PLSC 111 Ch 7 The Bureaucracy PDF

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4/20/18 PLSC 111 The American Political System- Chapter 7: The Bureaucracy What is the Federal Bureaucracy? -

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Most people working in the executive branch are not elected. They belong to the civil service and military bureaucracies and are not appointed by the president or any other elected official. These are the people who, at the federal level, fight wars, protect borders, and regulate markets In a democracy, a bureaucrat is anyone working for the government who is not elected or is not a judge in a court of law Government bureaucracy- Agencies and offices devoted to carrying out the tasks of government consistent with the law Federal bureaucrats work in government agencies Government agencies- An individual unit of the government responsible for carrying out the tasks delegated to it by Congress or the president in accordance with the law Most bureaucrats work in the executive branch, although Congress and the courts also have their own bureaucracies Congress and the president are the most important principals, and the bureaucrats are the agents Agencies in the executive branch exist in one of three settings: within a department, as an independent agency, or as a government corporation. Some agencies are part of a cabinet department, such as the Department of Agriculture or the Department of Justice Cabinet Departments are less independent, Independent Agencies are mid-independent, and Government Corporations are more independent Cabinet departments- Departments within the executive branch that encompass many of the agencies that implement federal policy. Secretaries appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate are given the responsibility of leading these departments and advising the president. Ex: Department of Agriculture; the Food and Nutrition Service is an agency within the Department of Agriculture, Department of State, Department of the Treasury, Department of Defense, Department of Justice, Department of the Interior Other agencies are considered to be independent, meaning they are not part of one of the cabinet departments Independent agencies- An agency that exists outside the cabinet departments and is run with a larger degree of independence from presidential influence. Typically headed by boards or commissions appointed by the president and approved by the Senate. Ex: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Science Foundation, Environmental Protection Agency, National Archives, Central Intelligence Agency, Social Security Administration. A subset of an independent agencies is made up of independent regulatory agencies, and these have the most autonomy among the independent states. All

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of these agencies usually regulate the conduct of business corporations in some way. The president and Congress are ultimately the principals over independent agencies, which are part of the executive branch. Examples of independent regulatory agencies are: FCC, Federal Trade Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission, Commodity Futures Trading Commission Government corporations- A federally owned corporation that generates revenue by providing a public service, operating much like a private business and with a higher degree of autonomy than a cabinet department or an independent agency. Generally, these corporations are motivated to generate revenue while achieving public service goals. Their operations are heavily regulated in most cases. As with independent agencies, the president appoints the boards of commissions of the government corporations, and the appointments must be approved by the Senate. Ex: U.S. Postal Service, Amtrak, Tennessee Valley Authority, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Corporation for National and Community Service

Why Do We Need a Federal Bureaucracy? -

Bureaucracies are necessary because, while top government officials make broad policy decisions, someone or some set of people actually has to do the work of government

Solvers of Collective Dilemmas -

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When government solves collective dilemmas, including those related to public goods, bureaucracies actually implement the solutions. Thus the main task of many bureaucratic agencies is implementing decisions (by Congress and the president) to create public goods. Consider the following examples of public goods and the government agencies or departments involved in providing them: o Scientific knowledge- NASA o Security- The Department of Defense o National parks- The Department of the Interior o Public health- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention o Funding for public goods- The Internal Revenue Service Other bureaucratic agencies regulate private and commercial activities to make society function smoothly Coordination problems also need solving among the federal bureaucratic agencies. As chief executive of the national government, the president sets the direction for the executive branch, and in modern times, has a large White House bureaucracy to help make decisions Sometimes regulatory agencies help solve prisoner’s dilemmas. This kind of collective dilemma is common among companies advertising against each other. Example: two companies selling aspirin tablets compete intensely for customers. The expected outcome with government regulation is that both companies advertise honestly, and the reputation of each company and its product remains intact. Consumers benefit from being updated with factual information. The expected outcome without government regulation is that both companies make false claims about the quality of the other’s product. Both end up

with smeared reputations and lose customers. Consumers are left with poor information about the product. Everyone loses. Principals and Agents in the Executive Bureaucracy The Motivations of Bureaucrats -

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Contrary to their popular image of being boring and monotonous, bureaucrats in government can be scenes of considerable political conflict. First of all, bureaucrats, like others in government, have policy goals. And as employees, they generally wan t the same things other workers want from their jobs: clear instructions about what they are supposed to do, autonomy to carry out their tasks in the way they think best, and resources to accomplish their goals. Federal bureaucrats seldom get all three items on their wish list in the right proportions: clarity in instructions from Congress and the president, who often disagree and sometimes are from opposing parties, autonomy from too much intrusion by the people who pay their budgets and hire their bosses, and enough resources (money and staffing) allocated by people who find it easier to get reelected when they complain about spending within the bureaucracy Bureaucrats are not helpless, they can take actions to gain some autonomy and resources to do their jobs well. Political scientist Daniel Carpenter studied how upper-level civil servants in the early twentieth century cultivated allies across the national government, creating coalitions in favor of granting certain agencies more autonomy from political interference. Until then, many agencies were dominated by patronage appointments Seaman Knapp pushed for the departments to make decisions based on the science of seeds, crops, and soils- many parts of the Department of Agriculture gained statures nonpartisan agencies that provided technical assistance to farmers of their political affiliations, and the department was able to expand with increased funding from Congress and new positions for scientists From Carpenter’s research, it is clear that bureaucrats can act like politicians in terms of building coalitions to bring about policy change Bureaucrats can also use their position for policy change that they see as desirable. One advantage bureaucrats tend to have over many members of Congress and the president is knowledge of a policy area and information about which policies work and do not work Furthermore, since bureaucrats are the government officials who are most directly in contact with the public, they can sometimes encourage people to communicate with Congress

Bureaucracy’s Principal-Agent Problems -

Principal-agent problems occur because principals cannot always observe what agents are doing. As a result, agents can shirk their duties and disobey their principals We often think of elected officials- members of Congress and the president- as the principals, and the executive-branch bureaucrats as the agents. Problems arise when

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bureaucrats gradually change their behavior and stray from what the elected representatives want, working instead toward what the bureaucrats want Bureaucratic drift- When government agencies depart from executing policy consistent with the ideological preferences of Congress or the president so as to execute policy consistent with their own ideological preferences Coalitional drift- When an ideological shift in elected branches creates disparity between the way an agency executes policy and the way new members of Congress or a new president believes the agency ought to execute policy Coalition drifts can also be caused by cycling coalitions in Congress Bureaucratic drift- bureaucrats change ideological position Coalitional drift- policy preferences of Congress or president shift Bureaucratic capture- When regulatory agencies are indebted to the organizations or interests they are supposed to regulate New presidential administrations sometimes seek to avoid the most jarring effects of coalitional drift, especially if the heads of agencies or departments are well liked by both political parties. It is not common for new presidents, even those not from the part of their predecessor, to keep in place leaders in foreign policy and some key economic positions

Bureaucrats as Policy Makers -

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Bureaucrats have political goals and preferences, and moreover they are called upon to act as policy makers in certain ways. The shorthand version of policy making by the national government- Congress legislates and the president executes by relying on the executive branch bureaucracy to enforce and implement the law- is overly simplistic. In reality, the executive branch conducts considerable lawmaking activity Administrative law- The body of law created by executive agencies with the purpose of refining general law passed in legislation. The vast majority of administrative law is made within the executive-branch bureaucracy, not within the White House Rule making- The process by which governmental agencies provide details on how laws passed by elected officials will be implemented. The making of administrative law is referred to as rule making. Laws passed by Congress are often vague, requiring, the government to establish a program or to regulate an aspect of commercial, private, or governmental behavior. If a law is vague, the bureaucracy must determine the specific details of the law as it is to be applied in practice Most of the rules and regulations for conducting commercial activities in the U.S. are actually drafted by administrative agencies doing rule making. Congress’ immense workload makes it impossible for its members and their staff to write sufficiently detailed legislation. In addition, Congress does not have the technical or scientific expertise of the executive-branch agencies Evidence shows that laws tend to be more vague under unified government than under divided government. This is probably because, under unified government, both branches are controlled by the same political party and Congress trusts the executive branch to implement the laws more faithfully than it would under divided government

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The Administrative Procedures Act (APA) of 1946 established guidelines for agency rule making that are still followed. Specifically, the APA mandated, among other things that agencies: o Make records about all processes used to decide on regulations and rules fully transparent and accessible to the public o Publish regulations in a timely manner and allow regulated persons time to comply o Publish proposed regulations and allow public hearings before enforcement, during which the agency can make amendments in response to public comment o Use trial-like procedures in many cases to adjudicate disputes, including protection for witnesses and defendants, and attorney-client privileges o Report to Congress regularly on the effects of regulations Because of the APA guidelines, agencies first propose a new set of rules, then allow for citizens and interest groups to comment on the proposed rules, and then possibly amend the rules in response to comments- ex: by 2025, all automobiles sold in the U.S. must have a fuel efficiency of 54.5 miles per gallon Besides rule-making, bureaucrats act as policy makers in a more general, less formal way. Scholars sometimes refer to the people who most directly implement policies as “street level” bureaucrats. They staff the offices that interact with citizens and representatives from interest groups and companies; they conduct the inspections or experiments; they write the memos justifying decisions; and they organize small groups of bureaucrats to do the work of the government

How Has the Bureaucracy Changed? The Early Years -

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In the early years of the American republic, national government policies were administered by a few agencies led by groups of people appointed by the Continental Congress. Ad early as the 1780s, the government began to create “departments” headed by a single, appointed person called a secretary In 1789, there were three executive agencies- the State Department, the Treasury Department, and the War Department (later called Defense) – and the Office of the Attorney General (later a full-fledged department called Justice) The number of agencies and their scope grew slowly Most national bureaucracies in the nineteenth century were postal workers, soldiers, or customs officials As the bureaucracy grew more quickly in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, numerous reforms were proposed to make it more effective and efficient

Growth in Size -

Largely due to increases in nationalization and the growing power of the presidency, the bureaucracy has grown

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The first major increase began in the late nineteenth century and continued through the Progressive Era in the early 1900s. The bureaucracy grew as the national government increasingly regulated the national economy and build a larger military. For regulation purposes, the government created a new type of bureaucracy: the independent agency (or commission). The first agency was the Interstate Commerce Commission. The Federal Trade Commission and Federal Reserve Administration were created to regulate, respectively, financial transactions and the money supply for banks Independent agencies were designed to have greater autonomy from political officials than executive departments had. People working for the independent agencies could be dismissed only “for cause” The national bureaucracy spiked in size during the 1930s and 1940s following New Deal legislation and the massive mobilization for World War II- Social Security Administration, Departments of the Army and Navy Another notable growth period of the civilian bureaucracy occurred in the 1960s and 1970s with Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society programs and related new initiatives under President Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter- Department of Housing and Urban Development, EPA, Department of Health, Education, and Welfare Since the 1960s, the overall size of the federal bureaucracy has plateaued Large spikes occurred between major wars

The Spoils System -

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The nature of presidential appointments has also changed over time. Because Andrew Jackson believed that national bureaucrats should not hold government jobs for long periods, he used to great effect a rotation system that opened up positions for presidential appointments every four years or so This timing conveniently aligned with presidential elections and, in effect, was a patronage or spoils system: to the victorious party went the spoils (jobs) Problems: constant turnover and unqualified appointees In the late nineteenth century, Congress passed laws establishing a professional civil service One problem with filling bureaucratic positions with political appointees is that campaign supporters and other ideological allies in those positions are not always knowledgeable or professionally trained to do their jobs In the 1880s, reforms known as mugwumps called for abolishing the spoils system and instituting a more merit-based bureaucracy

Civil Service Reform -

With the Pendleton Act of 1883, the national government began to institute a civil service system. The act made it illegal to require people to pay dues to political parties in order to get national government jobs, and it instituted layers of the national bureaucracy that are “protected,” meaning they are not subject to political appointment and are classified or ranked by the skill and education levels required

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All of these civil services are characterized by a system of evaluation and promotion from within the bureaucracies; tests and training take place to ensure that competent people fill the jobs Civil service reforms also served to break the grip that certain political party bosses had on specific segments of the national bureaucracy The civil service exams did not do away with all forms of bribery and patronage politics, but they did diminish their incidence and contributed to a more professionalized, effective government bureaucracy. The Progressives believed fundamentally in the idea that government could and should be operated in an apolitical and nonpartisan manner based on scientific principles

Modern Reforms of the Bureaucracy -

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Despite these reforms, the federal bureaucracy is widely seen today as bloated and inefficient. People believe it wastes tax payer money Ronald Reagan was openly hostile to government bureaucracy during his first campaign for president in 1980- determine to weaken public employee unions It is not easy for the government to cut jobs and eliminate public programs. Politicians often find it expedient to support bureaucratic reforms in principle while avoiding actual specific reforms that affect a given constituency Many bureaucratic reforms have resulted in reducing the size of the bureaucracy More than half (57 percent) of the federal agencies created between 1947 and 1998 have been abolished due to mergers of agencies, creation of new replacement agencies, or simply elimination altogether of the tasks

Privatization and Marketization -

Privatization- The contracting of private companies by the government to conduct work that was formerly done by government agencies Marketization- Government bureaucratic reform that emphasizes market-based principles of management that are common to the private sector Government contract- An agreement whereby the government hires a company or an organization to carry out certain tasks on its behalf Government grant- Money that the government provides to individuals or organizations to perform tasks in the public’s interest Since the 1980s, privatization reform has been a huge factor in reducing the growth of the government bureaucracy One highly controversial example of marketization sometimes used at the state or local level is government-funded vouchers that parents can “spend” to send their children to private schools. The premise is that failing public schools will compete for students and funding. Another example is cap-and trade policies regarding companies buying other companies’ emissions permits

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