Chapter 12: The Bureaucracy
Chapter 12: The Bureaucracy
I. The Federal Bureaucracy, in general
2. A bureaucracy is a way of organizing people to do work. Bureau=desk; -cracy=type of governmental structure (French)
3. A bureaucrat is a person with defined responsibilities in a bureaucracy.
4. The main purpose of the federal bureaucracy is to carry out the policy decisions of the President and Congress.
5. General Motors, the Southern Baptist Convention,
the Catholic Church, and the Department of Justice are all examples of
bureaucracies.
2. The Constitution gives almost NO guidance about the structure of the federal bureaucracy. The Framers simply didn't lay out the organization of cabinet departments, much less the independent agencies.
3. The bureaucracy is made up of three major groups of administrative agencies: the Executive Office of the President; the 14 cabinet departments; and the independent agencies.
4. The administration
consists of the officials and agencies of the executive branch that carry
out public policies. These administrators effect public policy in
the following ways:
2. The terms "administration" or "agency" are used to refer to any governmental body or, more particularly, to a major unit headed by a single administrator of near-cabinet rank. The terms agency and administration are used interchangeably.
3. The term "commission" is reserved for agencies charged with the regulation of business activities. Commissions are headed by varying numbers of top-ranking officers, or commissioners.
4. The terms "corporation" and "authority" are used for agencies that have a board and a manager and that is designed to conduct business-like activities.
5. While the above terms have precise definition,
they are are not used consistently. There is little uniformity in the use
of terms describing units within the executive branch and the lines are
now blurred.
2. Line agencies are those
agencies that actually perform the tasks for which the organization exists.
Examples: The Department of State, Department of Justice, and The Environmental
Protection Agency.
2. Until about 100 years ago, a person got a job with the government through the spoils system (a hiring and promotion system based on knowing the right people). Patronage: the practice of giving government jobs to the President's friends and political supporters.
3. The spoils system was largely defended by President Jackson who believed that the largest number of citizens should have the privilege of serving in government office, that any person of "normal" intelligence was fit to hold any government position, and that all government officials should belong to the party elected by the people.
4. Support for a civil service system increased dramatically as a result of the assassination of President Garfield in 1881. The Pendleton Act of 1883 created a system in which federal employees were chosen on the basis of competitive examinations, thus making merit, or ability, the reason for hiring people to fill federal positions.
5. President Jimmy Carter improved the system when he urged Congress to pass the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978. Reforms included the creation of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the federal agency which is charged with the testing and hiring of most federal workers. (Persons who pass civil service exams are placed on a "register" kept by OPM), and the Merit System Protection Board which enforces the merit system in the federal bureaucracy. Consequently, today, most federal agencies are covered by some sort of civil service system, based on the merit principle.
b. The Hatch Act (1939, amended 1993) prohibits
civil servants from active participation in partisan politics. Under the
terms of the Hatch Act, civil servants are permitted to:
2) Contribute money to a political party
3) Attend a political rally, and
4) Place a bumper sticker on their personal property
5) PRIOR to the 1993 amendments, civil servants
were prohibited from coordinating a campaign for a neighbor running for
political office.
1. The head of each department is know as the secretary, except for the Justice Department which is headed by the attorney general.
2. Department secretaries are appointed by the President with the approval of the Senate. Cabinet members can be fired by the President.
3. Together, the department secretaries serve as the President's cabinet. There are 14 cabinet departments.
4. Cabinet departments usually are organized into
sub-units based on geography. A member of the president's cabinet
is said to have "gone native" when that cabinet member places his or her
department's priorities above the president's.
2. While often referred to as "independent executive agencies," these agencies, as noted above, operate outside the executive departments (cabinet), but are nonetheless considered part of the executive branch of government.
3. There are four major reasons which explain
why these independent agencies exist outside of the cabinet department
structure
b. Some are independent to protect their officials from political pressures.
c. Some are independent to make them more responsive to interest group pressures.
d. Some are independent because of the peculiar
and sensitive nature of their functions.
4. Contrast an independent executive agency with
a executive department, such as the Department of Labor which was created
largely to give representation in government to labor unions, or the Department
of Veterans' Affairs, which represents the interests of military veterans,
both of which are important groups in American politics.
2. They are organized under a single administrator
and have sub-units that operate on a regional basis.
b. Members of independent regulatory commissions (agencies) often have extensive experience working in the industry that they regulate while on the commission. Independent regulatory commissions (agencies) are said to be "captured" when it serves to unduly protect the interests of the industry it regulates, rather than the public interest.
b. These boards and commissions must be made up
of members of both parties, and members cannot be removed for political
reasons. Terms are most often long and staggered.
5. The power of the regulatory commissions is controversial and has been decreased under Presidents Reagan and Bush. [They believed in a weaker federal government].
6. Congress has attempted to protect independent
regulatory agencies from political influence by requiring that each agency
be led by a group of commissioners representing both major political parties.
2. Their top officers are appointed by the President with Senate confirmation; all of their employees are public officials. The Postal Service and the Tennessee Valley Authority are examples of government corporations.
3. Some controversy exists as to whether government corporations are compatible with the democratic government's requirement that all public agencies be accountable to the public. Nonetheless, the advantage most often claimed for the use of government corporations is their flexibility.
2.Iron triangles are composed of bureaucratic agencies, interest groups, and congressional committees. The iron triangle is characterized by mutual dependency, in which each element provides key services, information, or policy for the others. The concept is currently best illustrated by the tobacco triangle, where a congressional committee, an bureaucratic (executive) agency, and an interest group, i.e., the tobacco interests, all inform and stroke each other to further their survival.
Chief
Justice Richard Barajas
Advanced Placement U.S. Government and Politics
Cathedral High School, El Paso, Texas
Last updated: April 2002