Bureaucracies, Bureaucrats and
Technology
Lee, R.M.
IIASA Working Paper
WP-80-186
December 1980
Lee, R.M. (1980) Bureaucracies, Bureaucrats and Technology. IIASA Working Paper. IIASA, Laxenburg, Austria, WP-80186 Copyright © 1980 by the author(s). http://pure.iiasa.ac.at/1283/
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NOT FOR QUOTATION
WITHOUT P E R M I S S I O N
O F THE AUTHOR
BUREAUCRACIES, BUREAUCRATS
AND TECII1.JOLOGY
R o n a l d M.
Lee
December 1980
WP-80-186
W o r k i n g P a p e r s a r e i n t e r i m r e p o r t s o n w o r k of t h e
~ n t e r n a t i o n a lI n s t i t u t e f o r A p p l i e d S y s t e m s A n a l y s i s
and have received o n l y l i m i t e d r e v i e w .
V i e w s or
o p i n i o n s expressed h e r e i n do n o t n e c e s s a r i l y repres e n t t h o s e of t h e I n s t i t u t e o r of i t s N a t i o n a l M e m b e r
Organizations.
INTERNATIONAL I N S T I T U T E FOR A P P L I E D SYSTEMS A N A L Y S I S
A-2361 L a x e n b u r g , A u s t r i a
INTRODUCTION
UIJRE.41!CK.4TIC ORGANIZ4'TIONS
TIIT': F31TREAl'C1?4TIC PERSONALITY
INP'OI<M 4'1'10N 1'CCI INOLOGY I N BUREAUCRACIES
SIJKNtlIIY
KF:P'EHEhTCES
BljREAUCRACIES, BURE.4L'CRATS AND TECHNOLOGY
Ronald X . Lee
INTRODUCTION
Bureaucracy. The t e r m is laden with negative connotations. One t h n k s of
large, rigidified organizations with baroque, ritualized procedures incapable of
adapting to changing needs and conditions in the environment. In mentioning
t h e t e r m bureaucracy one usually also speaks of its means of perpetuation: t h e
professional bureaucrat. These a r e usually cast as unimaginative, plodding individuals socialized into the rule system of t h e bureaucracy to the point where t h e
rules themselves, and not t h e purposes behlnd the rules, become the reason and
guides of their employ. In recent years, another force has appeared which
threatens to spread, the phenomenon of bureaucracy even f u r t h e r ; namely t h e
implementation of these bureaucratic rules and procedures in the form of
computer-based administrative systems.
The purpose of t h s paper is t o review in somewhat more depth the n a t u r e
and interaction of these t h r e e forces: the bureaucratic organization itself; the
bureaucrats that populate s u c h organizations; and the special impact of information technology on their operation.
BIIREAUCR4TIC ORGANIZATIONS
The t e r m "bureaucracy," as both a popular and scientific t e r m , has come t o
have a variety of often overlapping definitions. As a starting point, consider t h e
criteria proposed by Downs (1967; pp.24-25):
1.
2,
3,
4.
a large organization ( e . g . , where the h g h e s t official knows less t h a n
half t h e employees),
a majority of its m e m b e r s a r e full-time employees who depend on t h e
organization for most of their income,
initial hiring of personnel, their promotion and retention is based a t
least partly on their performance in their organizational roles as
opposed to, e . g . , family connections, religion, e t c . , or being elected t o
the position by some outside constituency,
the major portion of its output is not directly o r indirectly evaluated in
any competitive m a r k e t s .
I t is this last characteristic w h c h distinguishes bureaucracies from large profitoriented organizations. Downs elaborates further:
Unlike most other large organizations, bureaus a r e economically one-faced r a t h e r t h a n two-faced. They face input marke t s where they buy t h e scarce resources they need t o produce their outputs. But they face no economic m a r k e t s whatever on the output side. Therefore, they have no d.irect .way
of evaluating their outputs in relation t o t h e costs of the
inputs used to m a k e t h e m . T h s inability is of profound
importance in all a s p e c t s of bureaucratic behavior. . . .
Thus, for all practical purposes, t h e r e is a complete separation of each bureau's income from its expenditures. As a
result, the b u r e a u ' s ability t o obtain income in a m a r k e t cannot serve as a n objective guide t o t h e desirability of extendi r g , maintaining, or contractin-g the level of expenditures i t
undertakes. Nor c a n it aid the b u r e a u in determining how t o
use the resources i t controls, or in appraising t h e performance of individual b u r e a u c r a t s . In s h o r t , t h e major yardsticks for decisionrnaking used by private n o n b u r e a u c r a t ~ c
lirms are completely unavailable to men who r u n bureaus.
T h s does not m e a n t h a t no t e s t s of efficiency whatsoever can
be devised for bureaucratic behavior. Nor does it mean that
the tools of economics cannot be fruitfully applied to the allocation of resources within bureaus. Nevertheless, t h e inability of bureaus to rely on markets as objective indicators of
output value affects their entire operation.
Following t h s definition, nearly all government agencies qualify as bureaucracies since few government services a r e sold in competitive markets. Also
included are other non-profit organizations such as private foundations, educational and religious institutions, provided they satisfy the other t h r e e criteria of
large size, paid employment and evaluation of performance.
Under this
definition, bureaucracy is not only widespread but also increasing. In European
in particular t h e increasing trend towards socialism is putting more more and
more services under bureaucratic control--e.g. socialized medicine, social
insurance, post, electronic communications, energy production, etc. Moreover,
in the soviet countries, bureaucracy seems to have long since become an
entrenched facet of the society; witness Trotsky's comment back in 1936:
[According to t h e party program, the state a s a bureaucratic
apparatus was to begin withering away on the very first day of
proletarian dictatorship.] "This is what the Party program
says: and it has still not been canceled. Strange: it sounds
of
the
like
a
voice
of
a
ghost
from
out
mausoleum.. ..Bureaucracy has not only refused to disappear,
as it could have done by entrusting its role to the masses, but
is has become a n uncontrolled power which dominates the
people." from The R e v o l u t i o n B e t r a y e d , quoted in Abrahamsson, 1977. p.46).
Even in such supposed bastions of capitalism as the U.S, bureaucracy
appears to be steadily growing. Downs (1967, pp.32:34) cites a number of factors. One is the case of consumer goods with large "external" costs or benefits.
An external cost or benefit is one not reflected in good's free market p r i c e - f o r
instance, the smog created by automobile exhaust, or non-biodegradable detergents w h c h pollute rivers. The point is t h a t market mechanisms do not take
these external costs Into account in selecting a n equilibrium consumption level.
To compensate for t h e s e inadequacies, a b u r e a u c r a c y is often c r e a t e d
Another case where a free m a r k e t mechanism does not o p e r a t e well is with
so-called "collective goods." These a r e goods with indivisible benefits; once t h e
good exists, everyone benefits whether o r not they have paid t h e i r s h a r e . An
example is national defense. In a f r e e m a r k e t , e a c h person is motivated t o avoid
paying h i s / h e r p a r t ; since everyone m a k e s this assumption, the collective good
is not acquired. Again, t o avoid this pathology of t h e m a r k e t s y s t e m , control of
s u c h goods is given over t o a b u r e a u c r a c y .
A somewhat related situation arises in c e r t a i n industries s u c h a s oil production o r telephone services where economies of scale o r p a t e n t controls c r e a t e
strong monopolistic tendencies. In o r d e r t o p r o t e c t the c o n s u m e r f r o m unfair
pricing, two options have b e e n employed, both b u r e a u c r a t i c . One, is t o nationalize t h e e n t i r e industry into a governmental agency. Examples a r e PEMEX,
Mexico's national oil company a n d t h e various PTT's i n European countries. The
o t h e r alternative, effectively only slightly different, is t o c r e a t e a governmental
regulatory agency t o control t h e monopoly's behavior, e . g . , the FTC a n d FCC in
t h e U.S.
Other motivations for the c r e a t i o n of b u r e a u c r a c i e s i n capitalist or socialist countries a r e s u c h c o m m o n social functions a s poverty p r o g r a m s , judicial
s y s t e m s and monitoring of the government itself.
In a now classic s t u d y , the sociologist Max Weber (1956/1978), observed
a n o t h e r i m p o r t a n t a s p e c t of b u r e a u c r a c i e s . To Weber, t h e process of bureaucratization is a shift from organizational m a n a g e m e n t based on t h e i n t e r e s t s
and personalities of specific individuals, t o one based o n explicit r u l e s a n d proc e d u r e s . These rules and p r o c e d u r e s a r e identified with r o l e s in t h e organization r a t h e r t h a n individual people. Bureaucratic orgamzations t h u s t a k e on a n
~ m p e r s o n a l ,mechanical character. To Weber, t h s is a positive development
leadlng to greater effectiveness and efficiency:
Bclreaucracy develops the more perfectly, the more it is
"dehumanized," the more completely it succeeds In ellmlnating f r o m official buslness love, hatred, and all purely personal, irrational, and emotional elements which escape calculation [Weber 1956/ 1978:975].
Weber however also recognized that the very success of such a bureaucracy
is one of its dangers--namely t h a t it becomes a n immovable power in t h e society:
Once fully established, bureaucracy is among those social
s t r u c t u r e w h c h a r e hardest to destroy. Bureaucracy is the
means of transforming social action into rationally organized
action ... the ruled, for their part, cannot dispense with or
replace the bureaucratic apparatus once it exists, for it rests
upon expert training, a functional specialization of work, and
a n attitude set on habitual virtuosity in t h e mastery of single
yet methodically integrated functions...
Such a n apparatus makes "revolution," in t h e sense of forceful creation of entirely new formations of authority, more and
more impossible--technically, because of its control over the
modern means of communication (telegraph, e t c . ) , and also
because of its increasingly rationalized inner structure
[Weber i956/ :978:987-9891.
Weber's usage of "bureaucracy" is slightly different t h a n the one introduced
above; namely, it is a "rationalized" organization w h c h , presumably, may or
may not compete in a n open market.
However, it is generally observed that bureaucracies in the first, noncompetitive sense tend to be even more rationalized and rule-bound than their
competitive counterparts. Michael Dempster (1980) suggested a possible explanation f o r this. In a competitive environment, the organization is more likely to
be put in situations where i t must either change or die. The prescription of t h e
organization's operations in t e r m s of formal rules and procedures seems t o be
a t odds with its ability to change. Thus, overly rule-bound organizations tend to
be weeded out by a process of competitive selection
Hureaucr.dcles, on the other hand, a r e (by the firs: definition) immune from
lhis type of competitive t h r e a t , and so their rules and procedures may perslst,
even to the point of ritualization. Thls p r e s e n t s an interesting anomaly. Bureaucracies presumably seek to rationalize their operations f o r reasons of eficiency
and uniformity of policy. However, this very effort a t eficiency may, a f t e r time,
become a serious pathology of t h e bureaucracy.
Another suggestive point was also ralsed, namely t h a t formalization of
operations and organizational adaptability s e e m t o be confhcting principles. The
key question is whether this is a n inherent property of systems of rules and procedures p e r s e , or whether certain sociological factors involving t h e personalities in t h e organization also play a p a r t . This leads t o t h e second aspect of
bureaucracies to b e examined h e r e , the bureaucrat.
THE BUREAUCRATIC PERSONALITY
Seldom a r e bureaucracies discussed without considering t h e role played by
the people who staff t h e m . Weber for instance remarks:
t h e professional bureaucrat is chained t o his activity i n his
entire economic and ideological existence. In t h e g r e a t
majority of cases he is only a small cog in a ceaselessly moving mechanism which prescribes to him an essentially fixed
routine of m a r c h [Weber 1956/ 1978:988].
A b u r e a u c r a t , unlike many other vocations, is heavi.1~socialized and hence
psychologically dependent on h i s / h e r active role in the organization. Bureau-
cracies s u c h as have been described generally only arise in large organizations
and then usually only a fairly long period of adjustment and stabilization. Thus
t h e activities of a bu.reaucrat are not only explicitly prescribed, but their full
extent and interplay with other p a r t s of t h e organization is also complex and
diEcult to learn. The b u r e a u c r a t therefore becomes an expert in h l s / h e r role in
t h e p a r t i c u l a r organization. This 1s for instance qulte different from professionals or t r a d e workers whose specialities a r e generally transferable t o o t h e r
organizations
A b u r e a u c r a t ' s training is thus pecullar t o h s l h e r organization; which
m a k e s it u n s u r p r i s i x t h a t these people cling tenaciously to t h e i r positions,
building defenses a n d guarding informational r e s o u r c e s t o m a k e t h e i r positions
more secure.
This, I think, is one of t h e primarily reasons why bureaucracies a r e so persistent. Indeed, they survive even national revolutions. For instance, speaking
about t h e post-revolutionary period in Russia, Lenin complained:
[During t h e revolutionary upheavals, t h e b u r e a u c r a t s f r o m
t h e Tsaristic t i m e had b e e n s h a k e n up a n d placed in new
posts. But they did not r e m a i n t h e r e . They tried to regain
their old positions.] The Tsarist b u r e a u c r a t s began t o e n t e r
t h e Soviet institutions and p r a c t i c e t h e i r bureaucratic
m e t h o d s , they began t o assume t h e coloring of communists
a n d , for g r e a t e r success in t h e i r c a r e e r s , t o procure m e m b e r s h p c a r d s of t h e Russian Communist P a r t y . And so, having
been thrown out of t h e door, t h e y fly in through t h e window!
(Lenin, Selected Works, Vol VIII:353, quoted in [Abrahamsson
1977:41 -421).
Another i m p o r t a n t a s p e c t concerning t h e motivations of b u r e a u c r a t s t o
hold o n t o t h e i r positions was brought o u t by Trotsky, again based on observations of t h e Soviet governmental b u r e a u c r a c y :
Bureaucracy owns neither s h a r e s n o r s t a t e bonds. It is
r e c r u i t e d , replenished, and renewed a s a n administrative
h e r a r c h j r , independently of property relationships. The individual b u r e a u c r a t cannot transfer t h e right to exploit t h e
s t a t e a p p a r a t u s t o his heirs. Bureaucracy enjoys its
priklleges i n the f o r m of power abuse (Trotsky, The Revolut-ion
B e t r a y e d , pp. 179-iRO; quoted in Abrahamsson, 1977:46).
T h s last observation is interesting i n light of t h e r e m a r k s by Weber earlier
Weber views the process of bureaucratization a s tending towards operations
based on impartial rules and p r o c e d u r e s r a t h e r t h a n personalities a n d personal
motives
But, as the Trotksy quote suggests, one of the pathologies of m a t u r e
bureaucracies is practically the reverse. Because bureaucrats become so wedded to their roles, they not only depend on them psychologically bat also tend to
re-interpret them to satisfy their own personal ends. Portugal, a s i t u a t ~ o nI
know to some degree personally, is another example of a large government
bureaucracy which survived a national revolution. There the above mentioned
pathology of bureaucracy e17en has a name: "cunha" ('coon-ya'). Cunha is t h e
informal system for getting things done in the bureaucracy based on who you
know, trading of favors, e t c . In Portugal, and I suspect elsewhere, it is amazingly well developed and in many cases effectively invalidates the formal rule
structure.
I am sure similar informal systems exist in other large bureaucracies to a
g r e a t e r or lesser degree.
I point t h s out because such "cunha" systems may in certain cases be t h e
real barrier to improvement of t h e bureaucracy. The fundamental difficulty of
this is that because it consists for the most p a r t of quasi- or illegal actions on
t h e p a r t of its participants- hence a source of potential e m b a r r a s s m e n t - i t is
generally kept secret.
INFORMATION TECHNO1,OGY IN BUREAUCRACIES
Bureaucrats are no longer the only active force in bureaucracies. Whereas
a bureaucrat is trained and socialized to follow prescribed procedures, a computer can likewise be program.med to follow many of these same procedures.
Indeed, the computerization of a bureaucratic process is the ulti.mate form
of organizational rationalizat~on. The computer is the archetype of Neber's
dictum to eliminate "love, haired and all purely personal, irrational and emotionid elements" from the organization's procedures.
Yet while computers presumably help remove the undesirabie caprice of
Gul-eaucrats themselves, they nonetheless have become symbols of pathological
bureaucratic rigidity. We a r e all acquainted with the agonies of trying t o rectify
a computer based billing e r r o r , etc.
But is this really because t h e computerization of such process actually
makes them less adaptive, or is it rather t h a t computers provide a convenient
scapegoat for organizational incompetefice? Systems analysts will often argue
that the latter is the case. While I t h n k thts is to some extent true, it is as well
true t h a t computerization, a t least in its most prevalent forms, does add to
inflexibility. Thts stems from two interrelated problems.
The first is one of organizational responsibility: The people t h a t use t h e
computer programs a r e very seldom the ones t h a t write them. Thus the people
t h a t a r e close to the problem and able to recognize needed modifications as
they arise, must request the assistance of a programmer, who typically resides
in a different (data processmg) department. This problem has been widely
recognized and is often cited as a motivation for localized (microprocessor)
computing and associated high level languages that the functional departments
themselves can control; see e.g., Fick (1980).
However, t h s is likely to be only a partial solution, applicable only to those
procedures t h a t are modular and separable to individual departments. The
problem still would remain as to the management of procedures that pervade
large segments of the organization, especially where these a r e complex and
interdependent.
The second source of inflexibility arising from computerization arises, I contend, from the character of the computer languages used to describe these
procedures. The basic problem 1s that current programming p r a c t ~ c eforces
logical deslgns whose pieces are highly interdependent.
W~nograd(: 979) for instance observes
Using current programming techniques, systems often reach
a point a t w h c h the accretion of changes m a k e s their struct u r e so baroque and opaque t h a t further changes a r e ~mpossible, and the performance of the system is irreversibly
degraded.
The resistance of computer based information systems t o subsequent
modification is one aspect of the current "software crisis" gaining increased
attention in the computer science literature.
One way of viewing t h s problem is as a trade-off between "procedural" vs
"declarative" representations of knowledge (see Lee 1980, for more detail).
Briefly, procedural design makes use of a rigidly controlled sequence of steps,
each of which defines a narrow context of focus and therefore can make use of
specialized rules of interpretation. Declarative representations, on the other
hand, a t t e m p t to avoid such sequential dependence and seek to develop general
rules of interpretation. This latter approach is conceptually much more difficult
but, once achieved, offers much greater flexibility for further modifications.
Another advantage of t h s type of software a r c h t e c t u r e is t h a t i t allows the
specification of so-called "heuristics," i . e . , rules t h a t may not work in all cases.
Thus. for instance, a computer program confronted with a particular problem
may t r y t o resolve it using one s e t of heuristic rules; if those do not work, other
rules are tried, e t c .
Example applications of programs of this sort have been chess playing programs, programs t o find mathematical proofs, etc.
In such systems, there may in fact be multiple ways to solve a given problem (or none a t all); and it is the job of the program to find a satisfactory solu-
tron as quickly as possible.
Because the program must search through a
number of potentially ieasible alternatives for each problem, r a t h e r than having
a single solution technique pre-selected, these systems a r e considerably less
efficient, though correspondingly more flexible in dealing with highly varied
situations.
The trade-off between procedural vs. declarative designs for programming
languages is as yet still a n issue for research, and i t will be some time before
computer languages supporting declarative rule representations come into commercial use.
Beyond these technical issues, however, t h e similarity between the resistance to change in large computer systems and large scale bureaucracies is, in
itself provocative. What I want to suggest is that not only do computers offer a
new medium for representing bureaucratic rules and procedures, but also as
mechanical systems based on rules and procedures, the issues in programming
language a r c h t e c t u r e offer a useful m o d e l for considering the problems of
bureaucracies. That is, t h e issues currently under study tor the design of computer programs might offer a new interpretation of t h e problems in designing
bureaucratic rules and procedures, quite a p a r t from computer implementations.
The suggestion here is t h a t a n analogous procedural/declarative trade-off
exists for the design of bureaucratic procedures. The organization becomes
more efficient, the more its operations become proceduralized. However, t o be
flexible, these rules must be in a form that they may be easily examined and
modified without affecting other aspects of the bureaucracy's operations.
Furthermore, the flexibility of a given bureaucratic policy might be enhanced by
regarding it as a sort of heuristics for accomplishing a certain goal, r a t h e r than
as a single deterministic rule. T h s is implicit in the so-called "management by
objectives" approach to administration: instructions to subordinates are given
in the f o r m of goals to be attained rather than procedures. The employees a r e
then given the freedom to devise their own mans for reaching these ends.
The value of computer language representations as a model for the study of
bureaucracies is a t t h s stage only conjectural. The comparison does however
help to isolate one important facet of bureaucratic design, namely the s t r u c t u r e
of the bureaucracy's rule system. This aspect is generally submerged amidst
the many inter-personal and political factors t h a t operate in bureaucracies.
SUMMARY
Bureaucracies were viewed as large organizations lacking competitive pressures and performance incentives. They are economically one-sided with
measurable inputs and largely non-measurable outputs. They have a tendency
towards increased rationalization and formalization of their operations t h a t is
seldom if ever reversed by shocks from the market place.
Bureaucrats a r e employees bred into these organizations. They have
become socialized into its rules and procedures and have a personal interest in
its continued stability. This is a major factor contributing t o the reluctance and
inability of bureaucracies to adapt to new circumstances.
Information technology, as currently applied, tends to further re-inforce
the tendency to stability, indeed, rigidity of the bureaucratic rule system.
Bureaucracies, then, have multiple factors contributing to their stable continuance and resistance to change. Sometimes, when a bureaucracy's service
becomes so outmoded as to have doubtful social benefit, it is successfully abolished or reduced by a budget cut. The more serious problem is, however, with
bureaucracies t h a t control an obviously necessary social function ( e . g . , postal
service, army), b u t fail to improve or adapt their services to changing needs.
They continue on a s before, often despite efforts by elected leaders to change
them. (\Vitness how many campaigmng politicians promise to trim the bureaucratic fat, and how few actually succeed.)
The central research issue is whether a n alternative design for bureaucracies can be found which does not lead to irreversible rigidity. The suggestion
here was t h a t certain representation issues in the design of computer languages
may provide new insights. In particular was the possibility of representing the
bureaucracy's policy in the form of independent, declarative rules which can be
analyzed and modified gradually, r a t h e r t h a n requiring a complete reorganization.
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