Modern Bureaucracy PDF

OCON.9184.CP09.312-341 2/2/05 4:03 PM Page 320 320 CHAPTER 9 THE MODERN BUREAUCRACY CRITICS CONTINUALLY LAMENT that the national government is not run like a busi- ness...

OCON.9184.CP09.312-341 2/2/05 4:03 PM Page 320 320 CHAPTER 9 THE MODERN BUREAUCRACY CRITICS CONTINUALLY LAMENT that the national government is not run like a busi- ness. Private businesses as well as all levels of government have their own bureaucratic structures. But, the national government differs from private business in numerous ways. Governments exist for the public good, not to make money. Businesses are driven by a profit motive; government leaders, but not bureaucrats, are driven by reelection. Busi- nesses get their money from customers; the national government gets its money from taxpayers. Another difference between a bureaucracy and a business is that it is diffi- cult to determine to whom bureaucracies are responsible. Is it the president? Congress? The citizenry? Still, governments can learn much from business, and recent reform efforts have tried to apply business solutions to create a government that works better and costs less. Copyright © 2006 by Pearson Education, Inc., publishing as Pearson Longman. All rights reserved. OCON.9184.CP09.312-341 2/2/05 4:03 PM Page 321 THE MODERN BUREAUCRACY 321 TABLE 9.1 The Liberalized Hatch Act Here are some examples of permissible and prohibited activities for federal employees under the Hatch Act, as modified by the Federal Employees Political Activities Act of 1993. Federal Employees May be candidates for public office in nonpartisan elections May not use their official authority or influence to interfere with an May assist in voter registration drives election May express opinions about candidates and issues May not collect political contributions unless both individuals are May contribute money to political organizations members of the same federal labor organization or employee orga- May attend political fund-raising functions nization and the one solicited is not a subordinate employee May attend and be active at political rallies and meetings May not knowingly solicit or discourage the political activity of any May join and be active members of a political party or club person who has business before the agency May sign nominating petitions May not engage in political activity while on duty May campaign for or against referendum questions, constitutional May not engage in political activity in any government office amendments, and municipal ordinances May not engage in political activity while wearing an official uniform May campaign for or against candidates in partisan elections May not engage in political activity while using a government vehicle May make campaign speeches for candidates in partisan elections May not solicit political contributions from the general public May distribute campaign literature in partisan elections May not be candidates for public office in partisan elections May hold office in political clubs or parties Source: U.S. Special Counsel’s Office. The different natures of government and business have a tremendous impact on the way the bureaucracy operates. Because all of the incentive in government “is in the direc- tion of not making mistakes,” public employees view risks and rewards very differently from their private-sector counterparts.9 The key to the modern bureaucracy is to under- stand who bureaucrats are, how the bureaucracy is organized, and how organization and personnel affect each other. It also is key to understand that government cannot be run like a business. An understanding of these facts and factors can help in the search for ways to motivate positive change in the bureaucracy. Although many Americans bemoan a growing federal bureaucracy, they are actu- ally wrong. Presidents since Calvin Coolidge have tried to control the size of the bureau- cracy. His Two Percent Club was created to cut staff, as its name implies, by two percent. Later, President Richard M. Nixon, for example, proposed a plan to combine fifty domestic agencies and seven different departments into four large “super depart- ments.”10 The Clinton administration was also bullish on reform. The President’s Task Force on Reinventing Government cut the size of the federal workforce, halved the growing number of federal regulations, and set customer service standards to direct agencies to put the people they serve first. President George W. Bush also put bureau- cratic reform as a priority and expanded upon Clinton administration efforts toward a more paperless government. That effort, however, lost some momentum in the after- math of 9/11, which resulted in the creation of additional federal programs and offices and even a new Department of Homeland Security. Still, the Bush administration has continued, as discussed in chapter 3, to return responsibilities back to state and local governments. As that has happened, however, the size of state and local bureaucracies has grown proportionately. It is important to note that the following discussion per- tains only to the federal bureaucracy. Who Are Bureaucrats? Federal bureaucrats are career government employees who work in the executive branch in the Cabinet-level departments and independent agencies that comprise more than 2,000 bureaus, divisions, branches, offices, services, and other subunits of the federal government. There are approximately 1.8 million federal workers in the executive Copyright © 2006 by Pearson Education, Inc., publishing as Pearson Longman. All rights reserved. OCON.9184.CP09.312-341 2/2/05 4:03 PM Page 322 322 CHAPTER 9 branch, a figure that does not include postal workers and uniformed military person- nel. Nearly one-third of all civilian employees work in the U.S. Postal Service, as illus- trated in Figure 9.1. The remaining federal civilian workers are spread out among the various executive departments and agencies throughout the United States. Most of these federal employees are paid according to what is called the “General Schedule” (GS). They advance within GS grades and into higher GS levels and salaries as their careers progress. As a result of reforms during the Truman administration that built on the Pendleton Act, most civilian federal governmental employees today are selected by merit standards, which include tests (such as civil service or foreign service exams) and educational criteria. Merit systems protect federal employees from being fired for political reasons. (For a description of how a federal employee can be fired, see Table 9.2.) At the lower levels of the U.S. Civil Service, most positions are filled by competi- tive examinations. These usually involve a written test, although the same position in the private sector would not. Mid-level to upper ranges of federal positions do not nor- mally require tests; instead, applicants simply submit a resume, or even apply by phone. Who Wants to Be a Personnel departments then evaluate potential candidates and rank candidates accord- Bureaucrat? ing to how well they fit a particular job opening. Only the names of those deemed “qual- ified” are then forwarded to the official filling the vacancy. This can be a time-consuming process; it often takes six to nine months before a position can be filled in this manner. The remaining 10 percent of the federal workforce is made up of persons not cov- ered by the civil service system. These positions generally fall into three categories: 1. Appointive policy-making positions. More than 6,000 people are presidential appointees. Some of these, including Cabinet secretaries, are subject to Senate confirmation. These appointees, in turn, are responsible for appointing thou- sands of high-level policy-making assistants who form the top of the bureau- cratic hierarchy. 2. Independent regulatory commissioners. Although each president gets to appoint as many as one hundred commissioners, they become independent of his direct political influence once they take office. 3. Low-level, nonpolicy patronage positions. At one time, the U.S. Postal Service was the largest source of these government jobs. In 1971, Congress reorganized the Postal Service and removed positions such as local postmaster from the political patronage/rewards pool. Since then, these types of positions generally concern sec- retarial assistants to policy makers. More than 15,000 job skills are represented in the federal government, and its workers are perhaps the best trained and most skilled and efficient in the world (see Comparing Global Perspective: Who Are the Bureaucrats? Should We Care?). Government Bureaucracies employees, whose average age is forty-seven years, with an average length of service at seventeen years, include forest rangers, FBI agents, foreign service officers, com- puter programmers, security guards, librarians, administrators, engineers, plumbers, lawyers, doctors, postal carriers, and zoologists, among others. The diversity of gov- ernment jobs mirrors the diversity of jobs in the private sector. The federal workforce, itself, is also diverse. As revealed in Analyzing Visuals: Characteristics and Rank Dis- The Changing Face of tribution of Federal Civilian Employees, the federal workforce largely reflects the the Federal Bureaucracy racial and ethnic composition of the United States as a whole, although the employ- ment of women lags behind that of men. Women still make up more than 60 percent of the lowest GS levels but have raised their proportion of positions in the GS 13–15 ranks from 18 percent in 1990 to over 30 percent in 2002.11 There are about 326,000 federal workers in the nation’s capital; the rest are located in regional, state, and local offices scattered throughout the country. To enhance effi- Copyright © 2006 by Pearson Education, Inc., publishing as Pearson Longman. All rights reserved. OCON.9184.CP09.312-341 2/2/05 4:03 PM Page 323 THE MODERN BUREAUCRACY 323 FIGURE 9.1 Distribution of Fed- eral Civilian Employment. Executive 1,838,300 (67.7%) Legislative 30,900 (1.1%) Judicial 34,700 (1.2%) U.S. Postal Service 811,600 (29.9%) Total Employment: 2,715,500 Source: Office of Personnel Management, 2003 Fact Book. ciency, the United States is broken up into several regions, with most agencies having regional offices in one city in that region. (See Figure 9.2.) The decentralization of the bureaucracy facilitates accessibility to the public. The Social Security Administration, for example, has numerous offices so that its clients can have a place nearby to take their paperwork, questions, and problems. Decentralization also helps distribute jobs and incomes across the country. The graying of the federal workforce is of concern to many. More than two-thirds of those in the highest nonpolitical positions as well as a large number of mid-level managers are eligible to retire.12 Many in government hope that the Presidential Management Fel- lows Program, formerly known as the Presidential Management Intern (PMI) Program, which was begun in 1977 to hire and train future managers and executives, will be enhanced to make up for the shortfall in experienced managers that the federal government is now TABLE 9.2 How to Fire a Federal Bureaucrat Removing federal employees for poor performance is very difficult and rare. In 1997, for example, of the federal government’s 2.7 million employees, 3,550 were terminated for poor performance. Only 100 were demoted and only 1,257 failed to get a pay raise based on their poor performance.a Civil service rules make it easier to fire someone for misconduct than poor performance. Incompetent employees must be given notice by their supervisors and given an opportunity for remedial training. To fire a member of the competitive civil service, explicit procedures must be followed: 1. At least thirty days’ written notice must be given to an employee in advance of firing or demotion for incompetence or misconduct. 2. The written notification must contain a statement of reasons for the action and specific examples of unacceptable performance. 3. The employee has the right to reply both orally and in written form to the charges, and has the right to an attorney. 4. Appeals from any adverse action against the employee can be made to the three-person Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB), a bipartisan body appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. 5. All employees have the right to a hearing and to an attorney in front of the MSPB. 6. All decisions of the MSPB may be appealed by the employee to the U.S. Court of Appeals. a D. Mark Wilson, "Inadequate Remedies for Poorly Performing Federal Workers Would Undermine Airport Security," Heritage Foundation WebMemo 54 (November 8, 2001). Copyright © 2006 by Pearson Education, Inc., publishing as Pearson Longman. All rights reserved.