduce worker isolation, harassmeI).t, and resource inadequacy. (p. 205).

Other features may be added to this list. It's intended as a starter list, one designed to facilitate additional discussion and planning.

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Key Tensions that Won't Vanish This selective contrast between coercive and enabling bureaucracy is subject to misinterpretation. It's not one versus the other. Although something can be done - fast and effectively it is not a simple matter of initiating a process whereby it's "out with the old" (coercive) and "in with the new. As everyone knows, several tensions, contradictions, and dilemmas are present. At least for the foreseeable future, they will not disappear, and they'll weigh on workers at all levels in agencies. Examples include: 1.

Federal and, in turn, state policy requirements, which influence and determine the contexts and requirements for work.

2.

Contradictory expectations associated with coercive bureaucracy, professionalism, privatization pressures and market forces (e.g., pressure to contract and "out-source"), and civil society networks (predicated on everyday citizens assuming joint responsibility for protecting children, supporting families, and strengthening neighborhood communities).

3.

The tensions and challenges posed by an incomplete body of knowledge and insufficient research

4.

The challenges and tensions of accessing knowledge, resources, and expertise outside the realm of bureaucracy s reach. Issues include the boundaries for practice in relation to the co-occurring needs of families and the agency's relations with other systems (e.g., mental health, the courts, schools).

5.

Conflicting views of the agency and the work, starting with County Boards of Supervisors.

6.

Competing financial demands brought to bear on Commissioners and the agency, including Medicaid

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costs and operating costs amid proposals for tax reduction. With these and other tensions in mind, here is the final key feature of an enabling bureaucracy. Due recognition of dilemmas, uncertainties, environmental complexity. They need to be freely and openly acknowledged and use constant adjustive development and learning. There's a balance involved here between efficient and routine operations in relation to needs and problems that are fixed, predictable, known and given; and adjustments made for "wicked problems" that perplex everyone. Enabling bureaucracies that can reach this balance are known, in some circles, as "ambidextrous organizations." This challenge also is an opportunity for developments that reduce undesirable, preventable turnover and improve efficiency and effectiveness.

Epilogue Reactions and suggestions are welcome. And, as the saying goes, "there's more where this came from." Respond and ask, and we'll do our best to comply. a.

specialization each unit has its own sphere of expertise on which it is founded and against which performance can be assessed.

b.

referral since each unit is specialized, if the problem does not fit the unit, the problem and the person are shuttled off.

c.

coverage nothing within the sphere of the organization is left out-if something is, it is added

d. proper procedure the essence of bureaucracy is application of rational principles to actionsystematize, formalize conduct. Efficiency of means is accompanied by quality control and assurance

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procedures (including "canned" service packages). e.

redress adjudication of improper procedure-this is source of change in procedure as well

f.

anonymity personal-social diagnoses provide impersonal, objective data that serve as the basis for impartial, fair treatment and interaction.,.

g.

hierarchy authority and expertise are associated with one's position in the agency, and most are vested in a few who see the whole picture as opposed to the many who see only its parts

h. orderliness the propensity for taxonomies - i.e. tendency ~o classify into components and categories, which are self-serving. i.

organizability everything in principle is organizable and classifiable; when problems surface, they require administration."

II

j.

mechanistic complete, comprehensive rules and regulations can be quickly, automatically, and uniformly implemented by workers

k.

reproducible no action is assumed to be so unique that it cannot be done by someone else with comparable training. Comparable training prepares people to replicate interventions.

1.

production line each person should act on specialized parts of the product while remaining mindful that the organization's process will deal with the whole Invited Brief, m. componentiality separation of work from private life; segregation of human needs.

n. anonymity equality of treatment requires affective neutrality (keep your distance, manage your emotions).

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The anthropology of development: bureaucracy vs the people. 'Development' is the uneven growth of capitalism in two centuries of machine revolution, but more often it concerns making good the damage incurred by such a process. Since the second world war, development has been one name for the relationship between rich and poor countries; but the goal of improving the latter's economies has been tacitly abandoned for more than two decades when the income drain from debt interest has far outweighed the value of aid. Beyond that lies the unresolved question of bureaucracy and the people. Ordinary lives have long been overridden by bureaucratic planning recipes which could not accommodate the real interests and practices of people on the ground. In a climate of neo-liberalism this observation could be assimilated to a critique of the state, the core of bureaucratic order. Consequently states have often been by-passed as corrupt and ineffective, their place taken by business corporations and non-government organizations. But NGOs are driven by even stronger bureaucratic imperatives than many government agencies, because of their dependence on public opinion back home. Aid bureaucracies are always more accountable to head office than to local needs and circumstances. The multilateral agencies too, who took it on themselves to co-ordinate development, have constantly struggled with the contradiction between their bureaucratic nature and the desire to stimulate self-organized human initiatives whose impulses are inevitably stifled by remote controls. The World Bank's devotion to concepts like 'the informal sector' and 'social capital' testifies to this need to bridge the unbridgeable. The anthropologists entered this scene in the 1960s and after. They brought with them a method of long-term immersion in fieldwork, an ideology of joining the people

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where they live and a general hostility to numeracy, literate records and all the techniques of bureaucracy. They were asked, usually at short notice and for curtailed periods, to fill in the human dimension of development as a complement to the dominant work of the economists and the engineers,. But they had the people card to play and that was the Achilles heel of the bureaucracy. They could always claim the authenticity of proximity to the people on the ground. t have been there and you haven't. They soon found out that they were in the middle of a war between bureaucracy and the people. They could take up one of three positions. They could inform on the people for the benefit of the bureaucracy. They could take the people's side as advocates for their interests. Or they could try to sit on the fence as mediators, offering interpretations of the people to the bureaucracy and of the bureaucracy to the people. The last of course was the one most compatible with the discipline's tradition of selecting adherents with a romantic vocation for the role of lone ranger in exotic places. As individualists, their natural position was in the gaps between all and sundry. A subdiscipline, the anthropology of development, arose seeking to formalize the involvement of anthropologists in development bureaucracies. Techniques like Rapid Rural Appraisal were embraced as inevitable, whatever violence they did to fieldwork traditions. At the same time some anthropologists advanced a post-structuralist critique of development, claiming that it was just a way of preserving a situation where the rich got richer, while the poor got poorer. But, rather than dismissing all bureaucracy out of hand as a tool of the powerful, we should ask how to incorporate the perspective of the people into what is done on their behalf, how to make development more democratic. Consider an earlier effort to confer the benefits of the modern state on 'peasants'. Chayanov examined the

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internal organization of peasant economy in order to develop policy prescriptions that he believed would be in their interest. Some of these cooperatives, technical inputs, marketing supports etc were implemented most effectively in Scandinavian countries, notably Denmark. But the example demonstrates that a state governing in the interests of the people, with the help of good communications and advice, can make bureaucracy work for their economic benefit. After all the goal of impersonal institutions was originally to provide equal access under the law. People were fed up with everything being a question of who you know. They wanted to be free of feudal mafias, to live by rules that treated everyone the same. If the consequence of this was another kind of despotism, we should not throw out the baby with the bath water and go for a simpleminded anarchism which cannot by itself address the problems of global civilization. There is therefore a fourth option for anthropologists who wish to engage with development. We could participate in attempts to make ours a less unequal world, by working in bureaucracies of various kinds and by joining the people where they live. In this way we might help to make rule by office more democratic while performing public services beyond the means of most self-help organizations on the ground.

10

The Mother of All Bureaucracy A few years back, the New York Times ran a story about the company I was working for. The story, based on an interview with the president of my business unit, concerned a change in the company's plans for developing a key product. Employees weren't aware of the change before the story appeared, so someone working for me made sure to feature the article on our intranet. It was big news, and it was already public. Where was the harm in keeping employees informed? As it turned out, the harm was hidden in the mind of the unit president who was interviewed. He contended we had always planned to pursue the development option he had disclosed." The Times had erred in hailing his comments as news, and he was upset my group had echoed this viewpoint. /I

When I heard this, I was baffled. I knew nothing about the change the Times had reported, nor did senior leaders I queried on the matter. I learned later that the president was right, in a technical sense. The company had, in fact, disclosed the option the Times had cited. But that disclosure amounted to a single

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word in a table in the company's annual report five years earlier. We had not discussed the option since, internally or publicly. That's why the story was news to everyone but the president himself. But no matter. An aggressive fellow at corporate HQ aware of the president's pique, devised a solution to ensure such an awful "mistake" wouldn't happen again. He offered to form and chair a new committee to vet all the company's intranet postings. Eight senior people, including me, were appointed to this committee, giving all of us yet another hour-long conference call to clog our weekly schedules. The meetings weren't useful, except to our chairman, who lil<ed to confect the appearance that he was responsible for work he neither performed nor fa~tated. Cultures Generate Bureaucracy There are two broad styles of management prone to embrace "solutions" like the one just described. The OCI Circumplex, a widely used tool for measuring corporate cultures, refers to them as aggressive-defensive and passivedefensive styles. One or both come to the fore in what Fr. Robert Spitzer calls a Level 2 culture, or one dominated by ego-driven, comparative behavior. Aggressive-defensive managers mistrust the intentions and competence of others, and they also desire power and control. One way they achieve control is by building governance structures and processes that ensure little happens without their express approval. Passive-defensive managers tend to lie low and protect themselves by conformity and strict adherence to rules. They prefer to work in committees and teams, but for much the same reason antelopes prefer herds. It helps them avoid standing out when the wolves come prowling. I'm not saying committees and rules are bad; they're often indispensable, but only as a means to an end and not

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as an end in their own right. When they become an end, or a means divorced from the common good, the result is bureaucracy. Myoid company admitted that it suffered from bureaucracy, although it preferred the term "low-value activities." We were often exhorted to weed out such activities, but weeding involves attacking the roots, and the roots of the problem went deeper than we imagined. Like most companies, we had a Level culture a culture defined by winners and losers. The winners used bureaucratic means to guard and expand their influence; the losers used them to camouflage mistakes and responsibility. I'm sure I did both myself at various times. I wasn't above the culture, I was part of it. For years, I thought bureaucracy was an artifact of our size, a consequence of getting very large. I thought it was unavoidable, but I see now I wasn't correct. It wasn't a question of size, but a matter of culture. We were trying to solve the problem with reorganizations and cuts, when the real solution was moving from Level 2 to Level 3. Aggressive-defensive managers mistrust the intentions and competence of others, and they also desire power and control. One way they achieve control is by building governance structures and processes that ensure little happens without their express approval. The Four Levels Explained Editor's note: While the Spitzer Center website has long had a brief diagram to explain the Four Levels of Happiness the same diagram that appears in the Four-Level Leader email we realized that readers and friends of the Center might find a fuller explanation useful. We're adding this description below to the "Our Approach" tab on the website.

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Levell Happiness derived from material objects and the pleasures they can provide. This is the most basic level of happiness, and it can come from eating fine chocolate, driving a sports car, a cool swim on a hot day, or other forms of physical gratification. Level 1 happiness is good but limited. The pleasure it provides is immediate but short-lived and intermittent. It is also shallow; it requires no reflection, and it doesn't extend beyond the self in any meaningful way. Level 2 Happiness derived from personal achievement and ego gratification. You feel Level 2 happiness when people praise you; when they acknowledge your popularity and authority; when you win in sports or advance in your career. Level 2 happiness is usually comparative because the ego measures success in terms of advantage over others. You're happy when you're seen as smarter, more attractive, or more important than others, and you're unhappy when you lose the comparison game. Level 2 happiness is shortterm and tei1.Uous. You can be happy that you won today, and then anxious you might lose tomorrow. Level 2 is not inherently bad because we all need success, selfesteem, and respect to accomplish good things in life. But when Level 2 happiness - self-promotion - becomes your only goal, it leads to self-absorption, jealousy, fear of failure, contempt, isolation, and cynicism. Level 3 Happiness derived from doing good for others and making the world a better place. Level 3 happiness is more enduring because it is directed toward the human desire for love, truth, goodness, beauty, and unity. It is capable of inspiring great achievements because it unites people in

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pursuit of the common good, whereas Level 2 happiness divides people. Level 3 is empathetic, not self-absorbed, and it looks for the good in others, not their flaws. It sees life as an opportunity and an adventure, not an endless series of problems to overcome. Because people have limits, Level 3 happiness also has its limits. None of us are perfect, so we can't find perfect fulfillment in other people. Level 4 Ultimate, perfect happiness. When others fall short of our ideals, or we fall short ourselves, we're disappointed. This disappointment points to a universal human longing for transcendence and perfection. We don't merely desire love, truth, goodness, beauty, and unity; we want all of these things in their ultimate, perfect, never-ending form. People of faith recognize this desire as a longing for union with God, and they recognize perfect happiness can only come as a gift through faith in God. But even people who don't have faith have a similar type of longing, which may express itself through philosophy, through art, or through scientific efforts to solve the mysteries of life and the universe. If you don't have these commitments firmly in place if you talk about the win-win but you don't bring people to a Level 3 empathy for others - the win-win is very hard to implement. It will sound good and it will seem to make sense, but it won't stick. When times get tough, people will revert to a win-lose mindset unless they have the underlying personal identity and desires that are commensurate with the winwin philosophy Covey promotes. You really need a Level 3, contributive identity.

By the way, the win-win is very smart approach. I use it all the time.

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The reform of the State bureaucracy The Heads and former Heads of State and Government agreed with the expert panel's report following three major action principles: •

State bureaucracy reform constitutes an essential part of the efforts of Heads of State and Government (HSGs) to consolidate democracy, making it more participatory, accountable, honest, transparent, and politically effective.

•

To transform State bureaucracy into an instrument for democracy building, HSGs need to pursue decentralization, strengthen coordination, and place tighter monitoring on State bureaucratic activities. The three should come as a package. Decentralization requires greater policy coordination if it is not to undermine bureaucratic effectiveness, and a routine monitoring of the abuses of public authority and power if it is not to degenerate into a corrupt system of rule by 'oligarchs'.

•

State bureaucracy reform is a political enterprise rather than a 'technocratic' task because it directly affects how power is organized and operated. The HSGs should think politically if they are to succeed in State bureaucracy reform.

Yet, some HSGs noted two weaknesses in the experts' report. Based on their personal experience, some HSGs thought the report should have been more "holistic," explicitly and directly noting its complex interconnectedness with reform on both the judiciary and legislative branches, as well as civil society and party politics. This is true especially for monitoring because corruption has many deep causes. Fighting it only through State bureaucracy reform is bound to fail. For monitoring to succeed, HSGs need:

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•

A legislature willing to enact tough laws.

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A 'clean' judiciary judging cases in a fair manner.

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Political parties with a system of transparent fundraising.

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Citizens understanding why corruption is bad.

•

And a vibrant but egalitarian economy, which assures individuals a secure life and reduces their temptation to resort to corruption to 'protect' themselves from absolute poverty.

Adopting a holistic approach to State bureaucracy reform accordingly is to think of it as an unending' process' and to pursue it gradually with a balanced mind. Especially in regard to monitoring, many participants warned against a threat of political instability and economic chaos if it is pursued without a sense of balance. Their advice is, always carefully navigate in between complementary and yet competing political values, one of which is anticorruption, and achieve a balance between stability and reform. Without stability, everything, including one's dream to build a 'clean' open society, may be lost. The other weakness in the experts' report noted by HSGs concerns its lack of attention to education and communication. Especially for monitoring to succeed, it is critical to educate individual citizens concerning why corruption is bad, why HSGs are doing what they do, and how they can make a difference. This is because without a major change in 'popular culture, values and norms, it is impossible to clean up corruption. Moreover, only when society feels it 'owns' State bureaucracy reform can HSGs mobilize it as an ally to overcome bureaucratic resistance. The HSGs should prepare an education and communication strategy as an integral part of State bureaucracy reform. Without communication, everything is lost.

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Decentralization The HSGs agreed with the panel of experts' recommendation to focus on decentralization for two reasons: •

Decentralization, more than any other parts 9f State bureaucracy reform, constitutes an act of democratic consolidation because decentralization empowers individual citizens to participate in politics, hold politicians and State bureaucrats accountable for their actions, and establishes a system of checks and balances.

•

The HSGs should focus on decentralization also because if it is to succeed, HSGs need to move simultaneously on greater coordination and tighter monitoring. Decentralization serves as a catalyst for systematically asking oneself how to organize coordinating powers and what to monitor.

The HSGs also strongly agreed with the recommendation made by the panel of experts for tying in together political and fiscal decentralization, because only then will decentralization result in bureaucratic efficiency, accountability and transparency. As seen by both HSGs and the panel 'pf experts, competitive elections at subnational levels give political parties a strong incentive to keep an eye on each other's political actions, thus increasing efficiency, transparency, and accountability. By contrast, transferring some tax authority to subnational governments forces their leadership to accurately calculate and consider costs when raising each additional unit of tax and, in doing so, makes it politically responsible as well as economically efficient. In spite of such a broad agreement, the HSGs warned against four dangers that they thought the panel of experts did not take into account. The dangers are as follows:

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•

Decentralization can destroy an emerging democracy's already existing bureaucratic mechanism for control, superVIsIOn and coordination, without creating any new institutions. The HSGs need to defend' good' existing institutions when trying to create new centers of power.

•

The HSGs should not think of decentralization only in terms of devolving State power downward to subnational levels. Equally critical, if not more important, is· preventing excessive centralization within anyone central State bureaucracy. This problem exists even after a substantial devolution of State power to subnational governments. The HSGs should try to push power and responsibility down from minister to bureaus, divisions, and sections in each ministry.

•

The empowering of society should not lead one to assume an automatic political support from individual citizens for decentralization. The society is interested in receiving quality public service from State ministries and views decentralization only as an instrument for such a public value. Nor is it correct to always see subnational governments as an active supporter for decentralization. More often they footdrag, if not oppose it, because they fear it will burden them with additional responsibilities. To win their support, HSGs must also transfer powers and resources downward. Even then, HSGs will encounter serious political risks without many needed allies and friends when decentralizing. Only an unwavering presidential commitment will allow reformers to carry out decentralization.

•

For plural societies with sharp ethnic, linguistic, or religious cleavages, decentralization, if timed wrongly, organized incorrectly, and ineffectively

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explained to society, will backfire and intensify , tribal' conflicts. There is a real danger of one or another larger ethnic group hijacking subnational governments to exclude lesser forces from political power and economic prosperity. In such a case, monitoring mechanisms, however structured and processed, will not function as planned. To prevent decentralization from aggravating ethnic tensions and degenerating into political rule by a larger tribe against lesser ones, HSGs should try to make each subnational government unit as homogeneous as possible in ethnic terms and flexibly reflect local conditions in one's design for decentralization, but in ways which do not put into motion powerful secessionist political movements. The HSGs should adopt cohesion and identity as two major principles governing decentralization and make each subnational unit of political authority internally homogeneous, but also externally capable of living together with other units and imagining itself as an integral part of a larger nation. The HSGs also called for adopting subsidiarity as a central principle when deciding what to decentralize and not decentralize. This means that HSGs should identify what is best achieved through decentralization and focus on only those as priority items. Education is one promising area for reform. For smaller emerging democracies, HSGs should consider an option of decentralizing public services but not necessarily State organization in order to minimize costs. Decentralization may be a too expensive option for smaller countries. For new democracies located in Europe, decentralization has an external dimension. The transfer of power and responsibility to subnationallevels occurs with a partial transfer of sovereignty to its supranational regionalist

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organization, the EU, whose mission is to create supranational centers of power. The HSGs in Europe should seize such supranational regional integration processes as an opportunity to flexibly restructure State organization. Coordination

The HSGs agreed on the experts' recommendations to use a strong, autonomous central bank as their "last pillar" of economic order in case all other coordinating mechanisms fail under political pressures; to build a professional career civil service as a principle, but recruit outside experts more or less depending on goals, means and actor characteristics of any given issue area; and to appoint an "honest broker" to facilitate communication between all critical stakeholders. However, some HSGs voiced a strong caution against dividing up budgetary, .financial, and personnel management responsibilities into three separate ministries, especially if there does not exist a highly developed professional civil service. Where restrictive rules and norms on civil service recruitment do not exist, institutionally separating personnel management power from budgetary and financial responsibilities can result in a disastrous increase of State bureaucrats, because political leaders are always tempted to use State bureaucracy as a tool for political patronage. For such States with a weak civil service, HSGs recommended placing all three powers in the ministry of treasury and delegating power to its minister. The treasury is a source of stability in democratic transition and consolidation. Monitoring

All the HSGs recognized a greater need for monitoring, but they differed significantly on how strong and autonomous monitors should be. The HSGs were divided into two groups, one assuming an uncompromising activist posture against .corruption, and the other being more

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cautious or conditional in supporting anticorruption drives. This difference partly reflected how corruption-prone their politics were. The HSGs from high corruption societies tended to oppose setting up an autonomous, powerful monitoring mechanism, lest anticorruption drives explode into an uncontrollable systemic crisis. The other group without a similar fear could, by contrast, agree more readily with the Expert ~roup' s recommendations which included to set up the following: an auditor separated from both the executive and legislative branches; an anticorruption agency with power independently to investigate and even prosecute criminal cases a constitutional court to perform constitutional review on both executive and legislative branches' political actions; an administrative court to correct abuses of power on issues involving citizens; and an ombudsman to investigate complaints submitted by individuals to the legislature. Those more sceptical of monitoring mechanisms offered deregulation as a more effective way to reduce abuses of public authority for private gains. Regardless of one's stand on whether to establish an autonomous monitoring mechanism, all HSGs expressed a grave concern on both the media's and political parties' propensity to use rumors on corruption to hurt politicians. The issue of corruption has corrupted political discourses, one HSG argued. One HSG called for international cooperation to fight corruption. Possible measures include regulation of bank secrecy and confidentiality, international regulation of tax havens, and cooperation between national monitoring institutions.

11

Perfection of Meritocracy or Ritual of Bureaucracy Abstract

The paper addresses HRM systems and practices in a large multinational management consultancy company. The company invests a lot of resources in HRM tasks, and is frequently praised by employees for its accomplishments in hiring, developing and promotion in practice. HRM as a belief system and as practices then do not harmony particularly well. The paper critically interprets the meaning and the functions of the HRM system and the beliefs supporting it. The paper suggests are-interpretation of HRM systems and practices based on a culturalsymbolic perspective. It points at a) the limits and shortcomings of HRM systems in terms of rationality, b) the significance of organizational symbolism in accounting for the role of HRM systems and practices - symbolizing rationality and commitment to people improvement as well as a highly competent work force and c) the various effects of these systems and practices on employee compliance. Introduction It is common for people with an interest in people issues in business to emphasize the crucial significance of personnel - or human resources to use the nowadays most

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common label. Many researchers and practitioners stress the human resources and partly overlapping elements such as corporate culture, knowledge and core competence, as universally significant (Pfeffer, 1994; Tichy et aI, 1982). This claim can with greater confidence than in any other sector be made about what can be referred to as the knowledge intensive sectors. The importance of the personnel the organizational members - in knowledgeintensive firms is a widely emphasized. Since most, if not all, knowledgeintensive firms lack assets, others than the competences and capabilities of the work force, the personnel are truly these companies most important resource. Predictably, knowledge-intensive companies stress the importance of securing loyalty and commitment. Today, most thinking in this matter tends to be subsumed under the HRM label, where the abbrevation HRM stand for human resource management. Human resource mandgement is a loose concept that signifies a highly diverse set of frameworks, ideas, concepts, and practices. HRM focuses on what broadly can be described as the human side of enterprise recruitment, training, staffing, career planning and development, compensation, and labour relation. Most HRM thinking emanates from a managerial perspective and most, but not all, takes this perspective for granted. The common denominator lies in the object of study, rather than in theoretical elaboration, or methodological consistency. Many HRM authors al argue that human resource management is a core strategic activity, in fact as important as developing mission and strategy, and designing organizational strategy. According to Tichy et aI, human resource management consists of four key activities selection, appraisal, rewards and development that typically follows a cycle, the so-called IIhuman resource cycle". Other HRM authors, with a normative rather than rationalist interest, also or instead emphasise organizational

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culture and managerial philosophies as important tools for creating commitment among organizational members, which along with competence, cost effectiveness and congruence being the key watchwords for managing human resources. HRM is less of a particular well developed theoretical framework as a claim about changing corporate practices in dealing with personnel issues. It is not entirely clear if, and if so, to what extent, HRM represents something new and radically different. The real difference between HRM and PM is "not what it is but who is saying it" , according to Fowler. There seems to be some indications on a shift in orientation. Although HRM as a theoretical construct may be problematic there is little of HRM theory the label seems to have catch on in practice. Most organizations today claim to have human resource departments and human resources manager, thus implying that the human resources somehow is managed .

.

We will investigate a case of a set of HRM practices that can be said to extremely ambitious and of key significance for the success of a company. In this paper we will take a close look at the HRM system at a very large international consultancy firm. This firm claims to have and use a very rational and ambitious HRM system in which people are assessed, developed and screened out so that a highly competent, motivated and wellfunctioning work force is accomplished. Promotion decisions during certain intervals is important here, as is more frequently carried out assessments of performances and development needs in connection to project work as well as various devices for developing people. People praise this system, for its usefulness for junior personnel and for its capacity to deliver an effective work force, where hierarchical position and competence is an

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almost perfect match. However, a closer look indicates plenty of deviations from the ideal. Even though people stress a positive view on the company's systems and performances in terms of HRM many also express contradictory opinions and evaluations of HRM practices. The paper will point at a number of cracks in the HRM machinery, cracks indicating tendencies to breakdowns in trust and credentials, that do not lead to such consequences due to various efforts to prevent the cracks from fully materializing in people's talk and consciousness. Consequently, the paper critically interprets the meaning and the functions of the HRM system and the beliefs supporting it. These concern a) identity-constructing functions building up self-confidence and feelings of . belonging to an elite; b) the faith and pride in the company facilitated by the symbolism of the HRM systeMS and practices; and c) the usefulness of an ambitious HRM system in signalling to the external world the rationality of the company and the high quality of the personnel indicated by its qualitysecuring set of practices for processing and assessing the personnel. The value of the personnel on the consultancy service as well as the labour market is thus increased. It is argued that different actors develop different myth-preserving logics and tactics, contingent upon position and overview. The paper has two ambitions. The first is to investigate and through light on HRM in an organization where the reasons for putting a lot of effort into optimizing the competence of the personnel in recruitment, assessment, development and promotion are exceptionally strong. The difficulties of optimization or even accomplishing a high level of rationality is explored. The second objective is to suggest a symbolic understanding of the workings of the HRM systems and practices. This follows fairly closely the empirical material, but should be of more general relevance for the understanding of HRM in an organization theory

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context. The symbolism of HRM means that it is not the functional efficiency as much as what the structures and practices symbolize in terms of the ability and competence development of the personnel, the company's qualities viz. the client and the labour market, etc. that become significant. HRM and people processing Legge (1995) claims that HRM is in many ways a recycled version of traditional personnel management, but with emphasis on different aspects the rhetoric of HRM seeks to secure new meanings and emphases compared to the normative personnel management models. According to Legge, the rhetoric presents HRM as: aimed at managers and core workers, rather than a work-force collective connecting personnel issues with business strategy and bottom-line results focusing management on cultural and symbolic means of persuasion Drawing mainly on the work of Foucault, Townley (1993) argues that HRM practices provide certainty and closure to the relation between employers and employees. In Foucauldian terms, HRM operates as a particular field of power-knowledge, disciplining and normalizing the employer-employee relationship. As Townley put it. By presenting HRM as a process of power-knowledge. I am redirecting interest from the truth or falsity of discourse towards its functioning. The type of questions that are prompted in research relate to the production of knowledge and its effects. In particular, research moves away from the notion of practice as a technicist construct. Recruitment, assessment and selection are typically viewed from two radically different point of view: the

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scientific selection perspective and the social process perspective. The scientific selection perspective strongly dominates the HRM literature. It is based on the idea that recruitment, assessment and development deals with people that have stable sets of skills and capacities, and that these characteristics are possible to objectivively investigate and measure, thus making so called job performance prediction possible. Viewed as social process recruitment, assessment, and selection practices constitue and co-create the individual: One form of this social process approach simply notes the interplay between selection events, candidates' feelings and responses, and organizational outcomes, emphasizing the mutual adjustments and 'negotiations' that occur. But a more interesting and radical form sees the candidate and the selection decision as in various ways constructed by the process of selection and measurement. Thus assessment centres could be seen not as discovering potential, but as defining and constructing it. In this paper we will look at recruitment, assessment, and selection from a social process perspective. In this sense, we will take an interest in both the anatomy of the HRM system in our case and its outcomes, in terms of conduct and frames of references. An interpretive-cultural approach This paper adopts an interpretive line of inquiry. Our approach is thus not functionalistic we have now intentions to primarily contribute to improved ways of dealing with personnel issues through offering improved techniques and we do not address HRM in any objectivist sense. Our version of interpretive research draws upon a cultural understanding of organizations. This does not necessarily presuppose or target" corporate cultures" in the sense of unitary and unique set of meanings, values and symbolism

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corresponding to companies, but takes an interest in the level of meaning in organizations shared by smaller or larger groups and the significance of symbolism for how people communicate and make sense of their shared worlds. We use the term 'organizational culture' as a concept for a way of thinking which takes a serious interest in cultural and symbolic phenomena. This term directs the spotlight in a particular direction rather than is intended to mirror a concrete reality for possible study. We agree with Frost et al.'s 'definition' of organizational culture: 'Talking about organizational culture seems to mean talking about the importance for people of symbolism - of rituals, myths, stories and legends and about the interpretation of events, ideas, and experiences that are influenced and shaped by the groups within which they live.' We will also, however, take organizational culture to include values and assumptions about social reality, but for us values are less central and less useful than meanings and symbolism in cultural analysis. This position is in line with the view broadly shared by many modern anthropologists. Culture is then understood to be a system of common symbols and meanings. It provides' the shared rules governing cognitive and affective aspects of membership in an organization, and the means whereby they are shaped and expressed. Culture is not primarily 'inside' people's heads, but somewhere 'between' the heads of a group of people where symbols and meanings are publicly expressed, e.g. in work group interactions, in board meetings, in formal procedures but also in material objects. Culture then is central in governing the understanding of behavior, social events, institutions and processes. Culture is the setting in which these phenomena become comprehensible and meaningful. A symbol can be defined as an object a word or statement, a kind of action, a procedure or a material phenomenon that stands

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ambiguously for something else and or something more than the object itself. A symbol is rich in meaning it condensates a more complex set of meanings in a particular object and thus communicates meaning in an economic way. Occasionally, the complexity of a symbol and the meaning it expresses calls for considerable interpretation and deciphering. People have private symbols, but in an organizational context it is collective symbolism that is of most interest. Sperber interprets as symbolic 'all activity where the means put into play seem to be clearly disproportionate to the explicit or implicit end that is, all activity whose rationale escapes me'. As Gusfield and Michalowicz note, what is symbolic for one person may be non- symbolic for another. Still, we think it is wise to use ' symbol' as a conceptual tool for making sense of the hidden or latent meanings of an object.

The Case Excellence is a large consulting company and employing over 25 000 people worldwide. We focus on the Scandinavian subsidiary that employs approximately 700 people, but this follows the same overall philosophy and procedures as other subsidiaries. Excellence conducts management consultancy (broadly defined). They target large organizations as customers. The company has doubledigit growth in sales, and has been growing at that rate for some time. Below we will specify the parts of Excellence's HRM system - recruitment, career structure, appraisal and evaluation systems, and development. Recruitment: selectivity and standardization

Almost everybody working at Excellence has an academic degree. Consultants are mainly recruited directly from the larger Swejish Universities. Degrees in business administration or engineering are mandatory. Excellence

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attempts to profile itself as an elitist, demanding but richly rewarding place to work. Judging from polls among Swedish business administration and engineering students, the students seem to have got the message and also decided to approve. Excellence consistently ranks high in polls over most attractive employer. Excellence is growing rapidly. It also has a rather high employee turn over, something it shares with almost everybody else in this business sector. Taken together, this means that recruitment and retention are crucial areas for Excellence. The recruitment process is, as a consequence of the large number of recruitments every year, elaborate, timeconsuming and, involves to one degree or another, more or less everybody at Excellence. All employees, and even partners, are expected to take part in various recruitment efforts, such as presenting the company at Universities, interviewing job seekers, and generally looking out for people to hire. The HR department administers recruitment, but consultants decide upon who will be employed. The recruitment process is organized around two basic elements: screening and interviewing. Screening consists mainly of an evaluation of candidates qualifications. Interviewing is a somewhat more elaborate process where candidates are invited to Excellence headquarters in Stockholm and interviewed twice: once by HR personnel and once by senior consultants. The HR department has a goal of not taking longer than two weeks from first interview to final decision. Our informants indicate that they seem to meet that standard at the moment. Excellence claims that they recruit the "best people". They can probably mobilize back up for that claim, at least in the Scandinavian context. However, not all organizational members are convinced that Excellence is capable to keep the "best people" and that they loose a large proportion of the most competent personnel.

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There is a general feeling that the standardized methodology and work procedures, and the standardized career paths stifle creativity and make promotion a matter of seniority rather than qualification. Excellen,ce are currently attempting to counter this tendency. For example, they are condu_cting general revision of the career opportunities and career paths. They attempt to cut down on the time that it takes to make partner. They are developing schemes for profit-sharing. Finally, they are also attempting to find ways to channel entrepreneurial urges among organizational members within the firm, rather than leaving them no space for such activities and, thus, passively forcing them to quit.

Promotion and career structure The Firm is generally understood to be a career company. Initial advancement is expected to be swift for the individual. There are four basic levels: analyst, consultant, manager and partner. New personnel typically start as analysts. Exceptions are made for so-called "experienced hires", employees with work experience prior their employment at Excellence, that theoretically can enter at any level. In practice, most, if not all, experienced hires enter at the consultant level. Their experience often facilitate career advancement, but some of our informants have hinted that lacking the 'normal' path of socialization may slow career advancement for experienced hires. Employees are expected to advance within 12-18 months as analyst and within 2-4 years as consultants. They then become "managers", i.e. they get this title and gradually are functioning as project managers. After the manager level, advancement becomes more difficult. After 3-6 years as managers people are either put on "the partner track" or not. Far from everybody on the track do become partners. This means that only a very careful chosen few of all that starts as junior members of the firm ever makes it to the

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partner level. Many leave entirely based on their own choice. Those not being promoted are expected to leave the company in due course and almost everybody do. The company then works on an up-or-out-system. Appraisal and evaluation systems

The employees at Excellence are under constant performance evaluation. Sometimes people in the company talk about a "feedback culture", but evaluation and feedback is fairly strictly formalized. Evaluation is organized in two main processes. First, employees are evaluated in relation to their individual development. This process is labeled c-mapping and is carried out three to four times every year. The employee's nearest boss, usually the project leader of the project where the employee currently works, here primarily evaluates the employee. Employees are expected to propel this process themselves to a high degree. They are expected to articulate new targets for development, after they have received the feedback from the project leader. The feedback, on the other hand, is expected to be constructive and to help the employee to identify strengths and weaknesses. The general idea is that everybody should be evaluated in similar ways and according to similar criteria. Thus, there are several tools available - policy documents, forms, and standardized software - to ensure that everybody is treated in a fair and unbiased way. You have the c-maps, which is our tool for formal feedback. Ideally you start by determining the criteria, together with your project leader. And there are five common criterias, such as creating trust, adding value, and so on. And then you typically have more specific criteria. Am I a better programmer than expected? Am I better on communicating than expected? There are standard levels. And thats well-defined in the tool, how an analyst is

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expected to perform, a consultant and so on. And then you pick three or four criterias and then you set the expectations: in three months you should have done this and this. And the the project leader writes a brief summary after the three months, with your contribution. Typically it also includes comments on your strengths and weaknesses,. This is put together into a file that is send to HR and stored there. And then you have the annual review, counselling, where your development plan is developed and evaluated. Second, employees are ranked by their superiors in a process labeled banding. Banding occurs once a year. The employee is ranked in category I, 2 or 3. Band 1 is reserved for top performers. Category 2 is regarded as acceptable performance. Band 3 is a warning signal, that you are an under-achiever and need to get your act together. Banding is important because it directly influence compensation: salary influences, career development and perks. The idea is that banding is linked to c-map information. Several good c-maps accumulate into a good (category 1) banding. As we will discuss later on, the picture is murkier and more ambiguous in practice. The banding procedure is secretive: only the employee and his or her superiors knows about one's banding. Employees are actively discouraged to discuss their banding with each other.

Development The people at Excellence have fully embraced the rather modern idea that knowledge is scarce, important and business critical. Thus, they invest a lot of money, time and other resources in the development of the individual. First, newcomers start with a three week long introduction program which typically include a trip to the US for a week at the corporate training facility and later follows other forms of training. Second, Excellence have put much effort in developing

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a sophisticated system for knowledge management. Apart from the databases and websites, the knowledge management systems at Excellence is organized around socalled competence groups and knowledge champions. A competence group is roughly a group of consultants, organized around a theme (for example ecommerce or performance management), that gathers regularly and exchanges knowledge and experiences about the theme. Each consultant is encouraged to take part in at least one of them (it is possible, even common, to participate in several competence groups). Competence groups make sure that the information and the cases in the databases are updated. Knowledge champions are people who are designated to systematize the knowledge yielded in projects. Third, junior consultants are always paired with a senior consultant, who operates is his or her counsellor which is also the official title. The idea is that senior consultants shall operate as mentors and help junior consultants in their development. According to our informants, the counsellor is primarily important in making sense of the intricacies of internal politics al Excellence. In particular, the counsellor is important in the banding process since the counsellor speaks for the consultant under evaluation in the process. The counsellor is also important since he or she provides a way to shelter from exploitation from overambitious project managers, and also to communicate to the higher echelons of the company hierarchy. Fourth, knowledge- and information-sharing activities occur continuously at Excellence. There are seminars, workshops, information meetings, and so on almost 24/7. Internal speakers, external speakers, customers, vendors, university professors, think-tank analysts participate regularly: everything one can image in our informationsoaked era. Employees are expected to participate, and they do so willingly, since the traffic of knowledge and

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information emphasizes and underscores an important assumption about working at Excellence - that this is a place for those that value competence and has high ambitions. The fifth, and most important ingredient, is project manpower planning taking the developmental aspect into account. When staffing projects, the individual's development situation is carefully considered: getting juniors to work with different project managers, taking new and more deman,9.ing roles, getting options to work with things they are not that good with, etc. A system that works - members' perception of the HRM system The general perception among organizational members at Excellence is that the HRM system delivers. In particular, two aspects are highlighted. First, there is a widespread belief that the the corporate system for selection, promotion and ranking is reliable and that the resulting hierarchy expresses valid differences in technical and managerial competence. Second, it is commonly thought that the HRM system is successful in developing individuals, someting that is believed to validated by the fact that employment at Excellence makes individuals more attractive in the labor market. In other words, HRM practices and supporting cultural orientations means quality assurence through a) effective sorting Iflechanisms in recruitment and promotion and b) effective people improvement. , Hierarchy and differentiation as mirrors of competence and meritocracy The hierarchy at Excellence, which is fairly elaborate to begin with, is typically further elaborated to include how many years the individual have served at his or her present level. This practice is generally perceived to map competences and capacities accurately. The elaborated formal differentiation system is seen as mirror the actual competence of the employees.

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It should be emphasized that hierarchy is not valued

for its own sake. The authoritanian aspects inherent in hierarchical arrangements is typically considered with suspicision, and several of our informants voiced concern over the hierarchy's stifling effect on creativity. However hierarcy is valued at Excellence, not because it provides a unitary chain of command, but because it is believed to accurately express meritocracy. It is is the meritocratic value of differentiation that makes hierarchy perceived as legitimate and even necessary among organizational members. The reason why it works at Excellene is because people get promoted, not because they have been working a certain number of years at the firm, but because they are ready to take the responsibility. They have the experience and they have the competence. And, usually, you create respect in relation to the lower levels of the organization, and pay and economic compensation come with the responsibility. They are connected. As a consequence, I would say that a project hierarchy is necessary if you are going to work in a large project. It could be different if you are running a speaking partner-consulting project. So I think that if you take a look at this deliverance culture and our capacity to really deliver a product, it is related to the fact that we are good at running big projects. It is worth noting the enormous confidence in the ability to assess, produce and structure the ability of people in a formal system. Little doubt is raised whether human capacities are that well ordered and possible differentiate along hierarchical1ines, or that the assessments and formal differentiation structures exhibit a high degree of rationality in dealing with these capacities.

The HRM system as quality proof of the personnel Several of our informants pointed out, when asked why

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they have applied for work at Excellence, that they believed that it would make them more attractive at the labor market and that it, at least, would look good on their CV's to have . worked at Excellence. Many, in particular at higher hierarchical levels, credited the HRM system for a very good reputation of the personnel on the labor market. Then we have that one, at least that is what we say to explain it to ourselves, our reputation is very good concerning our employees. If you have five years at Excellence on your CV, then they don't care to look at your degree etc. They practically don't care to look at anything at all, they just say: "Okay, here is the job if you want it". They know that the quality of the people we hired is assured, and that we have trained and developed them. This makes our employees very attractive to everything from headhunters or ex-employees to, well, other consultancy firms too, that know us quite well. One interviewee compares Excellence with another, medium-sized consultancy firm he worked for earlier, and emphasizes the superiority of the former in its people development and screening process, resulting in a very fine match between level and capacity of people. At Administrative Consulting, there is a hierarchy as such, but there older people, so to speak, could be in the middle of the pyramid. And there was also people who advanced in the organization, but who lacked the respect and the knowledge that they should have. So already by that time, some of the credibility of this project organization was damaged, even if there were attempts, during my time there, to professionalize this approach. There were a couple of seniors who didn't perform very well. These people don't exist at Excellence, or at least they are extremely rare, they just don't stay. There is an "up-or-out" system. It is not brutal. People are not sacked because they fail in a project. But over a longer period, in one way or another, these people disappear. '

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To sum up: Excellence's HRM system is based on elite confirmation: a strong brand name and broad recognition of belonging to 'the best and the brightest'. The idea of an elite is justified and reinforced through up-market recruitment, relatively long periods of training, good options for competence development, cooperation with bright people, high wages and career prospects (either within or outside the company), and, perhaps most important, careful screening procedures in recruitment and promotion. In addition, the fact that even the most junior consultant sometimes works not very far from the client's top management team. Some HRM problems at Excellence As a direct consequence of the practice of primarily recruiting people directly from university, a large proportion of the work force works as underlings, with little individual responsibility and discretion. This discrepancy is to a large extent managed through complementary HRM practices. The young and unexperienced people who forms the bulk of the large-scale projects are typically willing to subordinate themselves to the systems and structures of the work methodology. The degree of compliance called for is related to the initial uncertainty felt by newcomers. The recruitment of very young and talented people is related to hierarchy and career steps. The intake of young consultants call for relatively well structured project management and the monitoring of more qualified people, i.e. strongly asymmetrical relations. Thus, a vital motive for starting and continuing working for Excellence is the career opportunities. The HRM system at Excellence operates in a manner that provides some instant gratification for often hard, routine, and repetitive work sometimes carried out in a highly formatted way and with few degrees of freedom. However, it promises stronger rewards in due course, with

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a promise that eventually, if you as a member work hard enough, is smart enough, and don't make peers, superiors or customers uncomfortable, will be gratified lavishly later on: both in terms of material compensation and personal autonomy. The elite image, the campus atmosphere, and the relatively high salaries are some important ways Excellence furnish instant gratification, that in many ways offers a taste of what might come. The relatively transparent career structure provides a predictable path for the individual, which makes it possible for he or she to create checks and balances: hard work and subordination now, windfall, status and autonomy later. The constant evaluation offers possibilities for gauging how well one is doing, both for the company and for the individual. Competence groups and training programs alJows for corrective action, thus making it possible for individuals to reframe their positions when evaluations are bad or career advancement has hit a speedbump. Still, working at ExcelleI'ce, at least on the junior levels, calls for quite a lot of subordination and willingness to accept long working hours and to work in a fairly hierarchical structure, in which a lot of systems regulate how things should be done. According to some interviewees this leads to a somewhat negative selectivity in terms of who stays in the company. If one is expressing the ambition that the company will hire the best people, take them in and put them in a box telling them to do so and so. Then it is not the best people sitting in the box, but the most adaptable people.

A significant problem for Excellence is to be able to attract and retain sufficient number of good people. The retainment problem escalates on a hot labour market, in which the experienced personnel are very attractive. The instrumental motives which one has relied upon may then make people inclined to go for attractive offers - in terms of financial

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compensation - from others. This is not necessarily only a matter of instrumental motives. As wage and other forms of compensation is seen as closely related to status and worth, willingness to go for the highest income may be a tactic of confirming and strengthening one's selfunderstanding as belonging to the elite. The HRM procedures of Excellence then makes people focused on external confirmation of one's value - to a high degree shown through wages and then the symbolism of the pay level become heightened, leading to a motivational logic around wage maximization, undermining corporate loyalty and intrinsic motivation. System failures. cracks and discrepanices in the HRM system HRM practices at Excellence can be characterized as follows: modem, coherent, ubiquitous, sophisticated, and in many ways all-embracing. The ambitions are high and a substantial amount of resources are put into managing it. They are present in most work situations. As an individual, you are frequently evaluated and asked to evaluate other people. You are expected to help out in recruiting new people: making interviews and participating in companysponsored events at business schools and universities. You are typically engaged in one, two, or even three competence groups, either as an organizer or as a participant. If you are a manager or more, you are also likely to operate as a counsellor. If you are less elevated and more junior, you are on the receiving end of the counselorcounselee relationship. Wherever you are and whatever you do at Excellence, you are engaged in HRM practices or operating in their close vincinity. The HRM practices at Excellence may appear to be consistent and build into a integrated framework. However, a closer look reveals several "cracks" here defined as

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perceived discrepancies and inconsistencies in the machinery that potentially threat its credibility, effectiveness and legitimacy. A crack is a deviation from the ideal of a robust and reliable system that is half-consciously noted and call for repairment work. Repairment work may address problems of the system and aim to improve it. But arguably this is frequently difficult when it comes to ambiguous phenomena as people processing. Repairment may also concern the symbolic sphere the development of meanings and lines of thinking which save people from taking the cracks fully seriously. In this section we will decribe and elaborate upon four deviations, possibly leading to cracks. Two concern process, i.e. how elements in the HRM system work. The other two relate to outcomes, i.e. perceptions related to how the company at the end of the day deliver what is promised in terms of optimal HR products, i.e. right people on the right positions. Feedback systems unreliable in delivery HRM practices at Excellence is replete with feedback mechanism, to the extent that it might be appropriate to talk about a 'cult of feed-back'. Organizational members are actively encouraged to give and seek feed-back in all situations. Typically, organizational members praises the feedback system, although often in a convoluted way and not without reservations. It's very formalized. Every project feeds a feed-back database consisting of 20-25 preformed criteria, where you are graded based on hierarchical level, summarized in strengths, weaknesses, and recommendations which is supposed to folloowed by a discussion. This is done after the project is concluded, about sex weeks after. But you need feed-back and guidance during the whole process. On the whole, I think that there is a balance between pointing out when it is not quite good and encouraging when you are doing well.

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Interestingly, the highly formalized character of the feedback seems to devalue its effects. Several of our informants indicated that although they believed that feedback is important, and that they though that Excellence excelled in prOViding formalized feedback, the validity of the feedback system was questionable. "We are to cautious", one senior manager said. Another crack in the system is evident in the way the apparaisal and evaluation procedures actually work. According to the norm, c-maps are written and performed by project managers. However, we found that in practice almost all orga~izational members write their c-maps themselves. "I wrote my own c-map again at the Dairy-project. I even wrote the evaluation, both contribution and summary. Then the project manager edited it somewhat. It is not supposed to work this way, but it does. That consultants write their own evaluations, at least as drafts, seems to be a common practice. In one of our observations the project leader casually told the project members that he wanted them to produce drafts for their own c-maps. The request was produced in an undramatic way, almost as an afterthought. It was recieved as trivial and as an everyday thing. Nobody hinted anything that resembled surprise or protest. However undramatic as a practice, the shift from being evaulated by another and evaluating oneself have subtle and importants consequences. It turnS what is supposed to be an evaluation of performance into an exercise in articulatir.g self-knowledge. Furthermore, this exercise is produced in a specific context and with particular linguistic resources at hand: cmaps invites, or even forces, the organizational members at Excellence to articulate selfknowledge in the corporate language.

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One problem and a reason for the delegation of the work with the c-maps to the individuals that these are about is that the HRM practices are time consuming. Frequently project managers feel that they don't have the time to spend the several hours that may be needed to make the c-map feedback system work. The feedback system is thus all the time competing with other tasks and requirements and depending on project managers devoting sufficient time to it. At least occassionally, it is carried out in a ritualistic way as a part of the administrative machinery. The promotion system

The so-called banding are another example on how practice deviate form the norm. On an ideological level banding appears to be a textbook case of examination, where the banding process is a simple additive process of putting together evaluations carried out under the period, in particular the relevant c-maps. In the banding, all project managers of relevance should, in principle, participate. The idea is that the decision should be as objective as possible. As these people have written, or at least edited and put their own evaluations on the c-maps one should anticipate coherence between c-maps and banding. However, a closer look at the process reveals a somewhat different dynamiCS. For example, banding and c-maps are in practice sometimes relatively uncoupled events, where c-maps have little direct impact on the banding process. I was surprised when I become involved in the banding process, that c-maps meant so little. I though they were important but it 'was evident that other aspects mattered more. In practice, it is recommendations and comments from project managers that decide. As a freshman, you think that c-maps is the thing. A couple of good c-maps become a good banding. But there is no clear connection between c-maps and your banding. Rather, your banding depends on what project managers thinks about you.

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Banding as a process is hidden and kept secret for the person who is evaluated. However, the person under evaluation is capable, through his or her counsellor, to exert a certain amount of influence over the banding process. In practiCf.: the person under evaluation is expected to provide input to the proc.ess: to suggest the persons most able to pass judgment on his or her efforts, and through the counsellor who will speaks for him or her raise objections about person that might pass perceived unfair judgments. Everybody is told to name and contact the persons who have relevant input for ones banding. If you have a feeling that things may go wrong anyway, you still have an opportunity to influence the process through your counselor. The discrepancies between the prescribed formal procedure and the ways the various evaluation practices loosely connect to each other may be seen as a typical example of how organizations work and that not much attention should be paid to it. Observation of some degree of inconsistency is not a sufficient starting point for an interesting study. It is, of course, difficult to assess But given the strong claims of the company and the personnel about the level of ambition as well as success in dealing with HRM issues, we think reactions such as those of the interviewees cited above are worth consideration. Process and outcome cracks So far, we have described some observations and reported experiences around how HRM systems are practiced. What does this say about the outcomes? Inconsistencies and deviations in the performance of practices do not necessarily lead to problems in the outcomes of the handling of personnel issues. Even if assessments in the context of feedback provision and the communication of feedback in formal situations like the c-map evaluations are not working according to the book, the company may still, in a variety of informal ways, be good in providing

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feedback. Formal procedures may symbolize a corporate commitment to feedback giving and be a reinforcing mechanism of a feedback culture, that does the trick in a variety of ways, including in more informal, everyday work life situations. Promotion decisions may be done in a as far as possible rational way, even if there is no close connection or consistency with other parts of the HRM system. Non-optimal functioning of formal procedures may therefore not entirely predict outcomes, and frequently organizational culture may compensate for the shortcomings of formal systems, guiding informal ways of thinking, acting and getting things straight. In addition, the cracks mentioned only indicate that intended procedures do not work fully, but it is difficult to assess how strong is the discrepancy between plan and actual practice. We therefore adress also outcomes of HRM issues, in terms of 1) whether Excellence is a highly effective feedback machinery and the company, at the end of the day, is experienced as promoting the right people and getting the best to senior positions. Clients better in delivering feedback than Excellence Without denying the performances of Excellence is providing feedback, it is worth noting that several people, when not asked to focus on HRM issues, but talk more generally about experiences in their work, emphasize the client as an even more significant provider of feedback than one's colleagues and superiors: The client means a lot. Because that's where you get your pats in the back. You rarely get that from co-workers. '" You have to ask to get it. But the client is very good at providing feedback. You don't even need to hear them say it. You can feel it. It is worth to point out that the informer in the quotation

above previously in the interview had stressed that she

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thought that the feed-back system was one one of the most attractive features at Excellence. However, as is clearly expressed in the quotation, the feedback mechanisms - as complete, or excessive, as they seems to be - fails to provide sufficient "real" feedback. Mysteries of promotion According to our informants at junior levels, it is sometimes difficult to see a pattern or specific criteria that apply for promotion to the partner level. This perception is presumably not shared by senior people and may reflect limited insights of those not having the entire picture of people's qualifications, but the point of interest in this paper is this perception about the uncertainty of the promotion process among at least a proportion of the people in the company. There is even a widespread ~pinion that the meritocratic character of the promotion structure is nullified, due to the lack of fast advancement above the consultant level.. Several of our informants claim, for example, that they didn't think that it was the best people who made it to the partnership level. There is a lot of people here who is extremely good and work like dogs. But they leave the firm. Those who are considered to be the best people here, they won't stay until they become partners. Thus, the promotion procedures at the higher level of the company is both is perceived as mysterious and, to some degree, spurios. They are considered mysterious since less senior people sometimes have difficulties in finding a pattern in who will be promoted and who will not. They are considered spurious since they will not include the best people anyway, since thay have left the company long before they qualify for promotion to the partner level.

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Many people express some scepticism to the competence of at least a proportion of the partner group. One would anticipate that an effective system would in particular be reliable in the screening of the people that become partners these are the people that have passed all the people processing improvement interventions (including all the feedback) and all· the quality tests and assessments during more than ten years of employement. If people perceive that more than an odd exception of those belonging to this exclusive top group do not belong to the very best, then some doubt of the effectiveness of the HRM system may be an effect. Contradictions: the highly rational HRM machinery or something else The combination of these cracks, raise rather strong doubts whether the employees of the company generelly perceive its HRM practices and accomplishments as that rational and effective. In some cases, people that emphasize the quality checks and guarantees and the usefulness of the promotion- and level-based categorizations of people may well, when asked about the quality of the personnel, have strong reservations of the outcome of all this and express rather contradictory meanings and assessments of the company from a HR point of view. There are several persons here that I think was a mistake to hire. They don't add value neither for Excellence, nor for the client. If I left Excellence, and would have chosen ten person to ask them to join me, I wouldn't just say" OK, line them up". I would have been very selective, that's for sure." (manager) The same interviewee also, like many others, express strong reservations of the competence of some of the partners. He thus during the interview expresses very strong faith in the fine tuned hierarchical differentiation system and its capacity to reflect competence and doubt whether this has lead to a labour force of generally high reliability and value.

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Other people praise the company for its effective feedback practices, but then indicate that there is a shortage of feedback and that clients are better in providing this than Excellence, as noted above in the discussion of outcome cracks. One can see a dualism here. When talking about employment and the company in abstract terms, it's feedback system is praised, but when getting into work and practice, there is a feeling of slow and little feedback from colleagues and superiors, while the client is superior here. Again, this does not mean that Excellence is failing "client-orientation" may mean that the feedback from the client, especially if it is positive carries heavy weight. But the feeling that there is rather little and slow feedback within the company is worth noting, as a contrast to the positive view of the company in this respect on an abstract level. We add a final example of a self-contradictory - or at least incoherent account on HRM practices. The interviewee, a senior manager, claims that hierarchy works very well because it mirrors competence. He starts by claiming almost perfect correspondance, but then modifies this picture. The reason that Excellence works is because people get promoted, not because they have been here a couple of years but because they are ready to handle the responsibility . They have the experience, they have the competence. And that often create respect among subordinates. Previously seniority was a governing factor for promotiom. Now maturity is even more important when there are more differentiated career paths. The interviewee says that the reason why it has worked and works today is something that one perhaps did not do previously but has done increasingly and will do even more

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in the future. The statement as a whole partly undermines the claims about competence behind the decisive factor behind promotion. Most of those promoted up to the present has been done so in the past, perhaps the recent past, but still the past and the workings of the company is an affect of previous HRM practices, where seniority was a stronger governing factor. II

These examples highlight the incoherences and contradictions of the meanings ascribed to the company's HRM systems and policies on a general level and the specific practices they seem to observe or experience closer to actual operations. These incoherences and contradictions can thus be located not just to different groups but also to specific people. As they are fairly broadly shared, we can talk of cultural manifestations rather than single, isolated individual perceptions and sense-making processes. Competence based ranking and promotion vs. other logics Many of deviations from prescribed procedures and inability to deliver all the promises of feedback provision, people improvement and highly rational and fair screening and promotion decisions do not come as a surprise for any, but the most naIve believer in the perfections of management rationality. In an complex, ambiguous world calling for pragmatic behaviour, it makes sense that banding and promotion may be loosely coupled to earlier feedback and these may sometimes triggered by other considerations than development and competence. One reason for this is the difficulties in achieving any high level of rationality in people issues it is difficult to provide rich feedback due to the careful monitoring, excellent judgement, language skills and time that this call for. It is also diffi£ult to assess people and their potentials. Other reasons concern other considerations than competence and competence assessments as important

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ingrediants in significant HR decision situations: the need to reward people for their efforts and to give them a gocd rating so that they feel encouraged to continue in the company. Suddenly I had my own little group. So I became a project leader of a project within the project. It was enormously exciting and stimulating. I was partly conducting operational work for the client, partly still working as a consultant and thus expected to deliver manuals, sales forecasts, and so on. You work 200 %, which have been a bit exhausting. It has payed off. I was promoted to consultant in less than 16 months, which is considered early. I have really received recognition for my hard work (consultant) Retainment issues also influence rankings and promotions. These are to some extent used to encourage valuable employees to stay. During a period the labour market was very hot, and during that time some people were promoted earlier than was common in the past. The conventional idea that time spent means an increase in competence also seem to enter as a strong 'rationalitysurrogate'. In the absense of exact measures, this expectation probably affect decision-making, at least in situations that are not clear-cut. Interpretation

The great majority of the personnel strongly emphasize the company's capacity to attract, recruit, develop and evaluate qualified personnel. Di£ferentation and hierarchy is strongly emphasized in promotion steps, titles, the kind of work tasks and superior/subordinate relationships people are located in. There are claims of almost perfect meritocracy and of a dense and rationalized network of effective cultivating of excellence. A vital element here is feedback. At our first meeting with the company representatives, they emphasized the "feedback culture"

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of the organization. A closer look reveals many rusty parts in this machinery. Quality checks of the outcomes are less than reassuring all the time. The human products coming out of the production process are sometimes not seen as up to standards. The HR operators often is less committed to carefully scrutinize how the machinery operates and unwilling to take the consequences of their experiences of how things work when assessing the company and its qualities as a whole as a screening and people processing apparatus guaranteeing a highly qualified workforce. There are several interesting questions to raise here. How to evaluate Excellence in terms of HRM practices? Is the company performing far from "excellence" to such an extent that its image appears to be badly supported by substance? Or would it be unfair to claim this? Why do a number of people hold up the view of the company as close to perfect as an apparatus capable of gathering, improving excellent HR products sorting away those that are not despite frequent instances of deviations from this. Why this compartmentalized consciousness. One reason is that the company, after all, is fairly successful in attracting, selecting and keeping people that are perceived as contributing to the effective production of fairly reliable solutions for clients. So may be the case irrespective of how well the HRM functions. One senior manager, in resp~mding on a direct interviewee question, said that it is not difficult to select those graduates suitable for the employment, mainly based on their characters, and the large majority, perhaps about 95 %, of these are eventually promoted to managers, i.e. if they stay in the company. As with all empirical material, we can't take this at face value, but note a discrepancy between a highly sophisticated and ambitious HRM system that far from fully

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work according to what is promised and corporate practices that seem to be broadly perceived as successful despite deviations from the system. What role does HRM play in the management of the company and for its result, i.e. in addition to having some (moderate?) effects on HR issues in a more substantive sense of securing and increasing competence? One of the most widely cited texts in organization studies claim that organizations develop formal structures for ceremonial reasons in order to adapt to the expectations to comply with institutionalized myths. For this reason - and not for efficiency concerns organizations develop structures such as those associated with HRM. Meyer & Rowan emphasize the external side of organizations legitimacy in relationship to various external groups is a key driving force behind the adoptation of the ceremonial structures. Productivity is accomplished irrespective of these structures - indeed even despite these. Organizations work due to the uncoupling of the ceremonial structures from efficiency-facilitating arrangements. In the case of Excellence, the HRM structures and practices go far beyond the requirement to follow broadly shared myths in order to attain legitimacy. Most people in the company would suggest that HRM guarantees high competence and strong performances. But there are, as we have seen, good reasons to take another path in interpreting what this is all about that resembles the point made by. The HRM arrangements can be seen as formal structures somewhat loosely coupled to substantive matters, but as carriers of "myths" about the company's competenceguaranteeing qualities. The HRM structures signal to external and internal audiencies that this company knows what it is doing and that the personnel that is promoted are thoroughly bona fide. Why buy its services. Why try to get a job and continue in this company? Because the high

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level of competence that the company develops, maintains and then offers. But how can we know this in advance? The massive HRM arrangements indicate that so is the case. These function as rationality-surrogates and comprise a vital part of what impress the input (labour) as well as output (client) markets. Why do not people see through the problems of delivering HRM practices and outcomes according to the ideals? On this we can only speculate it would be to ask to much to expect empirical inquiry to sort such tricky issues out. Three speculations are worth mentioning. One option is that they to some extent do, but realize too late. The ambitious HRM arrangements are highly visible already in recruitment situations and especially salient during the first time in the company. When people gradually find out of all the imperfecgions, they are less dependent on/bother about it. After a number of years in the company, they feel a certain selfconfidence and status and thus independence of the quality-ensuring and enhancing capacities of HRM. Against this speaks the observations that also senior managers exhibit contradictory opinions about the reliability of the HRM practices. Employees have a strong incentive to nurture and protect the myth. The value of the company's services and of the individuals if they seek other jobs on the labour market are dependent on the credibility of the company to dispose of a highly qualified work force, and this would an interest in communicating a strong and positive image of'the company's management of personnel issues. Self-interest and image management would then account for positive views of how the HRM issues are managed at Excellence. Against this interpretation we would claim that such image management talk is not predominant in most of the interviewees. All the statements include deviations from the ideal would indicate that the image management

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explanations does not tell the entire story. We think that these points are relevant, but also that there is no single explanation of or way to understand non-trivial phenomena. We think that organizational participants on the whole strongly believe in the value of the HRM apparatus at least at many occassions - and that experiences of the practices do not significantly undermine this faith. They have reasons to do so partly because of the persuasiveness of all the talk and all the arrangements associated with assessments, feedback, promotion and people development. There are good reasons to emphasize the symbolism of the systems and procedures. The intensity of HRM activities do not necessarily deliver the goods in any rational sense a highly competent workforce. But all the systems, procedures, acts and talk about feedback, assessments, the frequent promotions, fine tuned hierarchical differentiation system, and the people improvement activities seen as closely related to these education, selfimprovement efforts signal the presence of an impressive apparatus for the screening of highly competent people, the improvement of them and the rescreening of them at frequent points at their careers. HRM symbolizes people development and proofs on competence. HRM systems and practices can be seen as powerful input to what Broms & Gahmberg (1983) refer to as autocommunication. In their analysis primary targeting strategic management the communcation of plans and strategies do not necessarily communicate anything instrumental, but circulate messages organizational people themselves. The senders are then the same group as the receivers. Something similar can be said about the HRM system at Excellence. It signals to all involved - and as said above the entire organization is fairly heavily involved in various HRM activities - the heavy commitment to and signs on an organization capable of accomplishing meritocracy. The HRM structures and practices thus legitimize hierarchy.

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Why should one obey superiors, why should one do certain tasks and not others? Because a lot of brainpower has been invested in building systems that make it possible to decide the competence of people and because an enormous amount of energy go into activities making these systems work. The HRM apparatus then functions as a source of the communication of the multitude of messages telling people that they live in an organizational world where the formal systems guarantee the competence of people and that they should adapt to their relative positions, that the system is fair and that it is the abilities and efforts of the employees that account for their successes or lack thereof. HRM systems then symbolize a kind of rationality which makes compliance the only reasonable response. As informants have said, there is no acceptance within the company neither among senior actors or among one's peer group for claims that the company is to blame for problems. Nobody denies that in a particular assignement or in a specific banding ranking situation, people may be unlucky, but as a whole the company and the way it is managing its human resources guarantees fairness and rationality. A problem or a misfit in one assignement can be corrected in the next one - and it is partly up to the individual to use all the feedback, the councelor, the assignement possibilities and the educational options to get the career straight. The various elements of the HRM through the frequency, intensity and visibility - fulfill important symbolic functions. They symbolize the rationality and the fairness of the company the company as an effective people improvement environment the organizational structure and hierarchy as an expression of meritocracy and makes compliance highly reasonable the competence and development of the personnel, making being an organizational member a sure sign of competence and being

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a senior member a sign of even much higher competence, as a consequence of strong people development and screening measures. The company like HRM in general and the contemporary Western world at large is characterized by assumptions about knowledge solving problems and producing certainty. The work world and the humans populating it can be made the targets of the rational ranking, ordering and classification. Most likely there are great variations among companies and different people in such beliefs. Excellence is in this sense extremely rationalistic. But the individuals recruited have generally been very positively evaluated by various people-sorting assessment apparatuses if not, they had never been employed by Excellence and are therefore more inclined to believe in such apparatuses. Among corporate members there is a strong basic faith in a world capable of giving valuable feedback and thus confirming one's worth. Being a member of this company do confirm one's value. Being employed and promoted by this company symbolizes something special. They work for a company with a good reputation. It feels a bit posh to work for Big Consulting. Eventually, one develops a magnificient narcissist disorder, and thinks that one is a very good person in other areas, and I think that is a satisfying feeling for younger people. "I am successful". And the people we recruit have always wanted to be successful. They have always been dependent on strokes from the environment. And they get the strokes here. They have been A-kids since birth. We are in no way claiming that the selfunderstanding of the people in Excellence - to the extent that this citation says something about it - is wrong or misleading. If pressed, we would probably agree that the company employs able students and have far less imperfect systems and practices for dealing with their

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personnel in terms of development and promotion than most other organizations. But we are claiming that there are considerable ambiguity in assessments and improvements of people in this company as well as others. The basis for employment at Excellence is primarily characters from the university degree and we can't say that this tell the whole story about a person's competence or potential the fact that a person is·employed by the company is no certain proof that he or she belongs to the best. That most persons that-stay are promoted to the level of manager, does not necessarily means a guarantee of their abilities. Ambiguity is thus a significant feature and it is important to consider how ambiguity is coped with. Symbols are vital in this respect. Conclusion

Based on this study we arrive at three conclusions. These concern a) the limits and shortcomings of HRM systems in terms of rationality, b) the significance of organizational symbolism in accounting for the role of HRM systems and practices symbolizing rationality and commitment to people improvement as well as a highly competent work force and c) the various effects of these systems and practices on employee compliance. HRM practices such as assessment, feedback provision, development and promotion are highly difficult themes. We have conducted a careful investigation of a very large company that (i) has exceptionally strong reasons to give high priority to effective HRM, (ii) does invest a lot of resources technocratic as well as time and energy of personnel in HRM tasks, and (iii) frequently is praised by employees on different levels for its accomplishments. Despite these unusually strong indications on effective HRM, doubts can be raised about the success in this respect. There are strong imperfections perceived deviations from the ideals around the processes of feedback giving and

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promotions. Also in assessments of the outcomes of the HRM work, claim to have realized the ideal to a high degree do seem to be contradicted by the experiences of people. The strong indications of the difficulties of the HRM systems and practices to deliver all the prescribed ingredients and outcomes motivate that we consider an alternative logic than the rationalistic-functionalistic one in order to understand what goes on. If there is a lot of ambiguity and inconsistency involved, why do not people at Excellence acknowledge that it is difficult to assess what people actually are doing and to provide fair and precise feedback, that ranking and promotion decisions are tricky and that a lot of pragmatic considerations except competence" matter such as the need to compensate for hard work or minimize the risk that people are leaving? As people take seriously the finetuned hierarchy and assumes that it almost perfectly reflects real competence, they clearly do not acknowledge these difficulties. U

Interestingly, one of Excellences most ubiquitous HRM practices the c-map is, although on the surface appearing to be almost a caricature on the examination, in practice been transformed to operate in a distinctively confessional mode. C-maps are expected to be conducted by managers but, as noted above, almost all organizational members write their c-maps themselves,. Thus, what appears to be an examination is to a large extent converted into a confession. Confessions are, as stated above, powerful tools that provide a mean for the individual to generate selfknowledge, articulate self-definitions, and ultimately to engineer the self. As Townley points out. Part of the value of the confession i~ that it produces information that becomes part of the individual's selfunderstanding. It is also important to notice that these practices shade into other practices based not merely on accessing individuals, but allowing or training individuals

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to access themselves. As noted above C-maps is constructed in a way that makes organizational members at Excellence to engage in an exercise to articulate self-knowledge in the corporate language. Since c-maps also includes assessments of strengths, weaknesses, and desired development, organizational members are not only asked to confess who they are, but also who they want to be: they are asked to articulate a desired future and potential self. Accordingly, corporate influence is subtly extended to available forms of self-expression and -definition. Ironically, what appears to be cracks in the system can be interpreted as side-effects of a particular system of governmentality: side-effects that enhance rather than decrease the degree of control provide through the system. Although banding and c-maps deviate from the norm, they still take part in providing govemmentality - here in the form of participating in the production of the professional consultant subjectivity. In this way the system may be effective in producing personnel, despite the deviations from intentions. The procedures around c-maps and rankings may, despite the best of intentions, be arbitrary and at random or suffer from the lack of time and interest of superiors to devote sufficient attention to them, but the ritualistic qualities expressing certain assumptions, values and meanings are, apparantly, convincing. Producing a career map, going through all the issues, getting the feedback from the superior, direct attention at imperfections and strong sides of the subject, and indicate areas and paths of improvement. Not that good on programming, communication or leadership. Take a course or try to get a new assignements were this can be practised! Not only the detailed list of issues to consider and the criteria for getting the verdicts need improvement", average" and" superior", but also the large amount of people improvement 1/

1/

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options circling around in the company strongly communicates cultural meanings such as that: a) people need feedback (in a systematic-procedural form, delivered by a superior), b) a lot of feedback is provided, c) the company values this heavily, d) there are wealth of options that can be used to improve, and e) people can improve in this company ....The bombardment of this kind of organizational symbolism - closely resembling but strongly heightening meritocratic beliefs common in society but in particular the people in this company (and to some extent the industry at large) lead to a particular kind of mentality. Radical questioning even in the face of contradictory experiences is then not an option. At least not an easy one. The amount of symbolism counteracts the tendencies to strong doubt. The impact of the HRM systems and practices is not necessarily only or even mainly about making people with potential, but imperfect in various ways, taking the straightest path to perfection, carefully monitoring them and through a sophisticated surveillance system locating them exactly where they are at a specific time on this journey. The impact may be as much in terms of affecting motivation and accomplishing compliance. Competence is vague and hard to assess. The same goes for motivation, but interviewee reporting and also our direct observation indicate very long working weeks, 60-70 hours is not uncommon. The HRM systems provide a fairly strong sense of fairness, of a trustworthy exchange relationship. Assessment and promotion depend on people's capacity and in particular their efforts to improve themselves. There is little space for people to rationalize failures. The elaborated HRM systems make you get what you deserve, it is assumed. Your place in the hierarchy is a reflection of your competence, nothing else. You get as far as your abilities and efforts allow you. In other companies promotion is depending on seniority, limited options (there is perhaps

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only one managerial job in a particular department or function), laissez-fair, etc, but in Excellence it is different. All this means that people connect their selfesteem and ambitions closely to the HRM systems and the organizational hierarchy. They are more inclined to accept hierarchy and comply with it than in situations where it is not made credible by the HRM apparatus and the meritocratic ideology it simultanously draws upon and reinforces. The HRM systems and practices then are vital for accomplishing a highly committed and compliant work force. Excellence mayor may be not effective in producing a high level of competence. The company is definitely able to produce a compliant and highly motivated personnel. This is, as we have seen, not necessarily an effect of the HRM system to function according to the plan - in a rational and objective way. Through symbolizing meritocracy and encouraging a workplace culture in which the belief and value placed on meritocracy is heavily pronounced, the HRM systems and practices may well be a strong element behind the success of the company on the labour as well as client markets.

12

Bureaucrats or Politicians Abstract Policies are typically chosen by politicians and bureaucrats. This paper investigates the normative criteria with which to allocate policy tasks to elected policymakers (politicians) or non elected bureaucrats. Politicians are preferable if abili~ is less important than effort or there is , little uncertainty about whether the policymakers has the required abilities; if there IS uncertainty about social preferences and flexibility is valuable; if time inconsistency is not an issue; if vested interests do not have large stakes in the policy outcome; if policy complementarities and compensation of losers is important. Introduction Policies are chosen and implemented by both elected representatives (politicians) and non elected bureaucrats. The view that politicians .For useful comments we thank an anonymous referee, Philippe Aghion, Timothy Besley, Alessandro Lizzeri, Oliver Hart, Tom Romer, Andrei Shleifer, Charles Wyplosz and participants in seminars at Harvard, Princeton, Geneva, the CIAR meeting in Toronto, March 2003, and the Wallis Conference in Rochester in October 2003. This project was initiated while Alesina was visiting IGIER at Bocconi University; he is very grateful for the hospitality. Tabellini thanks CIAR for financial support.

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choose policies and bureaucrats implement them is too simplistic; the boundaries between decision and execution are a grey area and in many cases bureaucrats do much more than executing either de jure or de facto. For instance, in most countries non elected central bankers conduct monetary policy, with much independence. Regulatory policies are normally the result of both political and bureaucratic intervention, but the rise of the regulatory state has made the bureaucracy a key player in both the decisions and the execution of a large amount of legislation. Fiscal policy is by and large chosen by elected representatives (governments and legislatures): bureaucrats are involved in important aspects of auditing and implementation, but they do not choose tax rates or the amount of spending for their department. Foreign policy decisions are made by politicians. Is this division of tasks appropriate? More generally, what criteria should guide the allocation of responsibilities amongst politicians and bureaucrats? We explore this question from a normative perspective by asking what is the socially optimal allocation of tasks between these two types of policymakers. Economists have emphasized one specific argument in favor of delegation of policy to a non elected bureaucrat: time inconsistency in monetary policy pointed out that an independent and inflation averse central banker not subject to ex post democratic control would improve social welfare. But there is more to it. For instance, fiscal policy too is marred with a host of time inconsistency problems, but societies seem reluctant to allocate this policy prerogative to independent bureaucrats. An interesting question is why this never happens, and whether it is justified by normative criteria. An ability to commit to a course of action may even be desirable in foreign policy, which however is always the prerogative of appointed politicians, at least in the more

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relevant phase of choosing the general strategy. We focus the analysis on the individuals at the top (party leaders or high level bureaucrats such as central bank governors). Our premise is that the main difference between top level politicians and top level bureaucrats lies in how they are held accountable. Politicians are held accountable at the elections, for how they have pleased the voters. Top level bureaucrats are accountable to their professional peers or to the public at large, for how they have fulfilled the goals of their organization. These different accountability mechanisms induce different incentives. Politicians are motivated by the goal of pleasing the voters and hence winning the elections. Top bureaucrats want to fulfill the goals of their organization, either because of a career concern they want to appear competent to improve their external professional prospects in the public or private sector - or because they draw internal satisfatiction from doing well whatever they are expected to do. Armed with this premise, we analyze a model of task allocation in which a social planner exploits the different incentives of bureaucrats and politicians and assigns tasks to maximize social welfare. /I

We analyze many different types of policies. From a normative perspective, politicians are preferable for tasks that have the following features: (i)

good performance is due to effort more than to ability, and the required abilities are standard in the sense that there is little uncertainty about the politician's ability to perform his task.

(ii) flexibility is valuable, because social preferences are unstable and uncertain, or be- cause the policy environment can change rapidly; (iii) time inconsistency is unlikely to be a relevant issue

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and intertemporal trade-offs are not important; iv)

side payments to compensate the losers are desirable and relevant, or bundling of different aspects of policy management and a comprehensive approach is important; iv) the stakes for organized interest groups are small, or law enforcement is weak so that corruption is widespread.

A recent literature on principal-agent models addresses related issues in career concerns models. Dewatripont, Jewitt and Tirole discuss the foundations of this approach and apply it to study the behavior of government agencies. They focus on some issues related to ours, namely how the nature and "fuzziness" of the agencies mission shapes bureaucratic incentives, but they do not contrast bureaucratic and political accountability. Maskin and Tirole investigate the attribution of responsibilities between accountable and non accountable agents. The latter have intrinsic motivations, while the former seek to please their principals because of implicit rewards (career concerns). In our set up, instead, we neglect the role of intrinsic motivations: both bureaucrats and politicians need to be kept accountable with implicit incentives; but the implicit incentive schemes can be of two kinds those that define a politician (striving for re-election), and those that define a bureaucrat (career concerns). Schultz contrasts direct democracy, representative democracy and bureaucratic delegation. Like Maskin and Tirole, he views bureaucrats as unaccountable and focuses on the trade-off between ideological polarization and accountability: bureaucrats are less polarized than partisan politicians, but are more inflexible since they are unaccountable and cannot be removed after -shocks to the voters' policy preferences. Besley and Ghatak also study intrinsically motivated agents, and focus on how to combine intrinsic motivation

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with implicit rewards. Besley and Coate (2003) contrast appointed and elected regulators of public utilities; both policymakers' types are intrinsically motivated, but direct election allows the voters to unbundle policy issues. In a related context Hart, Shleifer and Vishny discuss when it is preferable to delegate the provision of public goods to private enterprises and when to keep it under control of politicians. Issues regarding incompleteness of the contract between politicians and private providers have close analogies with some of the questions we address below. The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 describes the simplest case of our model and justifies its assumptions. Sections 3 and 4 discuss cases of policies with a "public good" nature and with no redistribution. The Model Consider a society that has to decide whether to assign a policy task to an elected officer or to a bureaucrat. With the generic term" policymaker" we indicate who chooses policy, either a politician or a bureaucrat. In the simplest case we consider a single policy, the result of which is determined by the effort put in by the policymaker and by his ability. Thus, the policy outcome y is:

y = e + a (1) where a represents the effort of the policymaker and e jN (e, 62e) is his random ability. Ability and effort are additive.3 Citizens care about the policy outcome according to a well behaved, concave utility function, u = U (y). We start with linear preferences, U (y) = y, introducing strict concavity later when it matters. Effort is costly, and the strictly convex and increasing cost is labelled c = C(a). The reward for the policymaker is

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labelled R(a) and it differs depending on whether the policymaker is a politician or a bureaucrat. Both of them maximize their utility defined as: R(a) . C(a) (2) . with Ca > 0, Caa > 0 and R(a) to be defined below (subscripts denote partial derivatives). The timing of events is as follows. At the "Constitutional Table" society chooses who has control rights over policy, whether the bureaucrat or the politician. Next, the policymaker chooses effort, a, before knowing his ability, e. Finally, nature chooses e, outcomes are observed and the reward is paid. Irrespective of who has control rights over policy, only the outcome y is observed by the principals, not its composition between effort and ability. Hence the agent's reward can only be based on the policy outcome, y. In this simple environment, an optimal contract with the policymaker based on performance would achieve the first best level of effort - see appendix 1. But the assumption that policy performance is verifiable and contractible is hard to swallow. Public policy typically pursues many goals, that are often hard to measure and to reward directly through explicit and verifiable contracts. Moreover, if society could write unre- 4 The model can be restated in terms of rent extraction instead of effort, by defining a = .r where r > 0 are rents and V (r) (with Vr > 0 Vrr < 0 ) is the utility of rents We thus assume that policy performance, y, is observable but not contractible. Both bureaucrats and politician'1 are rewarded based on observed performance, but through an implicit reward scheme that contains specific restrictions compared to an optimal explicit contract. In the next two subsections we spell out our specific assumptions about the

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implicit rewards offered to a bureaucrat and to a politician, and giving rise to two different reward functions, RB(a) and RP (a) respectively. These reward functions are taken as given throughout the analysis. Our normative question is which reward function is more appropriate, given the nature of the policy task. The bureaucrat We posit that. the bureaucrat is motivated by "career concerns". That is, he is concerned with the perception of his ability ein the eyes of those that may offer him alternative job opportunities in the private or public sector, given the stated goals of the bureaucratic organization. This assumption is especially appropriate for high level bureaucrats that have already been promoted to the top of the bureaucracy, say a central bank governor or the chairman of a regulatory agency. More precisely, let x be the relevant measure of performance with which the bureaucrat is evaluated (the stated goals of his organization). We assume that the bureaucrat's reward is (the suffix B stands for Bureaucrat); RB(a) = aE(E (e

I x» (3)

where a is the market value of talent, E denotes unconditional expectations over the random variable x, and E denotes expectations over, conditional on the realization of x. Equation (3) contains several implicit assumptions. First, the bureaucrat cares about his talent as perceived by outside observers representing his relevant "labor market" . Second, the expectation of talent is formed by conditioning on the bureaucrat's observed performance. Third, the relevant measure of performance, x, must be defined in

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advance. Fourth, the market value of talent is a given parameter, a, possibly different from. In the context of this simple model, it is natural to assume that the relevant measure of performance for the bureaucrat coincides with social. At lower levels of the bureaucracy, job security and promotions dictated by seniority only may imply that maximizing perceived competence is not particularly relevant for bureaucrats.

How does equilibrium effort by the bureaucrat differ from that induced by an optimal contract? Comparing (5) with (36a) in section 1 of the appendix, we see that the bureaucrat puts in the first best level of effort if a = 1, i.e., if the market value of bureaucratic talent coincides with the true value of talent for society.6 But if the value of talent for the bureaucrat differs from that for society, and in particular if it is lower, then bureaucratic behavior is no longer socially optimal. The politician

The politicians's goal is to be reelected and this happens if the voters's utility exceeds a threshold W. Denoting by a the value of office, we can write the reward function for the politician as (the suffix P stands for Politician): RP (a)

=

where u jAW.a).

a Pr(u jA. W) = a[l . P (W . a)] (6)

= y is voters' utility and where P (W . a) = Pr(e

Voters are rational. Thus, they realize that the alternative to reelecting the incumbent is to get another politician with average talent, who will exert the equilibrium level of effort. It follows that: W

= -e + ae (7)

Like the bureaucrat, the politician chooses effort before

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observing his talent, taking the voters' expectations as given. With a normal distribution for e, equilibrium effort by the politician, aP , is defined implicitly by the first order condition: anCe)

=

Ca(aP ) (8)

where nee) = 1/6eji23 is the density of the normal distribution of e evaluated at its mean. How does the effort of the politician compare with that of the bureaucrat? Comparing (5) and (8), the answer is ambiguous and depends on parameters' values. A higher value of office, a, increases the effort of the politician, a higher market value for bureaucratic talent, a, increases the effort of the bureaucrat. Under the assumption that the participation constraint is always satisfied, in this simple example voters prefer whatever arrangement results in higher effort. To simplify notation, and since no additional result hinges on the value of these two parameters, in the remainder of th~ paper we set a = a = 1.8 politician's ability today is a signal of his ability tomorrow but some random element of ability is present every period so that it can never be fully learnt iIi advance. A widely studied case in the political business ccycle literature is that of a MA (1) process for ability. Persson and Tabellini (2000) discuss the implications of this political model more extensively. A more general formulation, outlined in the appendix, would have the politician care about both re-election and, conditional on losing office, his career prospects outside politics. If the value of political office is sufficiently high compared to the expected benefit of a career outside politics, then the main implication of our model would still hold. Since we are not considering an optimal contract, both the bureaucrat and the politician could be earning rents in equilibrium (i.e., their

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Discussion The model seeks to capture a key difference between political and bureaucratic accountability. The politician is held accountable by the voters who choose whether or not to reelect him, based on their utility. The bureaucrat is held accountable by his professional peers or by the public at large, for how he fulfills the goals of his organization. These different accountability mechanisms induce two behavioral differences between a bureaucrat and a politician. First, the form of the objective function differs: the politician strives to achieve a threshold level of utility for the voters; the bureaucrat wants to maximize his perceived talent. Second, the relevant measure of performance is different: for the politician it is the voters' utility; for the bureaucrat it is whatever goals have been assigned to the bureaucratic organization. In this introductory example only the first difference plays a role, since both voters' utility and bureaucratic performance are measured by the same variable, y. Hence the only behavioral difference between the two types of policymaker is that one maximizes an expected value, the other maximizes a probability, both defined over the same random variable. In later sections we study richer policy environments, where the difference over the relevant measure of performance also plays an important role. While the assumption that politicians maximize the probability of victory at the election is now common, there is not a standard model of bureaucratic behavior. Thus, although we are not the first to use it, our career concerns" model of a bureaucrat needs some discussion. II

Consider first the assumption that the bureaucrat cares about his talent as perceived by outside observers. While we have justified this assumption with reference to monetary rewards in future jobs, it can be interpreted more broadly. Top bureaucrats may care about their perception

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of talent "per se", as a matter of self-image, pride or legacy. Alan Greenspan will probably retire after he resigns from being chairman of the Fed, but he certainly cares about the perception of his ability in managing monetary policy. Next, consider the assumption that the relevant measure of performance (from which to infer bureaucratic talent) coincides with the goals of the organization. If there are multiple tasks, as discussed in the next sections, then this assumption plays an important role: it does not allow the bureaucrat or outside observes to select other measures of performance, for instance by focusing on tasks where the market value of talent is higher, or where imperfect monitoring is less of a problem. Thus, we rule out the case in which, say, a Central Banker chooses to ignore the problem of controlling inflation and, instead, signals his ability in international relations by publishing speeches and books on that topic. This assumpt!g.n can be defended on several grounds. First, as noted above, a broad interpretation of career concerns" can incorporate a desire for legacy and good reputation with peer groups, say other Central Bankers. Second, even taking the "career concerns" literally, future career prospects are uncertain and there is a coordination problem how does the bureaucrat know which is the relevant measure of performance used by outside 0bservers? The assumption that performance is assessed on the basis of the tasks explicitly assigned to the bureaucrat is a natural focal point to select amongst possible multiple equilibria. Third, as stressed for instance by Wilson (1989), bureaucratic organizations have weak internal incentives. To motivate employees, the mission of the organization must be well defined and pursued by the top bureaucrat. 1/

A leader who is perceived as pursuing his own personal ambition, rather than fulfilling the organizational goals, is likely to be resisted by his subordinates and this could

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undermine the leader's own performance. Moreover, a bureaucrat that pursues his own ambitions rather than fulfilling the organizational goals would damage his integrity, and this would certainly hurt his future career prospects. Finally, bureaucrats (top level or lower ranked) are not chosen at random. Presumably whoever is chosen to perform a specific task has a special ability in that task, or has a particular motivation to perform it well. This makes it in his interest to signal ability through that task and not others. In other words and to continue with the previous example, somebody chosen to be a Central Banker is competent in monetary economics, and it would not be in his interest to signal his ability in international relations ignoring monetary policy. How do these straw men" politician" and "bureaucrat" relate to real world cases? Probably the most compelling example of our "bureaucrat" is a Central Banker. His incentives to fulfill his task are mostly driven by the desire to appear competent, even though even a Central Banker occasionally may bend to the electoral needs of a politician. Like our bureaucrat, a Central Banker sets policy without political interferences and his tasks are set by a clear mandate to keep inflation low. An American President is instead the quintessential example of a politician: he seeks reelection for himself in his first term and for his party in his second, and is not constrained by pre-assigned or narrowly defined tasks. Top level bureaucrats in charge of important agencies may be preparing a leap into politics, so they may worry about their popularity and not only their competence per se. On the contrary, politicians may look ahead to a career in the private sector. While these caveats point to a large gray area and intermediate cases between our "politician" and our "bureaucrat", it is useful as a first step to clearly identify how career concerns and electoral incentives lead

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to different results depending on the nature of the policy (but see also footnote 7 above). Imperfect monitoring We now move to the case of imperfect monitoring, that is a situation in which performance also depends on extraneous randomness. Not surprisingly, the bureaucrat puts in less effort the lower is the signal to noise ratio. Next we turn to political delegation. The politician's reward is given by the same expression as above, except that now the distribution from which the probability Pr(y jA W) can be computed has a larger variance, that reflects both the variance of eand of a. It is immediate to derive the first order condition of the politician as follows: Note that, with imperfect monitoring, the career concern contract no longer induces the optimal amount of effort even when there is no difference between the value of ability for the bureaucrat and for society. Given risk neutrality, the optimal contract (under the assumption that the principal only observes y and ability is evaluated equivalently by society and the bureaucrat) would still induce the same amount of effort as in (5) above - see also section 1 of the appendix. That is, imperfect monitoring would not add any distortions. But if the bureaucrat can only be rewarded implicitly through career concerns, as we assume, then imperfect monitoring entails an additional loss of welfare for the voters. Therefore, less monitoring does not favor one or the other type of policymakers. This result is related to those obtained by Dewatripont, Jewitt and Tirole (1999b), who also point out that performance less closely tied to talent or effort weakens the incentives of agents motivated by career concerns. But note that the same conclusions also apply to

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a politician. Hence, imperfect monitoring reduces the performance of both policymaker types (relative to an optimal contract), but it does not provide an argument for preferring a politician to a bureaucrat at the constitutional stage. More uncertainty about talent, however, does favor the bureaucrat over the politician. With imperfect monitoring a larger variance of e increases the effort of the bureaucrat, while it has the opposite effect on the politician. Intuitively, an increase in the variance of e increases the signal-to-noise ratio and implies that observed performance (y) is a better indicator of ability (e). This makes the bureaucrat work harder, since by assumption he fully internalizes the benefit of higher expected ability. The politician, instead, only wants to overcome the 10 Here the bureaucrat is risk neutral, which means that his compensa- re-election threshold (giving the voters more than their reservation utility is a waste). If ability is more uncertain, then reelection prospects are less sensitive to effort, since more of the policy outcome is due to randomness. Hence his incentives are weakened. A risk averse bureaucrat would put in even more effort with more uncertainty over e, if his marginal utility was convex (eg. with iso-elastic utility function, as in the literature on precautionary savings). This would further increase his attractiveness relative to the politician. But the opposite would be true if the bureacrat's marginal utility was concave (in this case more uncertainty over e could weaken the bureaucrat incentives, if the effect on marginal utility outweighs the effect on the signal to noise ratio). The implication that bureaucratic rather than political accountability works better for complex tasks is strengthened if evaluating the performance of a bureaucrat also requires special abilities or skills- that is, if the extent of imperfect monitoring also depends on who does the

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monitoring. In the case of politicians, the ultimate judges of performance are the voters at large. The performance of bureaucrats, instead, is mainly evaluated by their professional peers. Hence, imperfect monitoring is less of a problem if politicians are given simple tasks, since bureaucrats can.J.llore easily be held accountable by their peers for more technically demanding tasks. Maskin and Tirole (2001) and Epstein and 0' Halloran (1999) reach a similar conclusion in different models. Is the real world attribution of task broadly consistent with this implication? H difficult tasks are also technically more demanding, then the answer is clearly positive. In many cases technical tasks are delegated to bureaucrats: for instance managing the financial structure of public debt, or regulating public utilities or other industries, while politicians retain the technically less demanding task of setting general targets. In the UK, for instance, politicians choose a target level of inflation, the technically demanding task of choosing interest rates to achieve such target is delegated to the Central Bank. It is not always true, however, that difficult tasks are technically more demanding. Some complex policy decisions, such as in foreign policy, require ability of a general rather than a specialized kind. According to Proposition 1, these complex and yet technically not demanding tasks are also better left in the hands of bureaucrats. But here, we often observe a politician in charge. The next section suggests a different reason, unrelated to variance in ability, why politicians may perform better in such policy environments.

Policy tasks in an uncertain world We now add an element of uncertainty to social weHare. In particular, suppose that at the Constitutional Table voters are not sure of howtheir preferences will evolve. We return to the case of perfect monitoring and we assume that there ~re two possible policies, that is two different

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directions in which effort can be devoted to: yi = e+ai, with i = 1, 2.12 With multiple tasks, which will be our focus from now on, one needs to specify a general cost function with multiple arguments, c = C(a1, a2). Instead of using the general formulation, we simplify to either an additive case (c = C(a1+a2)), where effort in the various tasks is perfectly substitutable in the cost function, or to a separable case (c = C(a1)+C(a2)), where the marginal cost of effort in one task is totally independent of effort devoted to the other tasks. We choose the simplest formulation that does not produce knife-hedge or "trivial" results. At the Constitutional Table the (identical) voters are uncertain about their ex post preferences over alternative policies, so that voters utility is now given by the following concave function. First, at the Constitutional Table voters choose whether to assign this policy to a bureaucrat or to a politician. Then nature chooses e, that is social preferences are determined. Having observed e, the policymaker chooses [ai] , then nature chooses e, and finally policy is determined and rewards paid. We assume that e is not verifiable. Consider bureaucratic delegation first. As discussed in section 2, if the Constitution assigns control rights over policy to the bureaucrat, it also defines a relevant measure of performance with which his ability is evaluated. In that section, social welfare was the natural measure of performance, because it coincided with the only possible measure of performance. But here, at the Constitutional Table social preferences are not yet known, since they depend on the future realization of the random variable e. Thus, we assume that the bureaucrat can only be assigned an unconditional measure of performance, defined as: x

= ay1 + (1 . a)y2

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where a is a parameter specified by the Constitution. This formulation entails two assumptions. First, we assume that the relevant measure of performance assigned to a bureaucrat cannot be ex-post social welfare, u. We can justify this assumption with the argument that social welfare cannot be operationally described ex-ante in an unambiguous way. To do so, we would need specific assumptions about utility functions, technology, and many other unforeseable but relevant features of the economic environment. Of course, individual welfare can be observed ex-post by polling each individual about the policymaker's performance. But telling a bureaucrat that his performance would be assessesJ. ex-post through an opinion poll would transform him into a politician, and the theoretical distinction between political and bureaucratic accountability that is at the core of this paper would be lost. The second crucial assumption is that the operational and describable measure of performance that can be assigned to a bureaucrat, and in particular the parameter a, cannot be contingent on the realization of the random variable: the mission for the bureaucrat cannot be contingent on the realization of ex post voters' preferences. This element of contract incompleteness is plausible, and again can be justified with reference to the undescribability or unforseeability of future states of the world. Next, suppose that, at the Constitutional Table, society gave control over policy to a politician. To win re-election, the incumbent must show that he is more competent than the opponent, given that voters observe their own utility. This means giving voters a sufficiently high utility. Whatever beliefs the voters entertain about effort allocation, and given that effort is not observed by voters, the politician always finds it in his own interest to put effort in the task preferred ex-post by the voters. This is what differentiates the politician from the bureaucrat. The

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politician's goals always depend on the realization of e (i.e., on the expost preferences of the voters). The bureaucrat instead must be tbld what to do and in some cases he will be assigned the wrong mission. The following proposition follows. Proposition 2 The politician, unlike the bureaucrat, always chooses the right task from the voters' perspective. This advantage of the politician is more important the more risk averse are the voters and the more uncertain are their ex-post preferences. Delegation to a bureaucrat is safe when society's preferences are well known and stable. But when they change, the rigidity" of a bureaucrat's behavior makes the latter much less attractive. This helps us to understand why monetary policy is often delegated to an independent central bank, while foreign policy is typically under the control of politicians. /I

Few would disagree with the statement that the appropriate goal for monetary policy is to keep inflation under control with some room for stabilization policy; and this goal is unlikely to change over time. But preferences regarding foreign policy are unlikely to be stable and unchanged, and as a result an appropriate simple bureaucratic goal cannot be stated once and for a1l15. In these situations, a combination of politicians and bureaucrats could be welfare improving. In fact, a natural remedy to the "narrowmindedness" of bureaucrats pursuing the wrong task is to let the politician decide the mission of the bureaucrat. Specifically, the constitution could prescribe that policy be delegated to a bureaucrat, but the bureaucrat's mission (the parameter a in above) be chosen by a politician.

-

If the politician observes the contingency

e and if he is

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held accountable by the voters as described in the previous section, he would always choose the socially optimal mission for the bureaucrat. This division of tasks (the politician assigns the bureaucrat some goals and the latter chooses the instruments with which to pursue them) is observed in a variety of real world arrangements. Of course, the precision and frequency with which bureaucratic goals are defined can vary from case to case, and determines the extent to which 'an independent bureaucrat is really in charge of policy decisions (rather than taking orders from the politician. There is a case in which ex post flexibility is in fact a disadvantage. When society's preferences are time inconsistent, the benefit of flexibility associated with political delegation has a cost. Politicians are much 15Hart, Shleifer and Vishny (1997) and Wilson (1989) make a similar argument to clarify why it would be close to impossible to privatize foreign policy or to delegate it fully to a nonpolitical agency. A related issue has to do with the time profile of costs and benefits of policy choices. Bureaucrats tend to care more about the long run consequences of policies, compared to politicians, for two reasons. First, often bureaucrats are appointed for longer than electoral cycles, precisely to avoid short-termist policies. Second, even when bureaucrats have short terms of office, the blame for myopic policies may reach them and hurt them later on. The reason is that bureaucrats care about their professional reputation in the eyes of their peers. This gives bureaucrats a strong incentive to focus on the long term goal. When the shorttermism of politicians is an issue, the interaction between bureaucrats and politicians can yield welfare improvements. Compensation of losers

A critical task of politicians is to form coalitions in favor

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of certain policies, compensating losers either with direct transfers or by bundling several policies into one package. To illustrate this point, we need a conflict of interest between voters (or groups of voters) and the possibility of side payments and of bundling policies with complementarities. Voters' utility now depends on the policy outcome and a transfer (positive or negative) received by the government. We have two voters (or homogeneous groups of voters of equal size) with strictly concave utility defined over private consumption, U (ci), i = 1, 2 where: c1 = yl + t, c2 = y2 . t, y2 iA t iA .yl (17)

Therefore t is adirect lump sum transfer between voters and the government budget is balanced. Each group benefits from different tasks requiring specific and uncorrelated abilities, ei, i = 1, 2. Let the distribumyopic electoral cycles in monetary and fiscal policy with rational voters. Besley and Coate (2003) find evidence that, in US states, elected regulators tend to keep lower electricity prices compared to appointed regulators. If, as likely, lower prices come at the expenses of lower investments, this finding is consistent with the prediction of short-termism by elected (as opposed to appointed) regulators. As in section 4, we assume that e is observable ex-post, but it is not describable ex-ante, so that the bureaucrat's mission cannot be defined contingent on e. The policymaker maximizes its usual payoffs, with different rewards for the two types of policymakers, except that now we assume that the cost function is additive in the two efforts: R (al, a2) . C(al) . C(a2) (19) Timing has the usual structure. First nature sets e and this determines which group is hurt by the spillover effect. Then the policymaker chooses ai and t, nature sets ei and rewards are paid.

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Consider the politician first. He maximizes reelection probabilities, which means that he has to win the favor of a strict majority of voters. Here this means winning the votes of both groups (as it will be clear below, nothing of substance hinges on the fact that in this simple example reelection requires pleasing all voters). Therefore: In this context, the hazard rate measures the elasticity of the probability of winning with respect to transfers. Thus, this optimality condition is similar to the Ramsey rule of optimal taxation: transfers are allocated between groups so as to equalize this elasticity across groups. If the hazard rate is monotonically increasing in z, and given the assumption of the same distribution for ei, i = 1, 2, equation (21) implies c1 = c2.17 This result follows from the assumption that bureaucrats cannot be given state contingent missions. If their goal is formulated in terms of aggregate efficiency, they will neglect the distributional consequences of their actions. A politician instead can take advantage of relatively complex and evolving spillovers between issues and build majorities with complex side payments schemes. Compensating the losers makes it easier to pass legislation while at the same time providing insurance against bad luck. Imagine a policy that favors a large majority, say a badly needed highway, but that creates losers, say the property owners. Under democratic choice, the losers might be able to block the project. But the politician can put together a package of compensation for the property owners, with large benefit for the majority. In a sense this is almost what describes the job of a politician. Instead, it is hard to imagine how a bureaucrat might do that. How can one write on paper what a bureaucrat is allowed to do or not do, to create bundling and compensation? A bureaucrat can be delegated the task of building the best possible highway and he may potentially do a better job than the politician; but he does

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not have the ability, interest or authority to provide compensation to the local owners.

Lobbying and bribing In this section we consider the case of lobbies that can influence the choice of policies with bribes or campaign contributions. Thus here "redistribution" is intended as favors towards powerful minorities that can influence policy decisions. Both the politician and the bureaucrat can be captured by the interest group, but with different mechanisms. This difference can give rise to a constitutional preference for one or the other type of policymaker, depending on the circumstances. As in section 4, there are two tasks, yi = e +ai, i = 1, 2 and the cost of effort is non-separable: c = C(a1 + a2). Task 1 benefits the voters at large, while task 2 only benefits a small but organized interest group. Voters influence policy only through elections. The organized interest group is small and its vote is irrelevant; but he can influe~ce policy through bribes, b, or campaign contributions, f . thus, the preferences of voters are just y1, while those of the interest group can be written as: (1 + a)y2 . b . f (24) where a is a parameter capturing the intensity of the group's preferences for task 2. Bribes can be offered to both the politician and the bureaucrat, but are illegal. Thus, if a policymaker accepts a bribe, with some exogenous probability q he is caught and pays a fine Z (the interest group is not fined). Campaign contributions are legal and can only be offered to the politician. The effect of campaign contributions is to increase the incumbent's chances of winning the elections. We model

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this by saying that the voters' reservation utility is a decreasing function of the campaign contributions collected by the incumbent: It is natural to assume that H(O) = 0, Hf > 0, Hf f < O. At the Constitutional Table the lobby has no influence, so if the bureaucrat is given control rights over policy, his assigned measure of performance coincides with the task that benefits voters at large (x = yl).Under these assumptions, we can write the policymaker's preferences as:

R(yl, y2) . C(al ... + a2) + b . qZ (26) where R(yl, y2) are the policymaker's rewards (RB(yl, y2) = E(ejyl) for the bureaucrat, RP (yl, y2) = Pr(yl jA W ) for the politician). The policymaker's effort devoted to task 2 is observable by the interest group, so that bribes and campaign contributions can be contingent upon the policymaker effort: b =B(a2), f = F (a2). The timing of events is as follows. First the Constitution allocates control rights over policies. Then the organized group commits to bribes and or campaign contributions, as a function of effort. Next, the policymaker allocates effort between the two tasks. Nature then chooses a realization of e. Finally, rewards are paid. This is a common agency game, with two types of principals: the interest group and the representative voter. The interest group has all the commitment power and can either influence the agent directly (through bribes), or indirectly (through campaign contributions). The distinction between the politician and the bureaucrat is that the latter can only be influenced by the interest group through bribes. We want to know whether the voters are better off with the bureaucrat or with the politician, and what influences this comparison.

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Bribing the bureaucrat If the constitution gave all control rights to the bureaucrat we would have a standard common agency game, with a single active lobby. If bribes are positive, then the equilibrium must be jointly optimal for the organized group and the politician. This immediately implies.

Thus, politically appointed policymakers are more easily captured by organized interests compared to bureaucrats, particularly in advanced democracies with a well functioning legal system. The reason is that, to influence a bureaucrat, the organized group needs to engage in illegal activities and fight against possibly deeply entrenched professional goals and standards of a technical bureaucracy. To influence a politician, instead, the interest group has an additional instrument: he needs to convince the voters that the politician is doing a good job and deserves to be reelected. The politician will then automatically respond with policy favors to the interest group, since this will help his chances of reelection. Thus, policies where the stakes for organized interests are very high, or where redistributive conflicts concern small but powerful vested interests against the voters at large, are more safely left in the hands of the bureaucrat. The regulation of public utilities is a typical example: the interests of consumers are easy to identify and protect through regulation, while the stakes for the utilities' supplier are very high and a politician may be easily captured. Note that this result points to an important difference between ad- 20 This normative argument in favor of bureaucrats is mitigated if they are easier to bribe than the politician, however. And bureaucrats with technical expertise may be more easily bribed than politicians through a "revolving door policy" - i.e. at the end of their public services polivanced and less advanced societies. In advanced societies with a well functioning judicial system, it is

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relatively easy to enforce the no bribe equilibrium, but campaign contributions may still be very effective at buying policies; hence, bureaucratic delegation works well. In developing countries, instead, stopping bribes might be close to impossible and politicians are likely to do as good a job as bureaucrats. Conclusions

Our analysis rests on two fundamental assumptions. The first one concerns the motivation of different types of policymakers. Bureaucrats want to signal their competence for t:a:'eer concerns, politicians for reelection purposes. The second assumption is that the tasks for bureaucratic agencies have to be specified ex ante and cannot be contingent on the realization of too many shocks on the environment or on the public's preferences. If one accepts these two hypotheses, the nature of our results is quite robust to variations on other less important assumptions. From a normative perspective, these differences between bureaucrats and politicians imply that some policy tasks, but not others, ought to be delegated to independent agencies. Consider first policies with few redistributive implications, such as monetary policy or foreign policy. Bureaucrats are likely to be better than politicians if the criteria for good performance can be easily described exante and are stable over time; if good performance requires special abilities that wary widely in the population and performance evaluation presupposes some technical expertise; if political incentives are distorted by time inconsistency or short-termism. Monetary policy indeed fulfills many of these conditions, and the practice of delegating it to an independent agency accords with some of these normative results. Foreign policy does not, because the criteria for good performance are unstable and more vague, and the benefit of insulating policy from the political

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process are smaller. Next, consider policies that have redistributive implications, such as trade policy, regulation, or fiscal policy. Here, bureaucrats perform well if the policy consequences touch narrowly defined interest groups, if criteria of good performance can be easily formulated and assessed in terms of efficiency, and if the legal system is strong. Politicians instead are better if the policy has far reaching redistributive implications so that compensation of losers is important, if criteria of aggregate efficiency do not easily pin down the optimal policy, and if there are interactions across different policy domains (so that a single measure of performance is affected by several policy instruments and policy packaging is required to build consensus or achieve efficiency). Regulation of public utilities or of specific industries are examples of policies that lend themselves to bureaucratic delegation, since they pit special interests against those of consumers as a whole, do not have large spillover effects, and policy performance can be evaluated on the basis of efficiency or other semitechnical criteria. Trade policy might fall in this category too, although here the redistributive implications are more pronounced. Welfare state policies, instead, have such broad redistributive implications that it seems risky to subtract them from the political process, as suggested by our examples on compensation of losers and cake splitting. But there are specific aspects of fiscal policy that would certainly meet our normative criteria for bureaucratic delegation: for instance, detailed tax policy provisions, or intertemporal fiscal policy choices where time inconsistency or political myopia is an obvious issue, as suggested. Overall, the normative analysis suggests that there is ample scope for bureaucratic delegation to improve over political delegation, particularly if politicians remain in charge of defining and correcting the general mission of

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independent agencies. Are these normative conclusions likely to be reflected in observed institutional arrangements? We explore this positive question in a companion paper, Alesina and Tabellini. There we show that opportunistic politicians do not internalize these normative criteria. Actual institutions are more likely to be designed so as to deliver maximal rents at the lowest risk for the incumbent politician. This argues for retaining under political control policy tools that are useful to build winning coalitions or to generate campaign contributions, such as trade policy or much of fiscal policy. It also means thaL politicians might want to get rid of tasks that expose them to risk, such as monetary policy. But this "risk shielding" requires that bureaucratic delegation be complete, so that the blame for policy failure lies fully with the independent agency and does not reach the politician. This might explain why it is politically so difficult to exploit delegation to indeperldent agencies in fiscal policy. Full bureaucratic delegation of fiscal policy is inconceivable, for normative and positive reasons. But partial delegation of narrowly defined technical tasks in fiscal policy may be politically unfeasible, no matter how desirable. The reason is that voters would still hold the politician accountable, as long as he retains some control (Le. unless the delegation is complete). And if he is held responsible, then the politician loses any incentive to delegate control.

13

The Future of Bureaucracy Whether liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican, Communist or Fascist, teenager or octogenarian, all of us can agree on one thing: Bureaucracy is bad. Bureaucracy is what burdens the elderly on their deathbeds with reams of paperwork which they must complete in triplicate before being allowed to die. It is what insists that we must explain first to a clerk, then to an assistant manager, then to a manager, and finally in writing (for the company records) why we are returning the guaranteed contraption which we purchased yesterday, but does not work today. It is the administrative process requiring a two-page request form to receive a copy of a document, when there are numerous extra copies piled in plain view. It is the organization that refuses to implement the simple, sensible, obvious improvement that both employees and customers have been suggesting for years. It is the source of the almost universal nervous twitching and congested throats as people sheepishly approach an office counter and hesitantly attempt to vocalize their request. Once castigated as the tyrannical realm of clerks, bureaucracy is synonymous to many with organized dehumanization. For, whether the requester is a customer, an employee, or another department, the bureaucrat identifies the source of any negative response he gives as "they" or "the firm" or "the rules" or "the agency." If we are to accept his account, the bureaucrat is never to blame. He claims to be only a middle man between the producer,

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the customer, and the organization. If so, we think, then why is he there at all, a superfluous, needless expense-a blockage of communications between the "real" parties to any transaction. We are pretty sure that those other three parties would be on our side. The "producers" are those most intimately involved in generating the organization's ultimate contribution. In schools, they are the teachers; in a transportation agency, they are the bus drivers and mechanics; in a construction company, the engineers and building crew; and in a factory, the assembly line workers. These are "the ones who are really where the action is." Who better understands the organization's business than those who generate it? At the other end are the customers, who may be the purchasers of the goods or services, the citizens who paid taxes for the service, or even another department that is being charged back for it. Their needs and wants are the very raison d' etre of the business. The ultimate importance of their opinion has been encapsulated in the old aphorism "the customer is always right," which has become a cornerstone of the universally vaunted Total Quality philosophy. Finally, the legitimacy of the organization itself is, of course, beyond question: It is the source of fulfilling the needs of both producers and customers. There appears to be no justification for this bureaucrat to interpose himself between the ones who really count. No one has a kind word for him. His title may be manager or supervisor or coordinator. But he is widely known as a rudely officious clerk, a buck-passing petty tyrant dispensing conflicting directives and insisting upon endless duplication. We think of him as the one who wastefully diverts resources from the organization, potential wages from the producers, and savings from the consumers to build his own purposeless empire.

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Probably most of us could agree with the above critiquealthough some might consider it a mite exaggerated. My biggest hesitation in accepting it is that I myself am a bureaucrat. Most others in the administrative services are in a similar situation. This is most obviously true of those of us who work for the government. However, as social scientists have been pointing out, bureaucracy is the usual organizational structure found in private companies, as well as in governmental agencies. Certainly most records or information managers fit in this category. Consider the bureaucratic nature of some of our more usual demands: All files must be removed from ring binders and hanging folders before being placed in boxes. Departments must fill out multiple, lengthy inventory forms to prove they have correctly purged their files. Departments should get down on their knees and swear never again to file another extra copy, if they expect to be allowed an additional filing cabinet. The public must fill out a form resembling an application for CIA security clearance just to get a copy of a readily available record. (The law says so.) Whenever the staff member from Accounting requests a duplicate of a journal voucher she misplaced, she must listen to a lecture on the filing system she should have adopted. As I mentioned in an earlier column, when I made such demands, I was accused-not without some justification-of being "a records management, bureaucratic tail wagging the dog that is fulfilling the organization's mission." What do we bureaucrats (whether the public ones working for the government or the "closet" ones in the private sector) have to say for ourselves? Are we really as valueless as we are portrayed (often to our faces).

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Whether liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican, Communist or Fascist, teenager or octogenarian, all of us can agree on one thing: Bureaucracy is bad. Bureaucracy is what burdens the elderly on their deathbeds with reams of paperwork which they must complete in triplicate before being allowed to die. It is what insists that we must explain first to a clerk, then to an assistant manager, then to a manager, and finally in writing (for the company records) why we are returning the guaranteed contraption which we purchased yesterday, but does not work today. It is the administrative process requiring a two-page request form to receive a copy of a document, when there are numerous extra copies piled in plain view. It is the organization that refuses to implement the simple, sensible, obvious improvement that both employees and customers have been suggesting for years. It is the source of the almost universal nervous twitching and congested throats as people sheepishly approach an office counter and hesitantly attempt to vocalize their request. Once castigated as the tyrannical realm of clerks, bureaucracy is synonymous to many with organized dehumanization. For, whether the requester is a customer, an employee, or another department, the bureaucrat identifies the source of any negative response he gives as "they" or "the firm" or lithe rules" or lithe agency." If we are to accept his account, the bureaucrat is never to blame. He claims to be only a middle man between the producer, the customer, and the organization. If so, we think, then why is he there at all. a superfluous, needless expense-a blockage of communications between the "real" parties to any transaction? We are pretty sure that those other three parties would be on our side. The "producers" are those most intimately involved in generating the organization's ultimate contribution. In schools, they are the teachers; in a

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transportation agency, they are the bus drivers and mechanics; in a construction company, the engineers and building crew; and in a factory, the assembly line workers. These are "the ones who are really where the action is." Who better understands the organization's business than those who generate it? At the other end are the customers, who may be the purchasers of the goods or services, the citizens who paid taxes for the service, or even another department that is being charged back for it. Their needs and wants are the very raison d' etre of the business. The ultimate importance of their opinion has been encapsulated in the old aphorism "the customer is always right," which has become a cornerstone of the universally vaunted Total Quality philosophy. Finally, the legitimacy of the organization itself is, of course, beyond question: It is the source of fulfilling the needs of l- Jth producers and customers. 'y

There appears to be no justification for this bureaucrat to interpose himself between the ones who really count. No one has a kind word for him. His title may be manager or supervisor or coordinator. But he is widely known as a rudely officious clerk, a buck-passing petty tyrant dispensing conflicting directives and insisting upon endless duplication. We think of him as the one who wastefully diverts resources from the organization, potential wages from the producers, i and savings from the consumers to build his own purposeless empire. Probably most of us could agree with the above critiquealthough some might consider it a mite exaggerated. My biggest hesitation in accepting it is that I myself am a bureaucrat. Most others in the administrative services are in a similar situation. This is most obviously true of those of us who work for the government. However, as social scientists have

Bureaucracy and Development Administration

been pointing out, bureaucracy is the usual organizational structure found in private companies, as well as in governmental agencies. Certainly most records or information managers fit in this category. Consider the bureaucratic natUre of some of our more usual demands: All files must be removed from ring binders and hanging folders before being placed in boxes. Departmt..'I\ts must fill out multiple, lengthy inventory forms to prove they have correctly purged their files. Departments should get down on their knees and swear never again to file another extra copy, if they expect to be allowed an additional filing cabinet. The public must fill out a form resembling an application for CIA security clearance just to get a copy of a readily available record. (The law says so.) Whenever the staff member from Accounting requests a duplicate of a journal voucher she misplaced, she must listen to a lecture on the filing system she should have adopted. As I mentioned in an earlier column, when I made such demands, I was accused-not without some justification-of being a records management, bureaucratic tail wagging the dog that is fulfilling the organization's mission." What do we bureaucrats (whether the public ones working for the government or the "closet" ones in the private sector) have to say for ourselves? Are we really as valueless as we are portrayed (often to our faces)? 1#

The second characteristic of modern bureaucracies is separation of the bureaucrat's person from the position or office he holds. The evolution of this modem impersonal administration was the slowest of all the aspects of bureaucracy to develop. In ancient, medieval, and even early modem times, government officials were the king's personal servants who owed their posts (and livelihoods) either to a personal relationship to the ruler or to inheritance from

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their own f~thers. Thus, the feudal lord granted a fief to his vassals in return for their personal "homage and fealty." Unburdened by any concept of what we today would call "conflict of interest," vassals often assumed that with their fiefs included the right to pocket all, or at least a part, of the fees and fines that they levied. With a different, but similarly blatant, willingness to confound public office with personal profit, elected officials in the United States and Britain gave positions to their supporters as part of an informal "spoils system" as late as the nineteenth century. In fact, the identification of civil service jobs as economic commodities, as opposed to the principle of hiring the best qualified for a set salary, has been normal much more of the time than it has been an exception. It has also been normal that bureaucrats have been able to mold positions to their own ambitions and abilities, converting them into informal "fiefs" and even "empires." The depersonalized bureaucracy can be traced to the attempts by central governments to strengthen their power by appointing new bureaucrats who, lacking their own independent power base, would be much more tractable. The commissars of Louis XIV in France, as well as the service gentry of Ivan the Terrible in Russia and Frederick II in Prussia, are famous examples of this tendency. However, just as normal was the tendency of the new appointees eventually to become entrenched themselves-a phenomenon that led later rulers to appoint still other groups of bureaucrats that would wield the real power and be more personally loyal to the monarch. The cycle continued until the late eighteenth century. From that time through most of the twentieth century, the governments themselves became less personal: States replaced kings; prime ministers replaced "the King's first ministers"; and industrial entrepreneurs became chairmen of impersonal corporations.

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Impersonal administration in government and business has numerous advantages. Decisions are made less on the . basis of friendship or the bureaucrat's advantage, than on what is best for the organization. Appointments and promotions are based on merit-not possession of an office as a "fief" in perpetuity or control of some votes or the influence wielded by friends and relatives. Moreover, the fact that the bureaucrat behind the counter does not own the office means that he is in less of a position to abuse his powers than those who considered the position their property. Bureaucratic Rules

The third defining element of modern bureaucracy is its adherence to, and enforcement of, rules. The development of a law- or rulebased administration complemented the rise of impersonal bureaucracy. Laws and·administrative rules leave less room for personal whim and discretion. The tighter the rules and the more sovereignty is assigned to law, the less capricious the bureaucrat. The laws and rules are the citizens' and the customers' assurance of fair treatment, of not being left to the arbitrary fancy of the monarch or the seller. As bureaucracies became more controlled by written regulations, the lives of subjects and customers became morepredictable-more relaxed. Today it is hard to imagine what it must have been like when legality was determined by the ruler's-or boss's-mood, whether he had slept well, whether his allergies were acting up, or whether his children talked back over the breakfast table. Over the past few centuries, society has not been so poorly served by the rules our multiple bureaucracies obey and enforce. Rules prevent those with power from wielding it arbitrarily. Rules are a safeguard against unpleasant surprises-a need even more important when we already feel lost in a sea of change. Rules provide a basis for

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agreement and thereby can legitimize the system and elicit commitment to it. Rules provide the organization, the producers, and the customers with some idea of what to expect from each other. HISTORICAL TRENDS ERODING THE PRIMACY OF BUREAUCRACY

What intrigues me about bureaucracy is that the same elements which were its strength from the late Middle Ages through most of the twentieth century are now becoming the very sources of its weakness. Current societal and business trends towards decentralization, networking, and accelerated change seem to undermine it. Most important of these, and precipitating the others, is the rapidity of technical and social change. The reality of "future shock" has been a salon topic ever since Toffler published his bestseller by that title in 1970. Yet it would be wrong to think that a sudden acceleration in change is something that began in the midtwentieth century. The Industrial Revolution at the end of the eighteenth century, the Renaissance, and the agricultural revolution in ancient times were other such sudden jumps. Modern bureaucracy became preeminent at the end of the eighteenth century partly because it was a means for dealing with the accelerated change resulting from the rise of national states and industrial economies. However, the rate of change seems to accelerate geometrically, rather than arithmetically, with each such "revolution." The increase in the post-industrial era has truly been a quantum leap in this rate of change, a leap too great for traditional hierarchical bureaucracy to handle effectively.

Problems with a Permanent Hierarchy Today, bureaucracy's hierarchical structure actually hinders the communication and adaptability to social evolution it once supported. The same pyramids of

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reporting lines that facilitated communication in the past now often slow it, because they channel the much more technically advanced information through a manager who does not lmderstand it nor is anywhere near as able to make a technical decision as two staff members located somewhere towards the pyramid's base. For example, a person at a lower level of Department A will report a minor problem involving Department B to his supervisor, who will then report it to his manager, who will report it to the director, who will then confront the director of Department B, who will demand corrective action of the Department B manager, who will then invite the manager of Department A to a meeting, where they will agree to have their supervisors get together and work out the problem. The obvious question: Why did not the two supervisors interact laterally in the first place. This situation becomes especially troublesome when the speed of changes requires quick decisions to keep the organization on track. The pyramidal routes of messages up and down bureaucratic reporting lines seem even more like bottlenecks because our technology has accustomed society to real-time communication. Finally, the same principle of "what worked before does not necessarily work now" also applies to the permanency that bureaucracy provided for the development of national states and industrial economies. The people involved in these two phenomena were just emerging from politically and economically isolated communities. They needed a stable structure to buffer the shock of the revolutionary experience and to educate them in the discipline required in modern societies. But the permanence of hierarchical structures is much less suited to today's post-industrial society. For post-industrial society requires flexibility and a speed of communication that traditional bureaucracy is hard-pressed to provide. Bureaucracy tends to be too permanent and inflexible for a period of rapid change and

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unanticipated challenges. Problems with Depersonalization Unfortunately, the good aspects of bureaucratic depersonalization (impartial administration and the merit system) are not secure achievements. Just as the officials who owed everything to Ivan N or Louis XN themselves became entrenched bureaucrats, so the upstart bureaucrats of today will start to build their empires. Such expansions go a long way towards explaining why executives often find it necessary to clean house at the top even though those being cleaned out appear quite competent. The progression towards impersonal administration is not linear and will never be complete. The negative side to depersonalization of the bureaucracy goes beyond its inability to eliminate the continuation of empire builders. Depersonalization can easily degrade into dehumanization. It frequently leaves the bureaucracy with the appearance of an unfamiliar, inhuman machine that is frightening to the customer or citizen. Since such bureaucrats speak for an impersonal position, not for themselves personally, they are more likely to be callous and unfriendly. Indeed, now it is possible to have the worst of both, seemingly contradictory, bureaucratic models at the same time: the pseudo-feudal, egoistic empirebuilding of the past and the appearance of a futuristic inhuman bureaucratic machine. The Problem with Bureaucratic Rules Voluminous, hard-to-read rules, many of which are obsolete antiquities or nonsensical self-contradictions, exacerbate this situation. Daily we encounter excessive red tape and nit-picking regulations forbidding the use of paper clips when the circular reads staples or permitting only the use of a form 107.326 rev A (certainly not 107.327 rev B) to order a pencil. All of us can recall being told to fill out a

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form that we were fairly sure would never be read or to obtain signatures from a long series of officials, who scrawled initials on the documents without seeming to pay the slightest attention to what they were approving. Many of the rules seem to exist because someone thought there "ought to be a rule" for everything or because the procedural manual seemed a little slim. Sometimes bureaucrats have bolstered their egos by assigning complex procedures and numerous rules to the process for which they are responsible. If we are honest, many of us have done this ourselves. I know that I have. Procedures I have authored for checking out a file read as though they were patterned on the requirements for obtaining a national security clearance to store nuclear bombs. My data entry instructions appear to be modeled on the NASA countdown to a Jupiter probe. Then there are all the rules for "processes" that surely any fiveyear-old could figure out for himself without a two-sided form accompanied by a ten-page guideline. Here are some real examples from where I work. How to request a vacation day. How to report spraining an ankle on the job. How to request a toner cartridge for the printer. (Disposition of the spent cartridge is, of course, not just a part of this simple procedure. It is at the "policy level. How to report an overflowing toilet in the restroom. How to dispose of trash at your workstation. Such rules complicate and slow processing. Often it seems as though they are made for the sake of making rules. Moreover, as argued by Burnham in the The Managerial Revolution, complex rules can also be wielded as unfair weapons by certain bureaucrats who use their knowledge of the rules to justify whatever suits them. Likewise, many rules that made sense when they were promulgated are not rescinded after they cease to be useful. In such cases,

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the letter of the law remains in effect to the detriment of all. An example of the unnecessary burden of rules that should have been rescinded was our rule in the Mail Room that any outgoing Federal Express packages had to be received in the Mail Room by 3:00 p.m. in order to go out as overnight deliveries. There was some justification for this rule. Each day, Federal Express came promptly at 4:00 p.m., and staff were notorious for waiting until the last minute to bring their packages down. We needed time to type up the airbills before the Federal Express courier came. Two years after I had unilaterally promulgated the 3:00 p.m. rule, the situation changed. We moved to a new building, where the Federal Express courier came at 5:00 rather than 4:00 p.m. Also by this time we had begun to use Federal Express's Powership system to produce the airbill, which saved a good deal of time. At this point, 4:30 would have been a reasonable deadline. But when a poor secretary arrived at 3:30 entreating us to make an exception and arguing the importance of the delivery, the clerk at the front desk, said "No." When I was called, I stood by his decision, arguing in my best bureaucratic manner, "If we made an exception for you, it would not be fair to all of the others we had to turn down." After she was gone, I reflected further that perhaps the most important disadvantage to senseless or excessive bureaucratic rules is that they limit the bureaucrat's flexibility in coming up with innovative solutions that can benefit both the customer and the organization in an era of frequent, large-scale change. PERSISTENT BUREAUCRATIC RESIDUES-WHY?

As we have seen, bureaucracies are a very old element in the development of civilization. In the modern era, bureaucracy was crucial in the evolution of the modern national state and industrial society. However, the three defining characteristics of modern bureaucracy

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(hierarchical structure, depersonalization, and rule-based administration) have effects that can be both positive and negative. On the positive side, they provided the stable, organized, consistent structure necessary to the development of modern governments and economies. But in the post-industrial world, their impact has become increasingly negative. The question becomes whether this negative impact is bad enough, and the political and economic benefits of bureaucracy waning enough, to justify scrapping its hierarchical bureaucratic organizational principles altogether. We must ask, not whether bureaucracy is good or bad, but whether its weaknesses have become so pronounced as to make its 5urvival unlikely and undesirable. Yes, there are signs that bureaucracy has outlived its usefulness, that it does not serve the needs of a post-industrial society, and that its negative side effects outweigh its benefits. Yet bureaucracies are still around. Are they just vestiges of an earlier social structure that we have not gotten around to replacing, or do they continue to serve some real purposes? As you might expect, since I am a bureaucrat, I tend to favor the latter explanation. To support my view, I argue first that bureaucrats are still part of our organizations because they are useful to organizations as buffers. As mentioned above, from one perspective, the bureaucrat's role as middleman between organization, customers, and producers appears as a needless obstacle to effective communication between these three groups. Yet, in many cases, it is the bureaucrat who must referee between such conflicting goals as (1) the producers' demand for higher wages; (2) the consumers' desire for lower prices, and (3) the organization's need for increasing profit, often implying both higher prices and lower wages. From· the executive point of view, bureaucratic intermediaries are indispensable in explaining the organization's position-what it will and will not doto long lines of workers and customers complaining and clamoring to have their demands met. The executives might

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be better able to express the organization's position, but they simply do not have the time. To put it more succinctly, as long as there is unpleasant work to be delegated, there will be bureaucrats to delegate it to. Second, despite all of our homage to "the customer knows best" and "the producers should know best," many times neither group knows what it really wants or how to get it. My favorite example in arguing that the customer may not always be right was the confrontation between my staff and a public-spirited, elderly, slightly lame man I will call Harold. Harold is a staunch advocate of better bus service and a fierce opponent of light rail and subway projects which he considers to be siphoning money away from improving bus service. Consequently, every week he requests seemingly endless copies of documents to provide the enemies of rail construction with ammunition to use against our project. I disagree with Harold's opinions, but I strongly support his right to obtain these documents, and we go out of our way to provide them. Harold is also the champion of another cause, the reservation of seats at the front of each bus for the elderly and handicapped. This is a laudable campaign, and I have often commended him for insisting at public meetings that all buses display signs to reserve this seating. However, Harold's dedication to this cause led him to board as many buses as he could and affix the signs himself if they were not already visible enough to suit him. Some in our agency considered this tactic a form of graffiti. I only smiled-until Harold began to replenish his supply of signs by requesting them as "public records" in batches of 100 at a time. This honestly seemed a little ridiculous, and I believed that he could better achieve his goals by working through proper channels (public and committee meetings, letters, and the like). I argued that bus signs were hardly public records. He told me that was a typically bureaucratic reply. So I asked our legal department for an opinion. To my chagrin, they agreed with Harold

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that the signs really were public records and that I did have to provide him with a sign-or at least a facsimile of a sign. However, they also gave me a way out by stating that there was no law that said I had to provide multiple copies of a public record. So Harold received a sign. No matter how just his cause. Believe that this was appropriate, and that it was one case when the bureaucrat-at least the bureaucrat's counselknew best. But what about the opinion of the "producers" -the workers, teachers, planners, engineers, and staffs in other functional areas. Do not those "in the trenches," "where the action is," have a uniquely valuable perspective on the processes involved? Indeed, they are able-with uncanny immediacy and accuracy-to identify those elements of a plan or procedural revision that simply will not work well in practice, no matter how wonderful it appears in theory. How many times have I worked late at night to develop a profoundly intelligent procedural solution, only to have my balloon of brilliance and pride punctured with a tired, scowling, "I guess, but what about. Usually, I just had not thought about that critical consideration which inevitably invalidates my whole solution. On the other hand, it is possible to be so close to a given process that one cannot imagine doing it any other way. Such tunnel vision has led some of the practicing "experts in the trenches" to overlook preferred alternatives that may be more obvious to the bureaucrat somewhat distanced from the task. Insecurity can also lead the producers to be excessively loyal to traditional ways of doing things-partly because what is familiar is comfortable, partly because new, unknown procedures may threaten their sense of competence and their job security. In an earlier column, I

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mentioned the example of mail clerks, who for the past twenty years had gone through a single sort of all company mail. They had refused to consider any alternative by saying, "We've been doing this for twenty years;. we ought to know." While they were on strike, a bureaucrat (the Records Management Supervisor) took charge. With no previous mail-room experience, but with a firm understanding of filing principles, she introduced multiple sorts, a procedural change resulting in completion of the work in less time with a smaller, much less experienced staff. Most bureaucrats-especially records managers-can think of similar experiences. Consider the almost universal opinion of producers in a functional area that the paper records which they daily process constitute an irreplaceable treasure for the organization. "What would we do if someone sued us over a matter documented in these files?" they ask. "How could the organization continue to function legally without the original, paper copy of all of its contractual documents?" The records management bureaucrat may argue rationally that other media are just as legal and are easier to control, but she will face an uphill struggle against the functional staffs belief in the sanctity of their paper until they finally run out of space to store it. Just as frequent is the producers' attitudes towards the boxes of inactive records they send to storage. Not trusting the barcode that records management bureaucrats affix to the boxes, they insist on taping manifests of the contents to the box lid or side. It is not until the lids are mixed up or the manifests are accidentally ripped from the box that they come to realize that, while the barcode may not look like much, it is a far more reliable way of identifying a box than scraps of paper taped to its top or side. I do not want to be misunderstood. Certainly, both the customers and the producers most closely associated with a particular function know a great deal about what they want and about what they do. Their knowledge and opinions are critically important. I am only

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suggesting that neither group is infallible and that the bureaucrats in the middle are not always wrong. believe that this was appropriate, and that it was one case when the bureaucrat-at least the bureaucrat's counselknew best. But what about the opinion of the "producers" -the workers, teachers, planners, engineers, and staffs in other functional areas? Do not those "in the trenches," "where the action is," have a uniquely valuable perspective on the processes involved? Indeed, they are able-with uncanny immediacy and accuracy-to identify those elements of a plan or procedural revision that simply will not work well in practice, no matter how wonderful it appears in theory. How many times have I worked late at night to develop a profoundly intelligent procedural solution, only to have my balloon of brilliance and pride punctured with a tired, scowling, "I guess, but what about.. .." Usually, I just had not thought about that critical consideration which inevitably invalidates my whole solution. On the other hand, it is possible to be so close to a given process that one cannot imagine doing it any other way. Such tunnel vision has led some of the practicing "experts in the trenches" to overlook preferred alternatives that may be more obvious to the bureaucrat somewhat distanced from the task. Insecurity can also lead the producers to be excessively loyal to traditional ways of doing things-partly because what is familiar is comfortable, partly because new, unknown procedures may threaten their sense of competence and their job security. In an earlier column, I mentioned the example of mail clerks, who for the past twenty years had gone through a single sort of all company mail. They had refused to consider any alternative by saying, "We've been doing this for twenty years; we ought to know.

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While they were on strike, a bureaucrat (the Records Management Supervisor) took charge. With no previous mail-room experience, but with a firm understanding of filing principles, she introduced multiple sorts, a procedural change resulting in completion of the work in less time with a smaller, much less experienced staff. Most bureaucrats-especially records managers-can think of similar experiences. Consider the almost universal opinion of producers in a functional area that the paper records which they daily process constitute an irreplaceable treasure for the organization. "What would we do if someone sued us over a matter documented in these files?" they ask. "How could the organization continue to function legally without the original, paper copy of all of its contractual documents?" The records management bureaucrat may argue rationally that other media are just as legal and are easier to control, but she will face .an uphill struggle against the functional staffs belief in the sanctity of their paper until they finally run out of space to store it. Just as frequent is the producers' attitudes towards the boxes of inactive records they send to storage. Not trusting the barcode that records management bureaucrats affix to the boxes, they insist on taping manifests of the contents to the box lid or side. It is not until the lids are mixed up or the manifests are accidentally ripped from the box that they come to realize that, while the barcode may not look like much, it is a far more reliable way of identifying a box than scraps of paper taped to its top or side. I do not want to be misunderstood. Certainly, both the customers and the producers most closely associated with a particular function know a great deal about what they want and about what they do. Their knc,wledge and opinions are critically important believe that this was appropriate, and that it was one case when the bureaucrat-at~least the bureaucrat's counsel-knew best. But what about the opinion of the "producers" -the workers, teachers, planners, engineers, and staffs in other

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functional areas. Do not those "in the trenches," "where the action is," have a uniquely valuable perspective on the processes involved. Indeed, they are able-with uncanny immediacy and accuracy-to identify those elements of a plan or procedural revision that simply will not work well in practice, no matter how wonderful it appears in theory. How many times have I worked late at night to develop a profoundly intelligent procedural solution, only to have my balloon of brilliance and pride punctured with a tired, scowling, "I guess, but what about Usually, I just had not thought about that critical consideration which inevitably invalidates my whole solution. On the other hand, it is possible to be so close to a given process that one cannot imagine doing it any other way. Such tunnel vision has led some of the practicing "experts in the trenches" to overlook preferred alternatives that may be more obvious to the bureaucrat somewhat distanced from the task. Insecurity can also lead the producers to be excessively loyal to traditional ways of doing things-partly because what is familiar is comfortable, partly because new, unknown procedures may threaten their sense of competence and their job security. In an earlier column, I mentioned the example of mail clerks, who for the past twenty years had gone through a single sort of all company mail. They had refused to consider any alternative by saying, "We've been doing this for twenty years; we ought to know." While they were on strike, a bureaucrat (the Records Management Supervisor) took charge. With no previous mail-room experience, but with a firm understanding of filing principles, she introduced multiple sorts, a procedural change resulting in completion of the work in less time with a smaller, much less experienced staff. Most bureaucrats-especially records managers-can think of similar experiences. Consider the almost universal

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opinion of producers in a functional area that the paper records which they daily process constitute an irreplaceable treasure for the organization. "What would we do if someone sued us over a matter documented in these files?" they ask. "How could the organization continue to function legally without the original, paper copy of all of its contractual documents?" The records management bureaucrat may argue rationally that other media are just as legal and are easier to control, but she will face an uphill struggle against the functional staffs belief in the sanctity of their paper until they finally run out of space to store it. Just as frequent is the producers' attitudes towards the boxes of inactive records they send to storage. Not trusting the barcode that records management bureaucrats affix to the boxes, they insist on taping manifests of the contents to the box lid or side. It is not until the lids are mixed up or the manifests are accidentally ripped from the box that they come to realize that, while the barcode may not look like much, it is a far more reliable way of identifying a box than scraps of paper .taped to its top or side. I do not want to be misunderstood. Certainly, both the customers and the producers most closely associated with a particular function know a great deal about what they want and about what they do. Their knowledge and opinions are critically important. I am only suggesting that neither group is infallible and that the bureaucrats in the middle are not always wrong. The application of such reengineering techniques to make hierarchic bureaucracies workable is not unlike the drastically radical surgery which doctors perform on terminally ill patients. Two questions nearly always accompany such attempts: Will the pCltient survive? Will the surgery so change the patient's life that he can hardly recognize himself? We may ask nearly the same questions about the reengin~ered bureaucracy: Will the radical reengineering permit it to survive into the twenty-first

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century? If so, will the organization that survives still be recognizable as a bureaucracy. Adopting a Common Sense Depersonalization and Rules

Approach

to

The problem of depersonalization is basically a matter of common courtesy. The fact that an orgaIization must be impersonal in order to avoid inconsistencies and conflicts of interest does not mean that we should behave as mechanical, uncaring parts of an inhuman machine. Just because the organization is not an association of relatives and friends does' not mean we should not be congenial. Just because we will never know most of the customers we serve or because they will probably never do us a favor does not mean we should act like petty tyrants. Just because a subordinate is supposed to do what we tell him does not mean we have to boss him around. This same common sense i~ necessary in dealing with rules. The challenge of bureaucratic rules is not how to eliminate them but how to develop systems for continually reviewing and revising them from the standpoint of continued relevance, efficiency, customer service, and integration with all other rules. ARMA International has provided an exceptionally good example of this in its support for the federal paperwork reduction program. Here is an example of bureaucrats-the records managers in both government and private business-striving to reduce unjustified requirements to collect and preserve records that they might easily have fought to maintain as a justification for their own bureaucratic empires. Note that it is the bureaucrats themselves who are often best able to identify the bureaucratic rules which should be abolished. This sort of exercise is also useful in teaching bureaucrats the value of organization above department" thinking. /I

The application of such reengineering techniques to make hierarchic bureaucracies workable is not unlike the

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drastically radical surgery which doctors perform on terminally ill patients. Two questions nearly always accompany such attempts: Will the patient survive? Will the surgery so change the patient's life that he can hardly recognize himself. We may ask nearly the same questions about the reengineered bureaucracy: Will the radical reengineering permit it to survive into the twenty-first century? If so, will the organization that survives still be recognizable as a bureaucracy. The problem 'of depersonalization is basically a matter of common courtesy. The fact that an organization must be impersonal in order to avoid inconsistencies and conflicts of interest does not mean that we should behave as mechanical, uncaring parts of an inhuman machine. Just because the organization is not an association of relatives and friends does not mean we should not be congenial. Just because we will never know most of the customers we serve or because they will probably never do us a favor does not mean we should act like petty tyrants. Just because a subordinate is supposed to do what we tell him does not mean we have to boss him around. This same common sense is necessary in dealing with rules. The challenge of bureaucratic rules is not how to eliminate them but how to develop systems for continually reviewing and revising them from the standpoint of continued relevance, efficiency, customer service, and integration with all other rules. ARMA International has provided an exceptionally good example of this in its support for the federal paperwork reduction program. Here is an example of bureaucrats-the records managers in both government and private business-striving to reduce unjustified requirements to collect and preserve records that they might easily have fought to maintain as a justification for their own bureaucratic empires. Note that it is the bureaucrats themselves who are often best able to identify the bureaucratic rules which should be abolished. This sort

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of exercise is also useful in teaching bureaucrats the value of "organization above department" thinking. Ecological units. The ecological units studied in this paper are formal organizational rules. A formal organizational rule is a written organizational document that usually specifies who should do what, when, and under which conditions. Most organizational rule documents contain a number of related provisions or component rules assembled under a single headline, the formal name of the rule document (e.g., reimbursement of expenses). Thus, most formal rule documents are really composites of component rules, which in turn can be decomposed into grammatical components, and so forth. Vital events. Organizational rules can undergo three basic vital events. A rule is bom when a new rule document is put in force in an organization. The second vital event is rule revision, which involves adding or removing provisions from existing rule documents. At times, the line between births and revisions might seem to be blurred, for example, when a revision shifts the main focus of a rule document dramatically or when a new rule document is born that retains large parts of other rule documents that were suspended earlier. In those cases, the distinguishing criterion is the existence of a predecessor document. For rule revisions, predecessor rule documents (i.e., an earlier version of the rule) can be identified. For rule births, no predecessor can be identified. For a number of methodological, empirical, and theoretical reasons, I limit this paper to the creation of new rule documents (rule births). I did not analyze revisions here, mainly because analysis of revisions requires a different theoretical and statistical apparatus. An implication of this focus is that this paper does not capture bureaucratization through elaboration of existing rules. To avoid potential misspecifications of the statistical models, however, I included the intensity of rule revisions as a control.

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The third vital rule event is suspension. A rule suspension (rule death) occurs when the rule is removed and no successor version of the rule is put in place. Suspensions are empirically less frequent than the other events and are analytically subordinate. From a bureaucratization theory perspective, rule births are the main components of bureaucratization, since each birth results in an expansion of the number of rule documents in an organization. Bureaucratization requires rule births, whereas rule suspensions can provide only a sufficient condition of bureaucratization (i.e., only if the rate of suspensions declines and if it is smaller than the birth rate). The growth rate of a rule population is the difference between the birth rate (the number of rules born in a given year) and the suspension rate (the number of rules suspended in a given year). A rule population grows as long as the birth rate exceeds the suspension rate. If the suspension rate equals the birth rate, the population does not grow. If the suspension rate exceeds the birth rate the population shrinks the growth rate is negative. Resources. Organizational rule production can be conceptualized as an ecological process in which rule populations evolve that feed on organizational resources. When such resources are limited, they can set limits to organizational rule production. When they are abundant they facilitate rule production. I distinguish two classes of resources: problems and rule-making capacities. Rules are to some degree seen as solutions to organizational problems. Organizations create new rules when they encounter problems that are not yet covered by existing rules, especially when these problems are fairly recurrent, consequential, or salient. Rule making is limited when there are fewer problems. Rule making can also be significantly impeded when rule-making capacities - such as attention, expertise, and the jurisdiction of rule-making bodies - are limited. For example, one of the rule-making bodies of the rules analyzed in this study was administered by only one person (the

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"editor" of the administrative rule book), who would occasionally assemble small groups of "rule owners" (i.e., relevant administrators from a given area) to discuss rule changes in their area. Large changes in one area would delay rule change projects in other areas. Population boundaries. Joint dependence on the same resources is the main defining criterion for rule populations. Thus, population boundaries can be established by categories of problems and of rule-making capacities. Organizational problems can be categorized based on their thematic relatedness, such as accounting problems or procurement problems. Organizations usually establish rule categories based on these problem areas, for example, creating accounting rules or procurement rules. Rules specific to each of these problem areas are usually more similar in content and purpose within than between areas. Rule-making capacities can be categorized according to the rule-making body authorized to create and change a set of rules. Organizational rule making, especially the production of formal policies, is typically located at higher levels of the organization. Rules are functional precisely because they can be produced centrally and applied decentrally. Such higher-level rule-making bodies are particularly important for the establishment of organizational rules that coordinate action across departments, e.g., rules setting general standards or rules defining transactions and interfaces between subunits. Thus, a rule population is a set of rules that is dedicated to the problems in a particular organizational problem area and is created by the same organizational rule-making body. Of course, the boundaries of individual rule populations depend on how organizations define problem areas and how they establish rule-making bodies. Some organizations, especially highly bureaucratic organizations (e.g., the military) develop very elaborate rule systems in which problem areas have multiple sub-areas and even multiple levels of sub-areas. Other organizations

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(or parts thereof) might have fuzzy definitions of problem areas, competing rule-making bodies, and even some overlap (or, worse, contradictions) between different rule areas. Clearly, such differences have implications for the way each rule population evolves, a point I discuss below. The proposed definition of rule populations has implications for the analysis of the evolution of rule populations. Problem areas and rule-making bodies are not fixed in most organizations. Rather, they can change over time. Boundaries around problem areas can shift, as when the organization expands into new activity domains. Rulemaking bodies can change, for example, when rule-making bodies are abandoned, established, or augmented. In longitudinal studies of rule populations, such changes have to be considered. Rule proliferation in organizations is as much an outcome of the proliferation of rules within (Ule populations as it is the result of the emergence of new rule populations. The statistical models of rule production presented below can cope with emerging rule populations and also test whether different populations of an organization evolve differently. Density Rule density, as in models of organizational populations, can be defined as the number of rules in a given organizational rule population at a given time. It tends to increase over time, as the rule population grows bigger and the organization grows older (e.g., Pugh et al., 1968; Blau, 1970). Density dependence of rule births means that the number of new rules born per year (the birth rate) depends on the number of rules already in the organizational rule population. A positive density dependence of the birth rate means that the rule population grows faster as the total number of rules grows larger; and a negative density dependence of the birth rate means that the rule population grows slower as the total number of rules grows larger. A

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grows slower as the total number of rules grows larger. A negative density dependence of the rule birth rate, however, does not imply a negative growth rate of the organizational rule population. It only means that the growth of the rule population slows down as the number of rules increases. This article focuses on an examination of accelerated versus decelerated growth of organizational rule populations and does not consider the rare case of shrinking bureaucracies. The Empirical Context

This study explores rule production in a medium-size, private university in the U.S. The university keeps two large sets of organizational rules, administrative rules and academic rules. The administrative rules deal with the administrative side of the university and academic rules regulate the conduct of faculty and students. The two rule sets provide the empirical data base of this study. The administrative data set is based on the "Administrative Guide," a collection of administrative policies that has existed at this university since 1961. This data set covers the entire history of the guide until 1990, the date the data collection was completed. The administrative rules consist of rules in six main areas: personnel, accounting, procurement, general organization (e.g., organization charts), services (such as printing), and rules regarding external property (i.e., government property, gifts). Each of these administrative problem areas constitutes an administrative rule subpopulation. The academic data set is based on the collection of academic rules at the university and covers the entire history of academic rules, from 1889 to the end of the data collection period, 1987. Over this time period the rule-making body of the academic rules shifted. From 1891 to 1967, academic rules were made by the Academic Council, essentially all faculty members of the university. In 1968, academic rulemaking authority was moved from the council to the

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Faculty Senate, an elected body of 55 faculty representatives, meeting biweekly and dedicated to decision making in the academic area. The academic rules fall into two main areas: rules about student conduct (e.g., honor code) and rules about faculty conduct (e.g., tenure rules). Each of the four different combinations of rule-making body and area constitute a separate academic rule subpopulation. The overall structure of the data is shown in figure 1. Administrative rules can be aggregated at two levels. The global level aggregates across all rule areas. On the local level, the administrative rule areas define the six administrative subpopulations. Academic rules can be aggregated at a global level, a local level, and an intermediate level. The global level aggregates across all kinds of rules. On the intermediate level, there are aggregations in two directions: faculty and student rules (aggregating across rule-making body) and council and senate rules (aggregating across areas). On the local academic level, four subpopulations exist: student rules made by the Academic Council, facuIty rules made by the Academic Council, student rules made by the Faculty Senate, and faculty rules made by the Faculty Senate. Weberian and Post-Weberian Models of Rule Proliferation Bureaucracy theories are not very explicit on the issue of density dependence of rule births, but through careful reading one can reconstruct some implied relationships between the number of rules in a bureaucracy and the rate of rule production. One can distinguish moderate and dramatic bureaucracy theories. According to moderate theories, organizations breed rules at a continuous but relentless pace, more precisely, at a rate that is implied to be larger than the rate of rule suspension. According to the dramatic formulations, rules breed rules. The moderate versions result in a continuous, linear expansion of the

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number of rules. The dramatic versions result in exponential growth of the number of rules. Most bureaucracy theorists use both formulations. Weber argued that rationalization, the driving force behind the erection of great bureaucracies, is really the result of an ascetic mind set that was carried out of monastic cells into everyday life. This would suggest the presence of a simple diffusion (e.g., proselytizing) process over the population of organizations (or their employees) and a subsequent, steady rule generation process in the lIinfected'; organizations. Rule proliferation is also fairly steady when bureaucratization occurs for other, purely exogenous reasons, such as the technical superiority of bureaucratic administration. Several of Weber's arguments, however, allude to mechanisms in which bureaucratization feeds on itself. This happens, for example, when bureaucratic expansion requires the establishment of control agencies, alongside the bureaucratic hierarchy, that supervise the adherence to rules and that create rules that llinit the authority of officials (Weber, 1978: 271). A second feedback mechanism results when new rules are created to unify and systematize existing rules and laws, sometimes in response to the interests of the bureaucratic officialdom, which is generally interested in clarity' and 'orderliness' of the law. On the societal level, Weber (1978) discussed at least three additional feedback mechanisms: (1) bureaucratic expansion in continental states facilitates their growth, which, in turn, fuels more bureaucratic expansion demands of culture (Kulturanspruche) push for increasing bureaucratic intensification, which, in tum, increases (2) the standard of living and makes for an increasing subjective indispensability of public, interlocal, and thus bureaucratic provision of the most varied wants"; and (3) some of the main causes of bureaucratization - such as the expansion of the state (with the accompanying "quantitative development of administrative tasks") and cultural, economic, and technological development II

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tasks") at the same time are promoted by bureaucratization e.g., "permanence of great states," economic development. Post-Weberians have proposed additional mechanisms. For example, Gouldner (1964) proposed a circular mechanism that expands bureaucratic rule systems. He argued that close supervision creates tensions that can be mitigated by bureaucratic rules, which, in tum, create low motivation and performance and thus motivate management to use close supervision, resulting in more tensions and more rules. Crozier (1964) saw increasing numbers of rules as the result of "vicious circles." He suggested that bureaucratic rule systems grow because impersonality and centralization are the only solutions to recurrent conflicts over personal privileges. Other mechanisms are proposed by authors such as Merton (1957) ("goal displacement") and Meyer (1985), who argued that organizational complexity exceeds the limits of bounded rationality. Although most of these mechanisms do not directly address density del' endence, they seem to suggest a positive effect of the number of organizational rules on the birth rate of rules, in agreement with a dramatic bureaucratization model: Impediments to Organizational Learning Limits to bureaucratic rule proliferation are rarely addressed by bureaucracy theorists. If they do discuss limits, they tend to invoke exogenous causes, such as cultul'al and technological changes (e.g., Crozier, 1964: 294) or rising awareness of the general public that bureaucracies create more problems than they solv. Yet bureaucracies are subject to inherent mechanism that limit their growth. Such endogenous limits are discernible from the perspective of an organizational learning approach, whIch shares bureaucracy theory's interest in rules but not its rationality premises.

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Theories of organizational learning have a peculiar outlook on organizational rule production. They assume that organizational rules are repositories of organizational knowledge and that organizational learning involves rule making. For example, Levitt and March argued that organizations learn "by encoding inferences from history into routines that guide behavior." While not all rule making involves organizational learning (Mills and Murgatroyd, 1991) and not all organizational learning results in rule making, it is evident that organizations can learn from experiences and that this learning often results in encoding of these lessons in formal and informal rules and routines. As the organization encounters more experiences, the average rate of encoding increases (ceteris paribus). When the organization encounters fewer experiences, rule production decreases. Differential supply of problems. I assume that organizational rule production is driven by experiences with organizational problems. Organizations create new rules when they encounter problems that are not yet covered by existing rules and when these problems are fairly recurrent, consequential, or salient. Organizations that encounter many such problems create a large number of rules. Organizations that encounter few problems will have a small number of rules. From this point of view, the supply of problems sets limits on organizational rule production. A rich supply of problems supports more intense rule production than a meager supply of problems. Unfortunately, it is very difficult to test hypotheses involving organizational problems. Comprehensive data about organizational problems, especially over long historical time periods, are virtually impossible to gather. In contrast to formal rules, which are written documents and are kept in archives, data about problems are usually not systematically recorded and stored in archives. To get at least an indirect assessment of the role of problem supply for rule production, I assess several factors that can be used to indicate the supply

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of problems in one area relative to another area. Then I test whether the birth rate is related to these differences. Several factors are likely to be related to the supply of problems in any given area. Large, heterogeneous problem areas, such as all administrative rules, are likely to generate more problems than narrow, homogeneous problem areas (e.g., rules regarding specific stakeholders such as government or donors). Populations in close contact with the environment (e.g., procurement, marketing) are likely to produce more problems than areas shielded from the environment (e.g., accounting). Finally, agency problems are likely to play a large role. Areas that are plagued by frequent agency problems are likely to provide many impulses for rule making (e.g., personnel rules or rules about reimbursement of expenses), whereas areas less subject to those hazards are likely to have a smaller arrival rate of new problems (e.g., rules regarding basic organizational structures and strategies). From this follows the next hypothesis: Absorption. The supply of problems for organizational rule production also depends on endogenous factors. At least partially, the supply is a function of the rules in existence. Organizational rules "absorb" problems. Rules contain encoded solutions to current and anticipated problems. Subsequent occurrences of situations generating the same problems can be handled by applying the rules. In this way, the problems can be avoided. Because they eliminate, or at least significantly reduce, the impetus for change, rules even absorb problems when they provide only cosmetic solutions (e.g., are created to appease external stakeholders or to alleviate institutional pressures). One can distinguish two absorption mechanisms, preemption and codification traps. Preemption, one of the accouterments of legal-rational bureaucracies, means that problems cease to be available for further rule production

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(within the jurisdiction of the same rule-making body) after they have been encoded in a rule. For example, organizations rarely have more than one non-smoking policy. Having more than one rule for a given issue would incur the risk of inconsistency between rules and thereby jeopardize the institutionalized expectation of rational administration. Codification traps occur when the extension and habitual application of old rules to new problems eliminate the perceived need to create new rules. In codification traps, problems get absorbed even if they do not exactly match the premises of the old rules. Merton (1957), with reference to Veblen, called this the "trained incapacity of bureaucrats." Bureaucrats tend to stretch established rules to cope with new problems. In this way, they obviate the need to develop new solutions. The outcome is a trap reminiscent of competency traps. Stretching old rules to deal with new problems reinforces the old rules and keeps experience with alternatives inadequate to make them rewarding to use. Both preemption and codification traps affect the rate of rule production. The larger the number of rules in existence, the higher the likelihood that new problems will fall into the factual or stretched domain of existing rules. Thus, the rate of rule production should decline with the number of rules in the population. It is likely that absorption is accompanied by another

mechanism that also implies a shrinking rate of rule production. It concerns the temporal order of codification. Not all possible organizational problems are encoded immediately. Some problems, such as basic problems, are encountered earlier, receive more attention, are solved easier, and are ceded sooner than others. The temporal order of codification depends on a number of factors. Here I focus only on recurrence. Organizational problems vary in the degree of their recurrence. Some types of problems recur frequently and others seldom. In organizations, recurring

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problems receive more attention and are codified sooner than rare problems. Recurring problems could be considered as "low hanging fruit" that are highly visible and easy to pick" by organizational decision makers (i.e., their solutions provide more returns). Rare problems easily escape attention and their solutions are difficult to assess because the feedback is long delayed. Such a dynamic implies a sorting process. Problems are dealt with in the order of their recurrence. Recurrent problems have a higher chance of showing up earlier in the organizational rule-making process and are codified earlier than rare problems, which have small chances of arriving and are codified later. Sorting by recurrence depletes organizational problem areas in a particular way: the set of remaining problems not yet codified consists of increasingly rare problems. Organizational encounters with these problems are rare and get rarer as the sorting process absorbs problems in the order of their recurrence. This suggests that codification proceeds from highly recurrent to frequent to likely to occasional to rare and, finally, to possible and potential contingencies. It takes longer and longer for this process to arrive at the next problem because the next problem is rarer than the preceding one. The outcome of sorting by recurrence is a negative density dependence of rule births. The resulting hypothesis is identical to hypothesis 3, which I therefore refer to as the absorption/ sorting hypothesis. /I

Turbulence. The absorption and sorting mechanism..:; are likely to be weakened when many new problem sources emerge in a problem area, a situation I term "turbulence" (inspired by Emery and Trist, 1965; see also Terreberry, 1968). Turbulence can disrupt absorption. Environmental turbulence can replenish the stock of problems in a problem area, thereby increasing the carrying capacity of the problem area for new rules. This situation is more likely in areas that experience a strong supply of problems, that is, in problem areas that (1) are located in boundary spanning areas, (2) are plagued by agency problems, and (3) are wide

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and heterogeneous. From this would follow that the negative effect of density on the birth rate of rules is weaker in turbulent areas and stronger in calm areas. Turbulence not only weakens absorption, it also disrupts sorting. Some of the new problem sources emerging in turbulent areas might generate highly recurrent problems and thus elevate the rate of rule production, at least until their most recurrent problems are covered. Although the sorting mechanism is likely to kick back in after turbulent spells cease (because rule making catches up with the new problems in the order of their recurrence), it can get significantly weakened when a high level of turbulence persists. This is particularly likely in rule areas located in turbulent environments (e.g., those closer to the periphery of the organization). Thus, turbulent problem areas will show a weaker negative density dependence of the rule birth rate than calm areas: The density dependence of the rule birth rate is stronger (i.e., negative) in calm areas and weaker (i.e., closer to zero) in turbulent problem areas. Recycling. Given this similarity between absorption and sorting, one might wonder if it is possible to disentangle both mechanisms. One difference between them concerns the effects of suspensions. Rule suspensions release problems previously regulated by organizational rules and put them back into the arena of organizational rule making, where they can be picked up or "recycled by other rules. In a sense, recycling is the inverse of absorption: previously absorbed problems become available for new rules. The outcome of recycling would be that the birth rate of organizational rules would shift upward as the number of suspended rules in a population increases. Recycling, however, does not reverse sorting. Sorting relies on differentials of problem recurrence that, at least a priori, are not related to recycling. Thus, empirical support for

>

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recycling would be consistent with absorption but would imply nothing about sorting. The rate of rule birth increases with the number of suspensions of other rules. Sorting, absorption, and recycling reflect situations in which rules compete with other rules for scarce resources such as organizational problems or organizational rule-creation capacities. Such resources can be more or less widely shared. For example, one could imagine that some rule subpopulations feed on resources of other subpopulations (e,g., when accounting rules encroach on the procurement area or when jurisdictions of rule-making bodies overlap). This is particularly likely if different rule populations form ecological communities. In that case, one would expect that global density and global suspension measures affect rule production. in other cases, rule subpopulations might feed mostly on their own resources. if rule populations are independent, density and suspension effects should be mainly localized within populations. The models presented below explore these possibilities. All independent variables except the suspension variables are lagged. The main reason for not using lagged suspension variables is that recycling occurs more or less instantaneously. Problems, once part of rules, are generally acknowledged as issues worth some regulation. Rational bureaucracies do not risk explicitly deregulating virulent issues and let them hang in the air for an extended time period. Rather, components of rules to be suspended are moved to new rules that are put in force at the time the old rules are suspended. A second reason is methodological. A fair amount of recycling occurs during overhauls of groups of rules, when a group of related rules is suspended and replaced with a new group of rules that deal with most of the issues of the suspended group. It is possible that births that occur during these overhauls are different from regular births; in particular, they are probably not independent

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from each other, thus violating assumptions of the Poisson model. Inclusion of contemporary suspensions captures the bulk of these overhauls and thereby reduces potential misspecifications of the models. Population age dependence is a possible source of spurious density effects. Lines of thought around the concept of liability of newness and work on the concept of structural inertia (Hannan and Freeman, 1984) suggest that organizational inertia increases with age. For organizational rule populations, this could mean that the rate of rule production declines as populations age, because social relations in an organizational area under the jurisdiction of a given rule-making body become routinized and obviate"new rules. If such arguments hold, the rate of rule production would decrease with population age. Therefore, if age is not included in the models, spurious density dependence might re$ult, because density tends to be positively correlated with age. To check this possibility, I tested models that included time clocks. For administrative rules, the time clock is the age of the administrative rule population. For academic rules, I included two time clocks, one for the Academic Council and one for the Faculty Senate. Each starts at zero and is updated every year as the corresponding subpopulation ages. Another potential source of spuriousness is revisions. One could imagine that the bureaucratization process shifts from rule making to rule changing as the number 6f rules in the organization expands. This would result in a spurious negative density dependence of the rate of rule birth if revisions are not considered in the models. For this reason, I included the number of rule revisions in the preceding year. A number of additional control variables were included in the models. Organizational and structural growth are frequently regarded as main causes of formalization in

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organizations (e.g., Blau, 1970). To capture their effect on rule production, I included two measures. Organizational growth was measured as the difference of the log of the number of students enrolled in year t-1 minus the log of students enrolled in year t-2. In effect, this is the log of the ratio of consecutive years. Structural growth was measured in the same way but was based on the number of degree programs at the university, i.e., as In(number of [programs.sub.t-1]) - In(number of [programs.sub.t-2]). This specification reduces multicollinearity because it uses first differences. It also normalizes the variables because it uses logarithms. Another set of control variables concerns the effect of university presidents on rule production. University history can and has been written in terms of presidential periods. Different university presidents signify differences in decision style, political agenda, and strictness in enforcing or stretching established rules. To capture the effects of different presidents on the rule production process, I included tenure dummies for different university presidents. The dummies are 1 in the years greater or equal to the beginning of the presidential tenure period, and zero before that. This way the exponential function [e.sup.[Betall of the effect (see equation 2) gives the change of the birth rate relative to the birth rate in the previous period, a method suggested by Hannan and Freeman (1989: 210). The first period (the tenure of president 1) starts at 1891, the second (the tenure of president 2) at 1913, the third at 1943, the fourth at 1949, the fifth at 1968, the sixth at 1970, and the seventh at 1980. The first period was used as the reference category.

RESULTS The parameter estimates of Poisson models of the rule birth rate reported here were estimated with LIMDEP. There are two tables of parameter estimates for

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administrative rules and two analogous tables for academic rules. The first tables in each subsection constrain the slopes of density and suspension parameters to be equal across subpopulations, although intercepts are allowed to differ. The models in these first tables are nested and therefore permit the use of likelihood-ratio tests. The second tables in each subsection (tables 3 and 5) allow slopes of density and suspension variables to differ between subpopulations, but for the most part, those models are not nested, so likelihoodratio tests were not used.

14

The Revolution is Today: Bureaucracy Is Forever In any nation, the bureaucracy shies away from anything resembling "new thinking." In the Soviet Union, bureaucracy is a mire as immobilizing as mud in Siberia, and as eternal as the seasons. "Chin," the system of infinite civil service gradations of rank inherited from the Mongols, and GogoI's caricC,lture of Akaky Akakievich, the timid petty bureaucrat of "The Overcoat" whose life falls apart after a harsh word from a high official, would have been familiar to Lenin, who wrote in 1897. "The complete lack of rights of the people in relation to government officials and the complete absence of control over the privileged bureaucracy correspond to the backwardness of Russia and to its absolutism."

So after the revolution, did he get rid of it. Of course not. As he observed himself in 1921. 'The czar can be sent packing, the landed proprietors sent packing, the capitalists sent packing. That we did. But bureaucratism cannot be 'sent packing' from a peasant country, cannot be 'swept from the face of the earth.' One can only reduce it by slow, stubborn effort.' Seventy years of communism in the Soviet Union brought .

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a vast bureaucracy of an estimated 18 million people. (By contrast, the United States had 4,194,436 Federal employees at the beginning of this year, plus more millions in state and local bureaucracies.) Mr. Gorbachev sometimes sounds as if he would like some of the capitalists and the landed proprietors Lenin sent packing to come back, to try to salvage something from the ruins. Yesterday, he and other Soviet leaders met to decide on economic measures that are expected to encourage private enterprise, set up a national banking system along Western lines to finance it, and start eliminating some of the millions of ways in which Soviet bureaucrats interfere with market mechanisms by telling enterprises how much of everything from pins to power plants to produce and how much to charge for them. Mr. Gorbachev said last week that he was ready to use his sweeping new executive powers to speed the latest package, hoping to spare it the fate of the ones he introduced in 1985 - the bureaucracy just ignored them. Lining Up to Fill Out Forms How is that possible? Imagine a country where practically everything requires filling out forms and waiting in line. Imagine a place where buying an airplane ticket or changing money for a trip abroad involves as much inconvenience and frustration for a Soviet citizen as going to the Department of Motor Vehicles for a new driver's license does for a New Yorker, where getting permission to live in an apartment in Moscow is as complicated as getting approval to build a modem extension on a landmarked building in Brooklyn Heights. The bureaucrats in charge of the coal and oil industries, of course, do not have to sweat in the mines or freeze in the Siberian oilfields; they sit in offices and wear suits and ties. But many would not know how to help economic reform

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even if they wanted to. Gavriil K. Popov, a radical economist in Moscow, said miners who were on strike last year only wanted the right to market for themselves any coal they produced above what they had to give to the state ministry, but the bureaucrats would not give in. There are so many rules and regulations that often the only way to get anything done is to quietly bribe those who enforce them. But there are no guarantees. Even for the initiated Western businesses, there are plenty of pitfalls. Stockmann's, a Helsinki department store that has been shipping orders to the Western community in Moscow for decades, tried to take advantage of new rules for joint ventures with Soviet cooperatives last year. It opened a small food store in Moscow, and for awhile it did a booming business. Now its shelves are empty, all because of red tape. Finance Ministry bureaucrats wrote its charter under a Council of Ministers regulation that says joint ventures can import products only for their own needs, according to the new Soviet business weekly Commersant. Customs officials discovered" this in March, and began turning back Stockmann's trucks. II

In 1986, at the end of Mr. Gorbachev's first year, there were 55 Soviet Government ministries and 23 state committees eqUivalent to ministries: ministries for defense, military production, internal affairs, health, justice, the merchant marine, light industry, heavy industry, electricity and electrification, metallurgy, chemicals, finance, trade, communications, fisheries and production of chemical fertilizer, committees for state security, state planning, prices, labor, television and radio, and forestry - to name only a few. Now there are only 37 ministries and 19 state committees. That does not mean all the old ones went away - just that they were merged or their functions devolved to the duplicate bureaucracies in the 15 constituent Soviet

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republics. For Soviet bureaucrats, as for their counterparts around the world, survival and self-interest are often more important than the public welfare. While the average Soviet monthly wage was 220 rubles last year -about $360 Valentin S. Pavlov, the Finance Minister, told the Supreme Soviet indignantly last December that some high-ranking functionaries were taking advantage of consolidation to raise their own salaries - to 1,500 rubles a month for the president of the urban planning association of the Ministry of Power and Electricity, for example, 1,400 for his general director and 500 for his driver. At the official rate of exchange (set by bureaucrats), 1,500 rubles is $2,475. Yuri A. Tyunkov, a spokesman for the Soviet Council of Ministers, said the Prime Minister gets only 1,200 rubles a month. That the growth of a bureaucracy that planned every detail of the economy would eventually be a paralyzing dead weight on initiative should have come as no surprise to any student of Weber, Marx, or Engels. Now Mr. Gorbachev wants to shift to a market economy regulated to prevent the excesses of 19th century capitalism, the only version most Russians still have in their blood. But this, too, could become a bureaucratic nightmare. But the United States, with its market economy, had more bureaucrats in the Federal Department of Agriculture (110,615), he said, than the Soviet Union had in its state Commission on Procurement and Food, and the same was true in other areas. In the Soviet Union, he said, "the idea of a vast bureaucracy is a myth.' One wonders what Mr. Gorbachev would say about that.

Bibliography Arendt, Hannah. Crises of the Republic. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovitch, 1972. Blau, Peter M. TIze Dynamics of Bureaucracy. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1973. Cook, Brian J. Bureaucracy and Self-Government: Reconsidering the Role of Public Administration in American Politics. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996. Creel, H. G. liThe Beginnings of Bureaucracy in China: The Origin of the Hsien." Journal of Asian Studies 23, no. 2 (1964): 155-184. Eisenstadt, S. N. The Political Systems of Empires. London: Free Press of Glencoe, 1963. Goodsell, Charles T. The Case for Bureaucracy: A Public Administration Polemic. 3rd ed. Chatham, N.J.: Chatham House, 1994. Habermas, Jurgen. The Inclusion of the Other: Studies in Political Theon;. Edited by Ciaran Cronin and Pablo de Greiff. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1997. Hegel, G. W. F. Elements of the Philosophy of Right. Edited by Allen W. Wood; translated by H. B. Nisbet. Cambridge, u.K., and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991. Lipsky, Michael. Street Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1980.

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Marx, Karl. Critique of Hegel's "Philosophy of Right." Edited by Joseph O'Malley; translated by Annette Jolin and Joseph O'Malley. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1970.

- -. Marx's Eighteenth Brumaire: (Post) modern Interpretations. Edited by Mark Cowling and James Martin. London: Pluto Press, 2002. Mbembe, Achille. On the Postcolony. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001. Reese, Thomas J. Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996. Rodney, Walter. How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. Washington, D.C.: Howard University Press, 1981. Scott, W. Richard. Organizations: Rational, Natural, and Open Systems. 5th ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 2003. Skocpol, Theda. States and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analysis of France, Russia, and China. Cambridge, U.K., and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1979. Smith, Adam. 1776. "Of the Division of Labour." In Classics of Organization TheonJ, edited by Jay M. Schafritz and J. Steven Ott. 5th ed. Fort Worth, Tex.: Harcourt College Publishers, 2001. Weber, Max. From Max Weber: Essays in SociologrJ. Edited and translated by H. H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1946. Wenke, Robert J. "Egypt: Origins of Complex Societies." Annual Review of AnthropologrJ 18 (1989): 129-155. Wilson, Woodrow. "The Study of Administration." Political Science Quarterly 2, no. 2 (1887): 197-222. Witz, Anne, and Mike Savage, eds. Gender and BureaucraClJ. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell, 1992.

Index A

D

Accountability 70 An interpretive-cultural approach 155 Anti bureaucracy 36

Decentralization 145 dopting a Common Sense 238

B

Bureaucracy Arena 51 Bureaucracy, Organisation & Political Change 1 Bureaucracy's Defining Features 125 Bureaucratic Performance 57 Bureaucratic Rules, 54 Bureaucrats or Politicians 190

c Challenge of Governance in a Large Bureaucracy 103 Changes over Time 64 Changing Quality of Life 46 Coercive and Enabling Bureaucracy 123 Compensation of losers 208 Coordination 148 Cultures Generate Bureaucracy 139

E empires 223 Enabling Bureaucracy 128 Enabling Bureaucracy's 129 F

Federal Express's Powership 229 Fiefs 223 Future of Bureaucracy 217 G

Governance and Democracy 115 Governance and Effectiveness 119 Governance and Governing III Governance and Public Bureaucracy 107 Governance Defined 105 H

HRM and people processing 154

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HRM system 164

R

I

Representative Bureaucracy 81

Impediments to Organizational Learning 247 Interpretation 178 Introducing Coercive Bureaucracy 126

s

L

Leading the Future of the Public Sector 80 Legitimacy 114 Lining Up to Fill Out Forms 258 Lobbying and bribing 211 M

Meritocracy 69 Monitoring 148 Mysteries of promotion 174

o Organizational 242 p

Perfection of Meritocracy 150 Policy tasks in an uncertain world 204 Political Culture, Development Administration 45 Post bureaucracy 34 Problems with a Permanent Hierarchy 225 Process and outcome cracks 172 public-spirited 231

Self-organising 113 T

The

Bureaucracy and Governance in Developing Count 50 The bureaucrat 196 The Empirical Context 244 The Management of Change at the Bureaucracy 25 The Mother of All Bureaucracy 138 The politician 197 The Primacy of Bureaucracy 225 The Problem with Bureaucratic Rules 227 The reform of the State bureaucracy 143 The Revolution is Today 257 The Vantage Point 45 Transparency 72 Two Kinds of Bureaucracy 125

w WGS Data on the Bureaucracy 60