Bureaucracy Essay - Grade: A PDF

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Kelcee Cramer SOC-102 Professor Williams 20 July 2019 Bureaucracy Essay While in today’s civilization there are many societal statuses and much more, organization and bureaucracy play a critical role in everyday lives. In Sociology, when sociologists mention the term ‘bureaucracy’, they are typically referring to the societal structures of organization that is present to this day. These organizations are intended as institutes for a certain duty. Although they do have duties of their own, they also have goals to be achieved for the most effective way possible. Bureaucracy is defined as, “a system of governments in which the most crucial decisions are made by state officials rather than selected representatives” (Bureaucracy, n.d.). Otherwise put, bureaucracy is a set of rules, administrations and statuses, managing their own organization. In the bureaucratic organization, Max Weber argued that there are five characteristics that the bureaucracy must me which include: (1) clear hierarchical levels of authority with work assignments flowing downward, (2) a division of labor, (3) written rules, (4) written communications and records, and (5) impersonality and replaceability (Troolin, 2018). Weber was a very educated man that was alive during the Renaissance era and brought great change to the world. Weber’s educational background consists of law, history, philosophy, and economics (Mitzman, 2019). Aside from his education, Weber pursued further and became a founder of Sociology. The goal of his five characteristics of bureaucracy is aimed to have a more successful and goal-oriented government.

Hierarchical authority structure is defined as “the amount of authority which increases with each level higher an individual or organization in hierarchy” (BusinessDictionary.com 2018). In this kind of hierarchy, the person who holds the most authority is the person at the top. With that kind of position, that individual is held accountable for having such authority and making the ultimate decisions. For example, if we look at the Board, it consists of regents, senates, and representatives. With the Board holding so much authority and being responsible for the final decisions, it is more controlling than the President himself. Even though the President may not be at the top of the hierarchy, he is still liable for making rulings with the approval of the Board. Moving on to the second characteristic of the Bureaucracy which is the division of labor. The notion of the labor evolution was first established by a man named Adam Smith. Smith mentions this in an economic book called, “Wealth of Nations” published in 1776, which in the time of the Industrial Revolution assisted the practice of technology in the society today. In the first chapter of Smith’s booked titled, “Of the Division of Labor”, it distributes his thoughts and viewpoints. Another term for labor specialization is division of labor which is more commonly used by economists. A better way to put division of labor is having a main job that is divided so that there are individual tasks and each individual is assigned to different occupations. An example of this would be say there is a car shop. Each worker that is working has different duties they must do in order to complete the car. There is not just one single person that builds the whole car from start to finish. You have mechanics, painters, assemblers, and so forth that each are held responsible for their own duty. Now, there are tons of certain tasks just like building a car, and such tasks are being given to individuals depending on their strengths and abilities.

The third characteristic of the Bureaucracy is written rules. Written rules, also known as formal rules, is defined as directions stating tasks in how the organization, or part of the hierarchy is to complete their tasks (Mitzman, 2019). These rules are universally known as SOPs- standard operating procedures and are made in system manuals. When officials abide by these rules, no time is wasted in making choices. In the office, officers’ duties and tasks are clear to other affiliates. It does take time to fully understand and recognize everyone’s duties. This is why representatives do not do a good job because they do not know the rules, which prevents the jobs from being completed. The purpose of written rules is to make sure that organizations are following proper practices and policies. The longer amount of time that a bureaucracy is present there are more written rules put in place. For example, my own school, Grand Canyon University, has different manuals with rules that are applied to students, administrators, campus workers, and so on. If the directorial principle does not have any written rules, is it even allowed? Written announcements fall under written rules but is different because the rules are not documents. Written announcements are a combination of choices, guidelines, and movements taken by organizations that are expressed and documented in official writing. These documents underline the continuousness of the organization’s rules and ways. The individuals that work in the bureaucracy spend majority of their time keeping record of the messages that come in and out. Aside from keeping track of these messages, they also create reports clarifying their activities. An example of this would be again Grand Canyon University demands each section of the Canyon Christian Schools Consortium to check in and check out before they start and end their duty. Each job differs depending on the section the individual is hired in. An example would be the K-Royal Palm will go off campus to better educate and assist high school students in

topics such as Math, Science, English, and History. But then you have other sections like the Seat-Fillers which are people who attend GCU events and fill in the spaces where there are empty seats. The fifth last characteristic of the bureaucratic method is impersonality and replaceability (Troolin, 2018). Impersonality and replaceability defends that the office is more vital than the person holding office. Working for an organization, the person in office is typically replaceable but holds most of the entitlement in the organization. Affiliates of the bureaucracy show loyalty to the office overall, not to each individual person. Being part of the bureaucracy, people tend to feel like the small wheel for a massive system. For example, when a teacher or boss retires, another person comes along to fill the spot of that person. The five characteristics of Bureaucracy argued by Max Weber not only help their goals to be achieved, but also permits development and persistence in the future. But just like anything else, nothing is faultless which calls for dysfunctions in the bureaucracy itself. Some dysfunctions entail red tape, a lack of communication amongst the different divisions, and bureaucratic hostility (Im, 2017). Red tape is when a person is compelled by the rules. When a routine of certain type, whether it be allowed, consequences in deferrals or dormancy. An example would be filling out an unnecessary amount of paperwork because you are a new patient at the dentist or doctor’s office. When regarding the lack of communication between amongst different divisions, it is referring to divisions interfering with what another division has already accomplished. This would happen because of the lack of communication. A life example of this would be a soccer team giving the ball to the other team because the teammates did not communicate well with each other. Lastly, bureaucratic hostility is feeling incapable when people are given unnecessary tasks in a large organization to achieve more effective assembly, cutting

people’s work short. For example, take the class system. The bottom of the system, most of the time not on the hierarchy are the “Untouchables”. The Untouchables are people who are given the nastiest and filthiest jobs. Their duty is to provide for the community by upholding its sanitation even though they can never move up the system. Bureaucracy in conclusion is that things can appear to be picture-perfect and immaculate, but there is nothing in life that is perfect. Move forward in life with attentiveness because things never appear as they seem.

References

BusinessDictionary.com. (2018). What is hierarchy of authority? definition and meaning. [online] Available at: http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/hierarchy-ofauthority.html [Accessed 2 Mar. 2018]. Bureaucracy. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.dictionary.com/browse/bureaucracy Troolin, A. (2018, March 2). What Is the Bureaucracy? - Role, Structure & Characteristics. Retrieved from https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-the-bureaucracy-rolestructure-characteristics.html Mitzman, A. (2019, June 10). Max Weber. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Max-Weber-German-sociologist Im, T. (2017, October 16). Revisiting Bureaucratic Dysfunction: The Role of Bureaucracy in Democratization*. Retrieved from https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/S2053-769720170000028001/full/html...