Chapter 13 (The Bureaucracy) study guide 2

Departments

- The biggest units of the executive branch are departments, covering broad areas of government responsibility. - The secretaries (heads) of the departments, along with a few other key officials, form the president's cabinet. The current cabinet departments are: State, Treasury, Defense, Interior, Agriculture, Justice, Commerce, Labor, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, Energy, Education, Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security. Figure 13.1. Each of these massive organizations is broken down into subsidiary agencies, bureaus, offices, and services.

Which of the following provides the best description of the organization and operation of the executive branch?

--- The executive branch has a top-down administrative structure in which the president exercises a great deal of control over similarly structured administrative agencies. X The executive branch is made up of diverse organizations with varying degrees of independence from and control by the president. ---- Presidents operate with a high degree of control over personnel and policy decisions across a wide range of administrative agencies within the executive branch. ---- All bureaucrats within administrative agencies are insulated from party politics and, thus, presidents are really not able to exert much influence over policy goals and policy making.

How is the rule making process tied to how administrative agencies make policy?

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De-regulation

A bureaucratic re-form by which the government reduces its role as a regulator of business. Through de-regulation, the government reduces its role and lets the natural market forces of supply and demand take over. Conservatives have championed de-regulation because they see freedom in the marketplace as the best route to an efficient and growing economy.

Define Bureaucracy

A large, complex organization in which employees have specific job responsibilities and work within a hierarchy of authority.

What are some of the causes of the expansion of government bureaucracies?

A principal cause of government expansion is the increasing complexity of society. Another reason government has grown is that the public's attitude toward business has changed. Throughout most of the nineteenth century, there was little or no government regulation of business. ------ Business was generally autonomous, and any government intervention in the economy that might limit that autonomy was considered inappropriate. This attitude began to change toward the end of the nineteenth century as more Americans became aware that the end product of a laissez-faire approach was not always highly competitive markets that benefited consumers.

What are some of the obstacles to effective implementation of policies?

After policies have been developed, they must be implemented. Implementation is the process of putting specific policies into operation. Implementation may be difficult because the policy to be carried out is not clearly stated.----- Policy directives to bureaucrats sometimes lack clarity and leave them with too much discretion. Effective implementation takes time as processes must be established and continually improved so all stakeholders can negotiate and communicate effectively. There's a great deal of trial and error as bureaucrats learn what works and what doesn't, and what's efficient and what is too costly or too slow. ----- Clearly the sheer complexity of public policy problems makes implementation a challenge. The more organizations and levels of government involved, the more difficult it is to coordinate implementation. Obstacles to effective implementation can create the impression that nothing the government does succeeds, but programs can and do work. Problems in implementation demonstrate why patience and continual analysis are necessary ingredients of successful policy-making. The Los Angeles clean air example shows that implementation can succeed, even when the problem is complex. To return to a term we used earlier, implementation is by its nature an incremental process, in which trial and error eventually lead to policies that work.

What is the rule making process?

Agencies exercise their policy-making discretion through formal administrative procedures, usually rule making. Rule making is the administrative process that results in the issuance of regulations. Regulations are rules that guide the operation of government programs. When an agency issues regulations, it is using the discretionary authority granted to it by Congress to implement a program or policy enacted into law. Rule making itself follows procedural guidelines requiring that proposed regulations first be published so that interested parties—typically interest groups—have a chance to comment on them, making any recommendations they see as appropriate.

Regulatory Commissions

Agencies of the executive branch of government that control or direct some aspect of the economy.

Performance Standards

Another approach to improving the bureaucracy's performance is to focus on performance: To what degree does any individual agency accomplish the objectives that have been set for it? In this view, each agency is held accountable for reaching quantifiable goals each year or budget cycle. Under such a system, congressional and White House overseers examine each agency to see if it meets its objectives, and they reward or punish agencies accordingly. As one scholar noted, this is a philosophy of "making the managers manage. A major initiative to hold agencies accountable for their performance is the Government Performance and Results Act. Passed by Congress, it requires each agency to identify specific goals, adopt a performance plan, and develop quantitative indicators of agency progress in meeting its goals. The law requires that agencies publish reports with performance data on each measure established.

What are the basic types of government organizations? (different parts of the executive branch). Provide an example of each type.

By examining the basic types of government organizations, we can better understand how the executive branch operates. In our discussion, we pay particular attention to the relative degree of independence of these organizations and to their relationship with the White House. Different Parts of the Executive Branch: 1. Departments (Biggest units) 2. Independent Agencies 3. Government Corporations

Government Corporations

Congress has also created a small number of government corporations. These executive branch agencies perform services that theoretically could be provided by the private sector, but Congress has decided that the public is better served when these organizations have some link with the government. For example, the national government maintains the postal service as a government corporation because it feels that Americans need low-cost, door-to-door service for all kinds of mail, not just for profitable routes or special services.

Define administrative discretion and explain why Congress allows it.

Congress recognized long ago that it has neither the time nor the technical expertise to make all policy decisions. Thus, agencies are seen as a better means of managing uncertainty. Ideally, Congress sets general guidelines for policy and expects agencies to act within those guide-lines. ----- The latitude that Congress gives agencies to make policy in the spirit of their legislative mandate is called administrative discretion.

Independent Agencies

Executive agencies that are not part of a Cabinet Department. They stand alone and are controlled by varying degrees by the president.

Government Corporations Term:

Government agencies that perform services that might be provided by the private sector but that either involve insufficient financial incentive or are better provided when they are somehow linked with government.

Competition and Out-Sourcing

Procedures that allow private contractors to bid for jobs previously held exclusively by government employees.

Civil Service

The system by which most appointments to the federal bureaucracy are made, to ensure that government jobs are filled on the basis of merit and that employees are not fired for political reasons.

Mentor Note

We often talk about bureaucracy as if it only exists as part of government. Bureaucracy, however, is something we confront everyday as we encounter complex organizations in our lives. In this section, the authors highlight the importance of culture for understanding how a government agency works. Consider the culture of different private bureaucracies (e.g., Apple or Wells Fargo) as a way of thinking about bureaucracy in general. What norms or unwritten rules seem to be at work? How do those norms or unwritten rules influence decision making?

Independent Agencies

Within the executive branch are many independent agencies that are not part of any cabinet department. They stand alone and are controlled to varying degrees by the president. Some, among them the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), are directly under the president's control.