Bureaucracy and Radical Politics: The Case of the Greater London Council

New Left Organizational Theory contains a powerful critique of bureaucracy, and in its place offers a model of collectivist organization. This rejection of bureaucracy, however, is inadequate for understanding left political strategy in the advanced capitalist state. The experience of the radical Greater London Council during the early 1980s suggests a more dialectical critique of bureaucracy, one that recognizes structural opportunities for the democratic transformation of bureaucracy. This study outlines a Gramscian organizational theory that goes beyond New Left Organizational Theory by suggesting a strategy of participatory centralization for radical politics within the state.     

Politics of E‐Government: E‐Government and the Political Control of Bureaucracy

This case study reports an innovative e‐government experiment by a local government in Seoul, South Korea—Gangnam‐gu. A new local political leadership in Gangnam made strategic use of e‐government applications to exert greater political control over the local civil service bureaucracy. The authors find that e‐government applications possess political properties that can be applied effectively by the political leadership as instruments to improve control over the government bureaucracy as well as to enhance essential government accountability and transparency. The political circumstances underlying e‐government development as well as its impact on local government are reported, along with key variables associated with this innovation and directions for future research.     

官僚体制的内在缺陷:新公共管理视角的分析

古典官僚制理论认为 ,官僚体制所体现的工具理性与价值理性的冲突是官僚体制自身不可超越的内在困境。在新公共管理的视角下 ,官僚体制不但存在工具理性与价值理性的冲突 ,在工具理性的内部也可能产生冲突 ,它所带来的效率也只是一种相当有限的机械效率。其内在缺陷就是缺乏竞争效率和创新机制 ,在政策制定和公共利益认定上偏离了原定的目标     

Decentralization and the post-war political economy

Abstract This paper uses cross–national data for 21 OECD nations to examine whether there is evidence of a connection between measures of political and fiscal decentralization and the major, long–term, performance parameters of the post–war political economy. Findings of what is necessarily an exploratory analysis of a wide range of policy outcomes suggest that federalism and the proliferation of constitutional veto–points have inhibited the expansion of the socially protective state and that a low level of fiscal centralization appears to have restrained post–war inflationary pressures and gone along with higher rates of post–war economic growth. No evidence is found to connect either political or fiscal measures with postwar labour market performance.     

Influencing the Bureaucracy: The Irony of Congressional Oversight

Does the president or Congress have more influence over policymaking by the bureaucracy? Despite a wealth of theoretical guidance, progress on this important question has proven elusive due to competing theoretical predictions and severe difficulties in measuring agency influence and oversight. We use a survey of federal executives to assess political influence, congressional oversight, and the policy preferences of agencies, committees, and the president on a comparable scale. Analyzing variation in political influence across and within agencies reveals that Congress is less influential relative to the White House when more committees are involved. While increasing the number of involved committees may maximize the electoral benefits for members, it may also undercut the ability of Congress as an institution to collectively respond to the actions of the presidency or the bureaucracy.     

State Building and Capitalism: The Rise of the Swedish Bureaucracy

The purpose of this article is to answer the following question: When did Swedish bureaucracy arise? That is, to determine a point in time when the organizational technology that Weber called bureaucracy became dominant in the process of Swedish state formation, as well as when bureaucracy finally replaced the feudal form of government based on the authority of nobility and the hierarchical ties of individual loyalties. The importance of this question relates to the debate on the sequential logic of economic and political development. The change from an aristocratic/particularistic to a bureaucratic/universal state apparatus can be understood as a change from despotic to infrastructural state power. Most empirical material indicates that, in terms of institutional structure, the transition to a bureaucratic administration started in the 1850s. Contrary to what most Swedish historians have argued, the Swedish state remained feudal and particularistic all they way up to the mid-19th century. If any particular decade is key to this transformation, it would be the 1870s. By then the last of the noble privileges had disappeared, a uniform salary system had been introduced, and the various state apparatuses had begun reorganizing toward a higher level of efficiency and rationality.     

认识并超越官僚制组织

马克斯·韦伯创立了官僚组织模式理论,奠定了现代组织理论的基础。因其严密性、合理性、稳定性与普适性,它在工业社会的组织形态中居主导地位。然而,随着信息时代的到来,官僚制的弊病也暴露出来。20世纪70年代末,西方国家掀起了一场声势浩大的新公共管理运动,企图彻底废除官僚制。但到头来,充其量只不过是充当了对官僚制进行改革的角色。在十八届三中全会的背景下,面对我国公共行政的现状,提出了实质性超越建议。     

The President and Representative Bureaucracy: Rhetoric and Reality

Policy makers have long recognized the importance of achieving a representative federal bureaucracy, but the four most recent presidents have expressed divergent views about policies designed to achieve this goal. Meanwhile, there have been widespread perceptions among federal employees that the administrations' ideologies have had a direct impact on the opportunities of minorities, women, and white men for advancement. Using government-wide data from 1979 to 1996, this article examines whether such employment opportunities have varied in the manner suggested by these perceptions. We find little evidence of a correlation between the president's views on affirmative action and minority and female representation in the overall federal workforce. Moreover, the curtailment of promotion opportunities during the Reagan and Clinton administrations has affected all groups nearly equally. Potential presidential influence has been more notable in the representation of women and minorities in politically appointed and career senior executive jobs. We conclude that equal employment opportunity and affirmative action policies have remained basically intact during the 18-year period, but that recent court decisions, along with efforts to reduce the size of government, may slow progress toward achieving a representative bureaucracy.     

The Bureaucracy and Its Masters: The New Madisonian System in the US

The bureaucracy's masters have redesigned the American political system over the past 20 years. As before, checks and balances play a critical role. This time, however, relations between one branch of government (the bureaucracy) and the rest are decidedly and deliberately asymmetrical. While acknowledging the need for bureaucratic accountability, the author raises questions about a growing emphasis on highly coercive controls from above. Instead he recommends greater reliance on catalytic controls from below, which energize the bureaucracy without stifling bureaucratic creativity and eroding bureaucratic integrity.     

The Politics of Recognition versus the Politics of Hatred

Hatred of America expressed in the 11 September attack is more than matched by the hatred by Americans for Islamists expressed in the war on Afghanistan, the War against Terror and the threatened wars against the 'Axis of Evil'. It is argued here that there is a pattern of self-reinforcing hatred operating in the world set in motion by the actions of the United States, particularly by George Bush Snr, and embraced and used by George Bush Jr to reinforce and further develop this pattern. To oppose this it is necessary to understand how hatred is generated, how this system operates and how Bush is exploiting it, and then to provide an alternative. It is argued this requires a new story of civilisation as the quest for justice understood as true recognition to oppose to the myths based on hatred promulgated by Bush. In terms of this story, the extreme economic, social, political and military policies of Bush and the myths used to justify them should be recognised for what they are, the challenge of barbarism to civilisation.     

Representative Bureaucracy and Partisanship: The Implementation of Election Law

Studies of representative bureaucracy argue that public administrators hold attitudes that are generally representative of the public and will implement policy in accordance with those attitudes. However, studies of representative bureaucracy generally have not considered the partisanship of local administrators. Many local election officials affiliate with a political party, and there is concern that partisan officials will manipulate election procedures to help their party. The authors analyze a survey of local election officials about their attitudes toward provisional voting. Findings show that Democratic local election officials have significantly more positive attitudes toward provisional voting programs in highly Democratic jurisdictions and significantly less positive attitudes in highly Republican jurisdictions. No such relationship occurs for Republican administrators. In addition, positive attitudes toward provisional voting are associated with more provisional votes being cast and counted in the 2004 presidential election. This work questions whether representative bureaucracy—when it concerns partisanship—is always a desirable outcome.     

官僚自主性与官僚控制模式——复合型、单一性、轴心化模式的归纳及比较

控制官僚是政治学研究中的一项重要主题。若以控制力的来源、向度和制度化水平作为分类依据,再基于对不同制度空间下控制官僚策略的比较,可以概括出复合型、单一性与轴心化这三种总体性的官僚控制模式。当代中国的控制官僚模式在权力制衡与社会制衡方面尚存在不足,需要改进和突破。     

论官僚制的形成背景及其合理性危机

官僚制作为—种高度理性化的组织模式,它的产生有其经济、政治、文化方面的背景。自其诞生以来,一直在各国公共管理领域中发挥着重大的作用和影响。但官僚制在其发展进程中内在缺陷日益显现。官僚制在现代社会中的专业化危机、服从性危机、民主危机、信息危机和使其面临重大的合理性质疑。