Authority and Power in Bureaucratic and Patrimonial Administration

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Authority and Power in Bureaucratic and Patrimonial Administration: A Revisionist Interpretation of Weber on Bureaucracy Author(s): Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph Source: World Politics, Vol. 31, No. 2 (Jan., 1979), pp. 195-227 Published by: Cambridge University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2009942 . Accessed: 29/01/2014 18:15
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AUTHORITY AND POWER IN BUREAUCRATIC AND PATRIMONIAL ADMINISTRATION: A Revisionist ofWeber Interpretation on Bureaucracy
By LLOYD T. RUDOLPH and SUSANNE HOEBER RUDOLPH*
INTRODUCTION
of bureaucracy, substantial qualiEBER'S understanding despite 'fl Tfication and revision, remainsthe dominantparadigmfor the We continuethe and formalorganizations. studyof administration of bureauconcepts by accepting his ideal-typical processof revision but we intendto subjectthem administration, craticand patrimonial to theoretical and historical and application.1 reinterpretation
* This article was presentedin an earlier and longer version at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association at Chicago in September I974, and received the Franklin L. BurdettePi Sigma Alpha Award for the best paper delivered at the meeting. 1 There is an appreciable literaturethat addresses itself to aspects of this paper. It includes Reinhard Bendix and Guenther Roth, Scholarship and Partisanship:Essays on William Delany, "The Max Weber (Berkeley: Universityof California Press I97I); AdniinisDevelopment and Decline of Patrimonial and BureaucraticAdministration," trativeScience Quarterly,viii (Winter i962-63), 458-50I; Lloyd Fallers, Bantu Bureaucracy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press i965); S. N. Eisenstadt, "Traditional in J. S. Jackson,ed., Sociological Patrimonialism and Modern Neo-Patrimonialisrn," Alfred Studies, Social Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press I972); Diamant, "The Bureaucratic Model: Max Weber Rejected, Rediscovered, Resurrected," in Ferrel Heady and Sybil L. Stokes, eds., Papers in Comparative Administration (Ann Arbor: Institute of Public Administration, University of Michigan i962), 59-96; John Armstrong, "Old Regime Governors: Bureaucratic and Patrimonial Attributes," Comparative Studies in Society and History, xiv Reinhard Bendix, Max Weber: An Intellectual Portrait (New 2-29; (January l972), York: Doubleday i960); Carl J. Friedrich, "Some Observationson Weber's Analysis of Bureaucracy,"in Robert K. Merton and Associates,Reader in Bureaucracy (New York: Free Press I952), 27-32; Ernest Barker, The Development of Public Services in Europe, (New York: Oxford UniversityPress I944); E. N. Gladden, A History of i660-i930 I, From Earliest Times to the Eleventh Century; II, From the Public Administration, Eleventh Centuryto the PresentDay (London: Frank Cass I972); T. F. Tout, Chapters in the AdministrativeHistory of Medieval England, 6 vols. (London: Longmans, Green I920-I933); JohnMarkoff,"GovernmentalBureaucratization:General Processes and an Anomalous Case," Comparative Studies in Society and History, xvii (October David Beetham, Max Weber and the Theory of Modern Politics (London: I975); Wolfgang J. Mommsen, The Age of Bureaucracy: George Allen and Unwin I974); Perspectiveson the Political Sociology of Max Weber (Oxford: Basil Blackwell I974). Some of these works contain useful bibliographiesor bibliographical footnotes.
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historically wouldtriumph thatbureaucracy Weber's anticipation administhanpatrimonial it was more efficient and powerful because led himto leadership thancharismatic tration and morepermanent of adaptation process historical changeas an evolutionary present and acif notteleological, inevitable, was at leastuniversal, which, ofhisOurreading andexplanation. understanding tohuman cessible Weber's leadsus toquestion tobureaucracy torical as itrelates change andwith a variety ofimplications. offronts on a variety interpretation of rational-legal in terms of bureaucracy Weber's conceptualization of theexistence failsto takeaccount rationality and formal authority and oftheperand outside oforganizations within anduseofpower The use of powerproduces conflict features. sistence of patrimonial good is notnecessarily organizations Whatis goodfor andpathologies. and pathology-when or forsociety: conflict fortheir participants and actors thelegitimate andinterests ofparticipants serve values they in the organizational have benignconsequences. environment-can the rather thansignalling The persistence of patrimonial features, efadministrative can promote of dysfunctional atavisms, survival loyorganizational and promoting conflict by mitigating fectiveness andefficiency. discipline, alty,
IDEAL TYPES AND THE EXPLANATION OF HISTORICAL CHANGE
and adto explainauthority heuristic use of ideal types Weber's in turn contrasts The formal on formal contrasts. ministration relied from traditional historical for change themeans demonstrating became tobureauandfrom patrimonial authority, tomodern (rational-legal) and bureaucratic administration Patrimonial craticadministration. butalso historically, notonlyheuristically, to eachother wererelated Charisma and charismeans oforganization. evolved as lessandmore Unliketraditional maticadministration specialproblems. presented and patrimonial and bureaucratic adand rational legal authority, to evolutionary hisis notsubject charismatic ministration, authority or rapidchange of severe crisis in times as itsbearer It "erupts" tory. and socialorder. orientation a new normative to establish attempts theritual and administrative if it is to succeed, Succession, requires charisma. As a result, of thefounder's Weberargued, routinization In itsroutinized lackspermanence. forms authority purecharismatic that totheevolutionary tends toward the ittoobecomes history subject in bureaucratic offormal organizations. rationality triumph and evolutionary use of formal contrasts hisWeber's interlocking
WEBER ON BUREAUCRACY
197
interpreters of worldcivilizations, to find tory led him,like other in Western civilization thatseemed to explain and, uniquefeatures andeconomic dominance among implicitly, tojustify itscultural i9thworld The West's and power had a uniqueness century civilizations. that reached wellbeyond self-understanding. historical significance ofmodern of A product civilization, studying anyproblem European isbound toaskhimself universal [Weber writes] towhat comhistory, ofcircumstances should be attributed in Western bination the fact that civilization andin Western civilization only, cultural phenomena have havlieina line ofdevelopment appeared which (as welike tothink)
ing universalsignificance and value.2
If history manis understood as open-ended-and, within limits, in timeand overtime, thenotion made-and "reality" as pluralistic ofadaptation butas goalthat history is evolutionary (notin thesense and An open-ended problematic. oriented) and universal becomes historical change canaccommodate pluralistic understanding ofhistory or design becausenecessity thatis cyclical and countercyclical-not interests recognized, idealandmaterial guide it,butbecause, as Weber Thisview andcounteraffirmations. giveriseto affirmations, rejections, ofhistory ofvalues, andtherevitalization stresses continuities, affinities, aswellas conflict over idealandmaterial interests. Ourobjective, guided different ofhistorical is to useWeber's change, bythis understanding and continuities as constructs to highlight the similarities heuristic earlier and later well as thedifferences and discontinuities between meansof administration. Becausebothhave been shapedby patriwe expect howtheformal monial andbureaucratic toshow influences, contrasts Weberusedobscure characteristics and motives overlapping and exaggerate in capability differences and performance. between andbureauWeber's useoftheformal contrast patrimonial and thealternative that we administration use of thetypology cratic to analyzeand explainthe have an objective in common: develop and ineffectiveness. Weberisocausesof administrative effectiveness ofbureaucracies in order latedand organized features to explain the oftheir effectiveness as wellas goalachievecauses (efficiency superior He identified thefuture. with foreffectiveness ment)and to portray or means-ends instrumental malrationality-i.e., calculation expressed of putain organizational and roles, and itsuse in pursuit structures found that bureaucragoals.Weber tively agreed-upon organizational
2 Weber,The ProtestantEthic and the Spirit of Capitalism [hereafter citedas Protestant Ethic] trans. by TalcottParsons(New York: Scribner LibraryI958), I3; emphasis in original.
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outimknown means ofcarrying themost rational ciesare"formally "He maintained beings."' overhuman control perative [domination] organization of bureaucratic reason fortheadvance thedecisive that form other over any technical superiority beenitspurely has always with mechanism compares The fullybureaucratic of organization. withnon-mechanical exactly as doesthemachine organizations other ofproduction. modes but characteristics; andrelate organizational abstract, We tooselect, toparticipants' orindirectly) didonly implicitly we attend (as Weber structures, ofadministrative characteristics Forus,theleading motives. conis thepotential fortheir effectiveness, problem and a principal strucin administrative Authority and power. authority flict between associto theexpectations byparticipants tures is basedon adherence that incumbents' with their formal that is,ontheassumption ated roles, roles with their congruent willbe sufficiently motives andorientations thatguided theestabrationality thebenefits of theformal to obtain motives Whenincumbents' of rolesand their relationships. lishment roleexpectations formal arenotcongruent with (and andorientations in terms ofpower. Individuarere-cast are),relationships rarely they ofstrategies andalliances mayanddo usea variety groups, als,isolated and to realizevalues, interests, below) in struggles (to be explored with those oftheadministraownchoosing that conflict goalsoftheir characteristic Power area general phenomenon structure. struggles tive administration.5 Weber's and bureaucratic expectaofboth patrimonial wouldincreasingly ofbureaucracy andtriumph tion that theevolution their roles(what becoming lead to objectification, i.e.,to incumbents toa highly conhasledinstead referred toas dehumanization) Weber likepatrimonial, has Bureaucratic administration, relationship. tingent insetting andrealizing on for itseffectiveness goals remained dependent between and power. Administraof congruence authority thedegree as they aremechanical arehuman as much contrivances. structures tive areaffected in theparticipants' bythevariability Because performances is effectiveness andcapacities, organizational will, purposes, participants'
3Talcott Parsons, ed., Max Weber, The Theory of Social and Economic Organization, 337. trans. by A. M. Henderson and Talcott Parsons (Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press 194), 4 "Bureaucracy"in H. H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills, eds., From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology (New York: Oxford UniversityPress I946), 2I4. 5 Both Eisenstadt and Roth see neopatrimonial featuresin contemporary states. But as featuresof "new nations," featuresthat constituteresidues and theysee them chiefly hangovers and adaptations from a previous patrimonial condition. Roth goes further and focuses on the element of personal loyaltiesin modern industrialstates. See Eisenstadt,and Bendix and Roth (both fn. I).
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overtime.Formalrationality subject to wide variations (and technolto organizational butcan also contribute ogy) can contribute efficiency, of alienaineffectiveness to organizational by buildingup the sources the struggle and fueling of poweragainstauthortionand resistance, of patrimonial in bureauor retention elements ity.The persistence if noteliminate can mitigate the struggle, cratic administration just as in patrimonial features ofbureaucratic administration can thepresence and effectiveness. (and did) enhanceits efficiency in the construction of our analytic frameWe havebeen influenced and implications of the literature on formal work by the findings organizations, by the relatedlessonsthatthe historical experiences of societies have provided, and by our recent modernand modernizing and on patrimonial research on formalorganizations administration ofunderstandings in princely India.6 that Theyhave led us to a variety has not been as efficient differ from Weber's.Bureaucracy or as masand feared, it would be. Nor is bureaucracy terful so as he thought, modernas Weber oftenarguedit was. Many features that distinctly have persisted he identified as patrimonial and, undera wide variety to administrative ofcircumstances, contributed effectiveness. Bureaucranot as Weber thought, when theymostclosely cies are mosteffective, he identified-i.e., the ideal-typical approximate (heuristic)features to simulate and dehumanized the qualitiesof a machine; rationalized is enhancedto the degreethatthe pathologies theireffectiveness and and impersonality dysfunctions generated by formalrationality (and forpower) can be channelled whichare an aspectof the struggle and in the serviceof commonly "corrected" by neopatrimonialism held organizational goals.7
6 See Rudolphand Rudolph, Education and Politics in India: Studies in OrganizaMass.: Harvard University tions, Policy, and Society (Cambridge, Press I972), esp. V of theReport chap.ii; The Coordinationof Complexityin South Asia, VII, Appendix
of theGovernment fortheConductof Foreign on theOrganization by theCommisson D.C.: Government Policy(Murphy Commission) (Washington, Printing Office I975); India: Elite Formation and (withMohan Singh), "A Bureaucratic Lineagein Princely and Conflict in a Patrimonial System," Journalof Asian Studies, xxxiv (May I975). 7 See Anthony Oberschall, Empirical Social Research in Germany, 1848-1914 (The "A Note on theNon-ideal on Weber, entitled Hague: Moutoni965). In a section Type "It is not generally Bureaucracy" (pp. I34-36), Oberschall observes, known that in Weberhimself and littleknownwritings, some of his speeches described certain feawhichwere eithernot mentioned or in contradiction turesof bureaucracy with his The examples Oberschall includethecontribution ideal typeformulation." provides of to the administrative and personalism effectiveness relations and efficiency patrimonial in World War I. Weber himself servedas a volunteer of military hospitals and left of his experience, availablein MarianneWeber,Max Weber, an "unfinished" report Ein Lebensbild (Tiibingen:Mohr 1926), 545-60.
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POLITICS HISTORY
IDEAL TYPES IN THE SERVICE OF CONTINGENT AND DETERMINED
and the philosophy in theconstruction of theory Scholars interested We to ideal types. have given ample attention of the social sciences notbecauseit has been neglected, butbecausewe return to thesubject and difficulties that toWeber's relate somequalifications wanttosuggest work on administration. in social sciencebased on historically and explanation deAnalysis or stereotype in art and literature: rivedideal typesis like caricature features thatare considered bothemphasize prominent by accentuation and de-emphasize and or distinct, (or eliminate)by lack of attention of minorimportance to the image detailfeatures thatare considered or idea beingconveyed. or modelson theone hand and caricaideal types The line between on the otheris a fineone. It is oftendifficult turesand stereotypes to whether the creator is a scientist/scholar, discern exceptby inquiring an artist or a layman.The termscaricature and stereotype or writer, reification and itsattendant of misplaced abstraction imply (the fallacy in A. N. Whitehead's thatmissor misconcreteness, term)-processes the leading,dominant, or energizing even while conveying represent the more abstraction The morecomplexthe reality, is reprinciples. it is to capture and convey quired,and themoredifficult theprincipal And when the reality is subjectto change features. being interpreted and action choice human human a result of as opposedto physias (as existsthatbothreality cal or biologicalreality and is), the likelihood of change,withall theirambiguities, the causesand processes ironies, will be lostfromview. and contradictions, withrespect Weber'sexplicit to ideal types methodological position thehistorically derived most closely approximates (inductive-deductiveHuman eventshave relationships (Zuinductive)mode of analysis. and but not lawfulness sammenhainge) regularity (Regelmiissigkeit), An understanding or necessity inter(verstehende) (Gesetzlichkeit). reaches to relationships of humanevents and regularities but pretation it is not not to necessity; laws. In this i.e., governed by meaning, by ideal typesare imaginative context, constructs, game plans for slices thattellus how theywould be put together of reality and work,how astheywould be relatedand patterned, if the logical and empirical
infact them existed. AsWeber about sumptions putit:
of empirical of the causalimputation we need For purposes events, and logicalconstructions, whichhelp therational, empirical-technical or thought as to whata behavior thequestion us toanswer patpattern
201
tern (e.g., a philosophical system)would be like if it possessedcomand "consistency."8 and rational, logical "correctness" pletely empirical Weber explicitlyrejected self-evident factuality, i.e., unmediated observation. One cannot distinguish "essential" components from "the
infinity of determining factors . . . by the simple 'observation' of the
course of events in any case, certainlynot if one understandsby that a 'presuppositionless' mental photographof all the physical and psychic events occurring in the space-timeregion in question-even if such were possible."9A "mental photograph" in Weber's view does not reveal a meaningful relationship (sinnhafte Bezogenheit): won through inAn understanding containsin the first interpretation evidenceof differing amounts. That an interstancespecific qualitative pretation possesses thisevidenceto an especially high degreeprovesas For behaviors(Sichverhalten) yetnothingabout its empirical validity. and resultcan restupon highly similarin theirexternaldevelopment eviof motivesof which the most immediately different constellations dent (verstindlich-evidenteste) is not always that which was reallyat
work."0
enElaborating on the contingentview of realitythat interpretation the purelyprovisionalcharacterof ideal reiterated tails,Weber tirelessly types,their subjective dimension, and the limits imposed on them by the intellectualpurpose to which a scholar addresses himself.For example: as We must,in otherwords,work out in the courseof the discussion, the best conceptual of what we formulation its most important result, that is the best fromthe here understand by the spiritof capitalism, us here.This pointof view ... is, further, pointof view whichinterests by no meansthe onlypossibleone fromwhichthe historical phenomecan be analyzed.Otherstandpoints non we are hereinvestigating would, for this as for everyotherhistorical phenomenon, yield othercharacas the essentialones.1" teristics Yet Weber found it hard to preservethe provisional tone of voice. The more definitiveworldview of his German historicistpaternity speaks through him despite himself. He pressed for higher levels of for more constraint, validityand power for his constructs, more lawin Sociologyand Economics," 8"The Meaningof 'EthicalNeutrality' in Edward Shils and HenryA. Finch,trans.and eds., Max Weber on the Methodology of the in original. Social Sciences (Glencoe,Ill.: Free PressI949), 42; emphasis 9 "Critical Studies in the Logic of the CulturalSciences," ibid., I7I. 10"Ober einige Kategorien der verstehenden Soziologie,"in Max Weber,Gesammelte Aujfsitze zur Wissenschaftslehre (Tiibingen:Mohr I922), 403; our translation. added. 11ProtestantEthic (fn. 2), 49; emphasis
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moments moreclosure, thanhis morecautious fulness, methodological cautionto the contrary he allowed.12 not withstanding, Provisional and used the languageof functional relatedness, systemic wholeness, in writing historical logicalnecessity aboutconcrete phenomena. Thus, the system logic of capitalism expels "irrational" or "incompatible" behavior: The modern capitalist enterprise cannotaccept what called is popularly "kadi-justice": adjudication according to the judge's senseof equity in a given caseoraccording toother irrational means oflaw-finding.... The modern enterprise also finds incompatible thetheocratic or patriofAsia and of ourown past. *13 monial governments If we takewordsseriously, one of theostensible meanings of "ideal of a type"warnsus methodological problem:an ideal typeis, to borrowClifford Geertz'slanguagefromanother context, botha model of and a modelforreality. Ideal types are constituted of "pure"attributes, or reachtheir formwhen theyare so constituted. "purest" "Pure" can conveya normatively neutralmeaningpertaining to unmixedstates a desirable (e.g., purepoison); but it can also suggest stateof affairs, how things oughtto be, and impliesthatits opposite, impure, is unhow desirable, things oughtnot to be. If Weber insisted thatmodels were not what he intended, forreality thatno normative judgments were meantor implied,he oftenfailedto observehis own caveats."4
12 The relationshipof Weber's work to these methodological problems varies greatly. Between two essays,and sometimeswithin the boundaries of a single essay, he would present generalizations at quite different degrees of abstraction.Thus the discussion of bureaucracyin the essay on typesof legitimate domination is relativelymore schematic, dogmatic, and insensitiveto contrarythemes than the same discussion in the essay on bureaucracy.These differences can in part be attributedto the differingintents of the two essays, and to sheer logistical considerations-number of pages. Yet the shorterversions,which obliged him to condense, are a betterguide to what, ultimately, he considered critical. By contrast, the numerous caveats, exceptions, and contrarytendencies which he rehearsed in the essay on bureaucracy offerthe beginnings of a more complex scheme for handling administrationthan the patrimonialbureaucratic diad. It is difficult to evaluate these divergences. Is it to Weber's credit that he recognized so many exceptions? Or is it rather to be deplored that they did not influencehis constructsmore? 13 Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich, eds., Max Weber. Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology, 3 vols. (New York: BedminsterPress i968), III, I395. 14 Weber frequently cautioned against the propensity to slide from neutral into normative stances. In his critical review of "energetical" theories of culture, he deplored the prevailing tendencyto convertthe pictureof the world (Weltbild) provided by particular disciplines into a Weltanschauung. See "Energetische Kulturtheorien," in Weber, Gesammelte Aujfsitze (fn. IO), 377. Yet it is difficult to read the following passage (fn. 3, p. 337), without a sense that more than a model of reality is meant if not intended: Experience tends universally to show that the purely bureaucratic type of administrative organization-that is, the monocratic varietyof bureaucracy-is, from
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Weber'sevolutionary understanding ofhistorical change-whatRobertNisbetterms a metaphor ofgrowth-15colored his ideal-typical constructs with a "models for" hue. His sociologyof religion, like his of authority, sociology movesfrompre-modern to modern.Rationallegal authority and bureaucracy replacetraditional authority and patrimonialadministration. The ethicalstriving and discipline required by a transcendent and uncontrollable God replacethe ritualism and maarenearto nipulative exchange required bygodswhosemagicalpowers hand.Like themovement ofreligious oflife ideology, thedrift offorms generally is in thedirection of theimpersonal, unreachable and uncontrollable. formulation ofhistory led Weber, at someonThis pessimistic tologicallevel,to despairof modernsocial forms. At an intermediate level of judgment, betweenultimate value and concrete however, history(the level that was Weber's most characteristic intellectual ground),he held thattheseforms, bothin religionand in organizarationallife,werea triumph ones.Demystification, overall previous and impersonalization ofculture and socialforms tionalization, greatly and marked thecourse enhanced thecapabilities ofWestern civilization of universal history. also led him to treat his ideal-typiWeber'sevolutionary perspective cal constructs forheuristic (which he intended purposes)as historical and actualization. Charismatic auphenomenacapable of extinction to be sure, has no particular historical thority, location;it appearsfrom reasonsforhistorical timeto timeand is amongtheprincipal change. and rational-legal the two typesthat have But traditional authority, of administration associated withthem,have a clear unilinear forms and patrimonial administration traditional are relationship; authority and over-run and bureaucracy. superseded by rational-legal authority
a purelytechnical pointof view,capableof attaining the highest degreeof efficiencyand is in thissenseformally the mostrational knownmeans of carrying out imperative controlover humanbeings.It is superior to any otherformin precision, in stability, in the stringency of its discipline, and its reliability. It thus of results for the heads makespossiblea particularly high degreeof calculability of theorganization and forthoseacting in relation to it. It is finally superior both in intensive efficiency and in the scope of its own operations, and is formally capableof application to all kindsof administrative tasks. As Carl J.Friedrich notes(fn. I, p. 31), "The verywordsvibrate withsomething of a Prussian enthusiasm forthemilitary typeof organization and the way seemsbarred to anykindof consultative, let alone cooperative, pattern. That the latter kind of patof adthatit may represent a 'morefully form ternmaybe a higher type, developed' of humanitarian not onlyin terms ministrative organization, values,but also in terms is all but excludedas a possibility." of 'results' 15 Nisbet, Social Change and History: Aspects of the Western Theory of Development(New York: Oxfordi969).
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As thelogicalprinciples thatcharacterize bureaucracy become more manifest andeffective over time, as the idealtype becomes more "pure," it can be expected Acas it becomes morelikeitself, to workbetter. -cording toWeber:
Whenfully developed, bureaucracy alsostands in a specific sense under theprinciple of sine ira ac studio. Its specific nature, whichis welcomed bycapitalism, develops themore perfectly themore bureaucracy is "dehumanized," themore completely it succeeds in eliminating from official business love,hatred, and all purely personal, irrational, and nature emotional elements which escape calculation. This is thespecific of bureaucracy and itsspecific virtue.16
The empirical that difficulties consistency and "purity" raisecan be ofperillustrated byWeber's treatment ofpersonal authority (a form sonalism or particularism) ofimand theauthority of office (a form or universalism). in personality For Weber, personal authority stands the the ofbureaucracy, wayofformal rationality, machine-like efficiency for while theauthority condition itsrealization. ofoffice is a necessary auMoregenerally, theauthority of office "goeswith"rational-legal Personal authorsense arethese valid? thority. Butinwhat propositions in somecontexts, hindered thehisitymayhave, to a certain degree in the torical formation ofthemodern state and industrial capitalism whenadministration period and production was shifting from home and family to bureauand factory and whentheworker was being . . . from thematerial meansof production, "separated destruction, academic and finance. ..."17 But personal administration, research, inimical to organizational is notnecessarily to authority effectiveness, andrealization oforganizational thesetting goals.18 Impersonality has andso doespersonalism. The perceived as wellas benefits, high costs,19
"Bureaucracy," in Gerthand Mills (fn. 4), 2I5. Rothand Wittich (fn. I3), III, I394. to 14th-century Thus Tout, referring British administration, is sure thatlevelsof performance and effectiveness werehigh.For example, record keeping leaves"nothing Our examination, and precision." not yet complete, to be desiredin,completeness of booksof Bedla thikana(estate) in Udaipur,a former the account princely state, proSee T. F. Tout, "The Emergence duces a similarimpression. of Bureaucracy," in Merton(fn. I), 79. the costsof imperson19Weberin his informal, nonsystematic writing recognized discussion of Weber'sunfinished on his experiality. According to Oberschall's report in military encesas a volunteer hospitals duringthefirst yearof WorldWar 1, Weber to thelack of a volunteer soldiers thelevelof convalescing attributed put underarrest and non-medical thatcateredto recreational needs not attendedto by organization volunteer nursesfromgood social he foundthatwell-educated the professional staff; in handlingpatients than the averageprofessional were more effective backgrounds nurse"becauseof a variedand individualapproach[thatattended to] theirhuman needs."Oberschall and intellectual (fn. 7), I36.
16 17 18
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ofthetrade-offs quality involved can vary withhistorical and organiA conceptual zational contexts. strategy that takes these considerations into account bypositing a personalism-impersonality continuum ormix rather than an evolutionary dichotomy mayreveal that personalismthan at best, as a survival rather and in anycaseas an obappearing, stacle totherealization offormal to (as wellas rationality-contributes effectiveness. impairs) organizational Weber recognized at theempirical butnotat theheuristic and exthatarisefrom planatory levelhow psychic compensations neopatriand relationships contribute to thediscipline monial motives required The subordination ofthewilland theself for"strict mechanization." and bureaucratic to formal rationality authority are possible notbehavebecome their roles(objectified, causeparticipants dehumanized), thehonor of a status butbecause officials are accorded and prestige group.
of strict mentsof thestatus mechanizagroup. . . workin thedirection
which at thesametimehas consideration Strict and control, discipline fortheofficial's of honor, and thedevelopment of prestige sentisense . A strong tion. status sentiment officials notonlyagrees with among theofficial's to subordinate himself readiness to thechief without any
will of his own but [also] . . . statussentiments are the consequence
forinternally of suchsubordination, they balance theofficial's self-feeling.20 [Presumably suchan explanation makesmoresenseforBritish, forexample, and Indianofficials, thanforAmerican German, French, ones.]
did notalways listen ButWeber's self heuristic, ideal-typical to,or at leastdid notregister, Weber's self. Whatis thetheoretical empirical ofthese ofstatus, motives standing vitally important patrimonial honor, andprestige toWeber? The andthebehavior they produce, according ofconsistency attractions and logical led to evolutionary and elegance essentialist and modesof explanation whoseimplication is language that and patrimonial traditional motives are authority (personalism) survivals thatwill wither becomes deaway as bureaucracy "fully its"specific nature" and its"specific virtue." veloped" byrealizing
AUTHORITY AND POWER IN CONFLICT AND CONGRUENCE
ofhowWeber's We nowturn to a consideration ofbureauanalysis inthelight ofa conceptual canbe revised that cracy strategy highlights than contrasts between similarities rather and patrimonial bureaucracy In particular, we examine administration. theexistence and potential
20
in Gerthand Mills (fn. 4), "Bureaucracy,"
208.
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incongruence between authority andpower in all administrative structures. It was Weber's failure to takeaccount ofthepotential forconflict between authority andpower that ledhimtooverestimate seriously thetechnical of bureaucratic superiority administration. It also contributed to hisneglect ofpatrimonial in bureaufeatures and motives andtohisfailure to resolve cracies torecognize howthey-by helping between conflicts and power-cancontribute to administraauthority tive in both effectiveness bureaucratic and patrimonial administration. The playofcontradictory which exWeber's tendencies, evolutionary willbe resolved, in fact contradicplanation suggests persists. Instead, tendencies of tory (forexample, personal and theauthority authority office) helptoexplain howadministrative in a variety structures work ofhistorical contexts. Weber in terms rather conceptualized ofauthority than bureaucracy in organizations whenparticipants power. Authority exists do whatis required ofthem byvirtue oftheir For instance, organizational roles. incumbent A's roleauthorizes himto askofincumbent B that he do andincumbent therequirements ofhisforsomething, B, recognizing Moregenerally, in organizamally assigned role, complies. authority when exists the incumbents' tions orientation andbehavior motivational is congruent withtherequirements formal roles. of their Unlikeauwhose amount is constant and allocated to calculathority, according basedon formal tions is variable rationality, powerin organizations and mercurial. Its amount overtimewiththe and distribution vary andinterests ofparticipants; with thedistribution ofpowerpurposes relevant andcoercive); with resources (e.g., material, the symbolic, parof uncertainty and discretion; control and withtheparticiticipants' ortowithdraw toapply andaffect. Unlike pants' willingness efficiency areoften authority relationships, power unstable andconrelationships A getsB to do whathe wants himto do bymobilizing flictual. B in ofshared theservice andgoals;through values, interests, theuseofthe ofpersonality andtheexercise ofleadership; "power" andbythemaofincentives andsanctions nipulation (including social, psychological, A andphysical has over B when B does what A wants coercion). power do. (A and B should himto do and whatB wouldnototherwise be
as well as individual actors.)21 takenhereas collective
21 Alvin W. Gouldner and Michel Crozier in particular have recognized the problematic nature of power in organizations. See Gouldner, Patterns of Industrial BureauCrozier's formulationof power is cast in terms cracy (Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press I954). of how organizational actors attemptto control and manipulate uncertainty and rules. Our formulation focuses on the participants' use of power (a multidimensional reand circumstantiallyavailable to organizationl actors) in the source differentially
207
was hierarchically distributed and flowed For Weber, authority downHe assumedthat structure. ward fromthe top of the organizational their formal would internalize rolerequirements and bear incumbents and nonconflictual relation to organizational a compliant, consensual, goals: in which bureaucrat cannot outoftheapparatus The individual squirm oravocational In contrast to thehonorific the he is harnessed. "notable," bureaucrat is chained to his activity material professional byhis entire In thegreat ofcases, he is only andidealexistence. a single majority cog in an ever-moving mechanism whichprescribes to himan essentially ofmarch. The official with fixed route is entrusted specialized tasks and be putintomotion or arrested cannot normally themechanism byhim, butonlyfrom thevery top.The individual bureaucrat is thusforged whoareintegrated ofall functionaries intothemechtothecommunity in seeingthatthe mechanism interest anism.They have a common thesocietally andthat exercised carries continues itsfunctions authority of officialdom to theattitude-set on. . . . The discipline refers of the for obedience within in public official precise hishabitual activity, as well as private This discipline organizations. increasingly becomes thebasis of all order....22 whether even the Prussianbureaucrats who werethe One wonders achievedsuchqualities. Weber'scontempt for sourceof thiscaricature thatsome mayhave. In fact, themsuggests powerin organizations is moreoften thannot distributed to authority, and flows from inversely thebottom up. As Crozierseesit,thoseat thetop have a greatdeal of but verylittle assumedfrequent authority, power.Weber erroneously he was wrongto believethatpreciseobeand easyroleidentification; diencewould becomehabitualand the basis of all order.Men may
and fluctuating context of theirlimited commitments to organizational authority. See Crozier,The Bureaucratic Phenomenon (Chicago: University of ChicagoPress I964), esp. p. I58. Although we have benefited fromDahrendorf's revitalization of conflict can be understood theory, we cannotagree thatparticipants exclusively in termsof can be understood rolesor thatconflict their in terms organizational of the zero-sum across roles. Ralf Dahrendorf, distribution of authority Class and Class Conflict in Stanford Press i958). Industrial Society (Stanford: University 22 "Bureaucracy," in Gerthand Mills (fn. 4), 228-29; emphasis in original. Although in Weber'sbureaucratic thereare strongconsensual in lightof implications theory, much of his otherwork he more properly belongswith "conflict theory." His socifor example,groundsideologyin the world view of competing ology of religion, statusorders. createda scenein The Caucasian Chalk Circle whichillustrates Brecht Bertolt the A corporal role internalization. to recapture highest hopesforbureaucratic attempting footsoldier committed affect of an unmilitary-looking to warthewithdrawn reluctantly zeal: "Whenyouheara command, exhorts him to exhibit like behavior, organizational whenyou thrust you shouldget a hard-on; yoursword,you shouldcome." (Revised version English byEric Bentley.)
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do noteasily or frequently masks butthey don their organizational withformal Weberwouldhavebeen less impressed become them. aboutthe humancondition had he and moreoptimistic rationality andrebelled fact. He feared meninto recognized this against making them to their in formal roles machines-i.e., subsuming organizations -not becausehe thought but becausehe doingso was inefficient, "Forthelaststage of thiscultural it was inhuman: thought developwellbe truly said:"Specialists itmight without sensualists ment, spirit; without this that it hasattained a levelofciviheart; nullity imagines
lization never beforeachieved."23
ofthemodern wasbased Weber's sense ontheassumption that tragic those wouldnotfear, or evadebureaucratic involved resist, authority, butthat wouldwillingly thetasks, they and commands accept rules, their roles ofthem. He did notenvison required that they wouldfind andusepower Nordidhe anticipate against authority. that theuseof power in organizations by"lower participants" wouldrequire higher to find and use power participants as well as authority fororganizational effectiveness and survival. His conceptualization ofbureaucracy failed totakeaccount ofthestruggle forpower that is endemic in administrative relationships. Weber did,ofcourse, that recognize hadpower, bureaucracy butnot in ways we meanhere. In hisview, "thepower position ofa fully developed is always bureaucracy overtowering. The 'political master' finds in theposition himself ofthe'dilettante' whostands the'exopposite It doesnotmatter pert."' whether thepolitical master is a "people" or a parliament, a collegiate a popularly elected body, president, or an or constitutional absolute monarch.24 Butbureaucracy's poweris instrumental and"societal,"25 notpartisan andpolitical, andit is directed totheoutside. Bureaucrats arepowerful because oftheir expertise and and because special control knowledge they and manipulate informaofthe"official tion, particularly bymeans secret"-"the specific inventionofbureaucracy." ButWeberdid notcount bureaucracies among theactors engaged in thestruggle for He didnotperceive power. them as pursuing their in alliance interests and values or conflict withother political actors. Whenthey do so byvirtue act, they ofexpertise, notinterest. Nordid
"Bureaucracy," in Gerth and Mills (fn. 4), 232-33. 25 According to Weber, bureaucracybecomes "an instrument for 'societalizing' relations of power" when it becomes "the means of carrying 'community action' over into rationallyordered 'societal action.'" Ibid., 228.
23Protestant Ethic (fn. 2),

24
I82.
209
in hissystematic ofthereciprocal hetake account, writing, relationship environmental forces andactors on theonehandandbureaubetween on theother, on organizacracies and theimpact of thisrelationship as we tional goals, resources, andinternal power relationships. Finally, formal inside havealready indicated, Weber ignored theroleofpower forbureaucratic organizations eventhough it is a necessary condition forforeffectiveness. Thesemisperceptions areofa piece:ifthedrive of mal rationality and instrumental efficiency and therequirements of motives expert and special knowledge are considered theguiding for officials, they will notbe perceived as engaging in thestruggle power without orwithin. for Contrary to Weber's view, bureaucrats do engagein struggles power within organizations andin thepolitical arena. Expertise is not their Men in organizations rebel and sometimes onlymotive. resist, the machine-like of formal and the against, expectations rationality differential of benefits distributions and authority. In resisting, they and engage in behavior that theperspective pursue strategies is,from of organizational goalsand procedures, irrational and dysfunctional, butfrom their ofviewquite thereverse. The result is a paradox: point therationality ofirrationality and thefunction ofdysfunction. overinterests Powerstruggles arisewithin organizations (e.g.,pay, ofwork, conditions over values(e.g.,theinfluence bargaining rights); of ideology, associational or counter-culture, "wrong"socialization, ofself andfrom resistance toappropriation community membership); (alienation) and thediminution of autonomy that recognition ofbutinuous. in conflicts Theyareexpressed over leadership, goals, policies, rules,procedures, tasks,and so forth;27theyoccurfromthe top to thebottom of organizations; and they often involve outside forces and actors. Powerstruggles are sufficiently common and sufficiently important in thelifeand workof organizations thatthey cannot be ignored or left at theperiphery, or relegated to a residual category. Theymust stand at thecenter ofanytheory oforganization. We consider theimportance ofthestruggle forpower a more fundamental toWeber's ofbureaucratic codicil axiom efficiency than other qualifying statements aboutthelimits of formal rationality, suchas
26 Robert Blauner's dimensions of alienation supply another account of these areas of conflict;see Blauner, Alienation and Freedom (Chicago: Universityof Chicago Press 27 We do not mean to suggest that the issues beneath such conflicts are lacking in independent validity.
reaucratic authority entails.26 Powerstruggles in organizations are con-
i964) .
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Marchand Simon'sterm orWarrenIlchman's evenmore "satisfycing," call to relyon "optimalignorance."28 These terms invoke qualifying the much more modestclaims thatscholarsof formalorganizations nature makewhenthey recognize theimperfect, and high-cost limited, of information; to the variability and uncertainty of commitments "strict obedience"and organizational goals; the impactof conflicting interests and values withinorganizations and in theirenvironments of unknown on organizational performance and goals; and the effect and unintended consequences. The moremodest view of formal and organizational effirationality ciency thatmuchof therecent literature on formal organizations suggests arises to a considerable extent that from a methodological strategy simulates thelogicaloperations ofeconomics, imposing reality-approximatingmodifications on rational-actor models.Assumptions concerning perfect rationality and information are constrained to bringthem in line withknownlimitations A focuson powerstrugof real actors. gles,by contrast, a morefundamental represents modification because it starts witha political rather thanan economic model.It takespower rather thanformalrationality and economizing behavioras its point of departure and presses thaninstrumental substantive rather goals to the foreground. Dahrendorf (because he emphasizesconflict, not because he features authority and formalroles), Etzioni,Allison,and, Crozierlead us closerto modelsof formal notably, organization (and thatfeature forpower.In conceptualisociety) powerand thestruggle zationsof organizations thatfeature can pursueorpower,authorities withthe requirements of forganizational goals and gain compliance mal rolesonlyif thevalues,interests, and purposes of the participants thoseof the organization approximate (a condition thatWeber took forgranted butwhichwe findunlikely and infrequent), or ifthey can marry organizational withsufficient authority powerto insureefficient Becausethe latter compliance by participants.29 condition is extraordidifficult torealizeat highlevelsor forvery narily long,we find Weber's of bureaucracy claimsforthe technical Adsuperiority unconvincing. in patrimonial ministrative effectiveness and bureaucratic administra28 James G. March and Herbert A. Simon, Organizations (New York: Wiley I958); Warren Ilchman and Trilok Dhar, "Optimal Ignorance and Excessive Education: Educational Inflationin India," Asian Survey, xi (January I971), 523-43. 29 Graham T. Allison, Essence of Decision (Boston: Little, Brown I970I); Ralf Dahrendorf (fn. 2I); Amitai Etzioni, A Comparative Analysis of Complex Organizations Crozier (fn. 2I). (New York: Free Press I975);
211
tion(holding technology constant) depends, rather, on thedegree to or congruence.30 arein conflict and power which authority
BUREAUCRACY AND THE STRUGGLE FOR POWER: THE ENVIRONMENT
to appreciate thedegree Weberfailed to whichbureaucracies and in struggle forpower, their notonly-aswe have participants engage already indicated-within organizations, butalsoas actors in political As he saw it,bureaucracies did notpursue their arenas outside. own for in thestruggle As impersonal substantive purposes power. anddisof societal their will and actions embodied vehicles power, wereoriof efficiency and domination in theservice ented to motives of other Their andinterests. outside in theform actors' values goalscamefrom orproducts oflawsandpolicies tobe implemented, and services tobe is a precision as such instrument which canput supplied: "bureaucracy ofquitevaried-purely as wellas purely itself at thedisposal political or anyother sort-of interests in domination."3' economic, dimension to thestudy offormal an environmental Adding organidifferent Formal a wholly creates zations understanding. organizations affected forces that areprofoundly to influence by environmental try andresource orcontrol their andbyparticigoals, policies, allocations, forces to benefit theorganization efforts to use environmental pants' arenot, it.Environments ofcourse, within hoor their ownpositions of a variety or monolithic. of actors: mogeneous Theyare composed reference ofdiffering and unfriendly friendly publics; groups weight and customers; clients authorities and private and significance; public a constellation constitute ofdistant andimmeinterests. Together, they withtimeand circumwhosepowerand strategies diateactors vary stance. inthedegree towhich arecongruent Formal organizations vary they The morecongruent forces. withenvironmental or incongruent the and their environments of the less purposes organizations are, likely At thesametime, them. between lowers the is conflict congruence fororganizational bechances autonomy. Conversely, incongruence and interests and environmental tween organizational goals,values, oforganizational both and conflict raises thelikelihood independence Sinceorganizational forces. is rare with environmental self-sufficiency
30 Because conflict often arises out of strugglesagainst alienation or exploitationand may be judged as desirable when weighed against the for autonomyor equity, conflict and social order that congruence makes possible. benefitsof efficiency 31 "Bureaucracy,"in Gerth and Mills (fn. 4), 23I.
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influence between orand mutual of dependence and somemeasure it as a seriis common, we regard environments ganizations andtheir the thathe neglected of bureaucracy analysis ous lacunain Weber's dimension.32 environmental basedon knowledge created ofhindsight thewisdom It is notonly thelegislative and administrative procofinterest groups, byscholars and firms, andindustrial socieconomic institutions ess,public policy, oftheenvironmental dimension. Weber's neglect ology that highlights theMarxist WarI, onedidnothavetoagree with Evenbefore World class be an executive committee oftheruling viewthat thestate might had more thana "legal"relationthat authorities to recognize public more or firms thana market relationship environments, shipto their Weber did the influence of environmental Indeed, recognize totheirs.33 motives and behavior whenhe turned on bureaucratic from forces level, themotives analysis. If,at themacrosocial heuristic to empirical are universal and ahistorical; of bureaucracy if,thatis, bureaucracy a "principled of'privilege,'" ofdoing busia "horror rejection displays
and equalizpursueslevelling ness'from case to case,'" and generally
andreinforcing themotives andeffects paralleling ingobjectives (thus at theempirical environmental circumof democracy),34 level, then, tendencies become universal decisive. andnotthese Bureaucracy stances leveleverything-only that which theneedsofthe it seems, doesnot, it strives toWeber, tolevelthose moment "merely According require. areas in theindividual in itswayandin those that, powers that stand And underabsolutist state structures, unicase,it seeksto occupy." ones:"Bureaucratization aremodified versal motives byenvironmental connected withthe formation of administration is deliberately of of Stand, or status or is entangled with order], estates [in thesense
of social power."Moreover, "the themby forceof existing groupings of offices forcertain status frequent, groupsis very reservation express evenmorefrequent."35 These observations bring and actualreservations
32 Carl J. Friedrich develops at some length the propositionthat administrative staffs cannot be understood apart from the environmentsto which they are responsible ("responsible bureaucracy"); see ConstitutionalGovernmentand Democracy (Boston: Little, Brown; various editions), chap. xix. For a graphic account of relationsbetween a bureaucratic agency and its clientele and other environments, see Arthur A. Maass, Muddy Waters: The Army Engineers and the Nation's Rivers (Cambridge: Harvard
Press I951). University
33 John Kenneth Galbraith has done much to restore some balance in the understanding of economic behavior by suggestinghow much of it relies on political rather than "economic" motivation; see Economics and the Public Purpose (Boston: Hough-
ton Mifflin I973).

35Ibid., 23I.
34 "Bureaucracy,"in Gerth and Mills (fn. 4),
224.
213
committee as theexecutive himvery closeto a Marxianviewofthestate that is,theextent to whichenvironoftherulingclass-to recognizing, or appropriate bureaucratic can co-opt organizations. mentalforces from of"advisory bodiesselected theexistence Weberalso recognized whicharefrequently foundin the and interested circles, amongprivate of officials or of former modern state and whosenucleusis notformed of departmental minsystem rationalized officials."36 "The thoroughly as in France,"is "supplemented by the callingin isters and prefects, bodies recruited fromamong the ecoof interest groupsas advisory mostinfluential strata."37 and socially Having come thisfar nomically forces presumably engagein strughow environmental in recognizing bureaucracies, Webertookit all back. The glesforpowerto influence frequent" groups,he found,is "increasingly "calling in" of interest thepowerof bureaucracy" as the relationship increases but "it further of interest groupsinto the to put "the concrete experience is ordered of expertly administration trained officials."38 The of a rational service to his German as is context, Weber remark that, appropriate suggests of statecorporainterest groupsmore in the framework interpreted pluralism, tismthanof liberal(or societal)corporatism, interest-group or classconflict.39 Economiccorporations, of themodern . structures economy, . . . thebureaucratic private in notables themselves [on boardsof control] by drawing complete for thesakeoftheir circles disinterested from knowledge expert among Northemforrepresentation and advertising. or in orderto exploit ofspecial but holders do notunite knowledge expert mally, suchbodies of paramount economic interest the decisiverepresentatives rather of theenterprise-and thebankcreditors suchmen groups, especially holdmerely Theyhaveat leasta conadvisory positions. byno means an actually often dominant and very position." occupy trolling voice,
36 Ibid., 237.
of interestgroups in the context of state and liberal poratism. For an interpretation see three articles in Comparative Political Studies, x (April (or societal) corporatism, I977): Philippe Schmitter,"Modes of Interest Intermediationand Models of Societal Change in Western Europe," pp. 7-37; Leo Panitch, "The Development of Corporatism in Liberal Democracies," pp. 6i-90; and Gerhard Lehmbruch, "Liberal Coralso see Schmitter's earlier "Still the poratism and Party Government," pp. 9I-I22; xxxvi (January I974), 85-I3I. Century of Corporatism,"Reviewof Politics, pluralism is criticallyevaluated in J. David GreenThe literatureon interest-group stone, "Group Theories," in Fred Greenstein and Nelson Polsby, eds., The Handbook II (Reading, Mass.: Addison-WesleyI975), 243-3I8. Science, of Political 40 "Bureaucracy," in Gerth and Mills (fn. 4), 237-38. German banks and bankers continue to play a critical role in investment decisions of firms and industries as members of boards of directorsand apex bodies' governing committees.See Andrew
38 Ibid., 239. 37 Ibid., 238-3939 Ibid., 237-38. Here and elsewhere, Weber anticipated recent work on state cor-
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Again, having come this far,he did not-as did Thorstein Veblen, for example-recognizethat such arrangements createdarenas for and thoseinterstruggles between thoseinterested in speculative profit rationalproduction. estedin formally and inferences fromWeber's We are left,then,with deductions heuristic definition of bureaucracy thatdo notrecognize how struggles forpowergenerated by environmental forces influence organizational motives and actions, and withintimations at the empirical level that environmental forcesmay act contrary to formalrationality and the of organizational At setting goals by politicaland economicmasters. thisjuncture, Weberleftthesubject up in theair withtheremark that of organized of theposition interest "discussion groupswithinthe administration, whichmaybe in theoffing, does notbelongin thiscontext."4"
BUREAUCRACY AND THE STRUGGLE FOR POWER: APPROPRIATION
of bureaucracy is the all-important ecoCentralto Weber'sanalysis of theworker fromthematerial nomicfactof "the'separation' means of production, academicresearch, destruction, administration, and fi"is thecommonbasisof themodern state nance... ." Such separation In bothcasesthedisposition . .. and of theprivate capitalist economy. overthosemeansis in thehandsof thatpowerwhomthebureaucratic ortowhomitis availablein caseofneed."42 apparatus.. . directly obeys The The difficulty withthisview is thatit is only half of the truth. to re-appropriate boththe otherhalflies withthecontinuous struggle material meansand thepowerof thebureaucratic apparatus. of theresources and authority of bureaucracies has a Appropriation The manifest dimension dimension. and a latent manifest encompasses of publicauthority when buthe appropriation by bureaucracies-i.e., becomepoliticalmasters themselves reaucracies by seizing power or Latentappropriation it in theirown interest. exercising encompasses of resistance to organizational thosemanifold strategies authority that or control of result in theparticipants' reusing taking organizational sources, rules,or goals fortheirown substantive purposes. can occurunderconditions of bothmodern Manifest appropriation it is not an exclusive of patriand traditional authority; characteristic in whichWeberidentified monialadministration, appropriation (nonModern Capitalism:The ChangingBalance of Public and PrivatePower Shonfield, Pressi969), chap. XI, 239-64. (New York: OxfordUniversity 41 "Bureaucracy," and Mills (fn.4), 239. in Gerth 42 Rothand Wittich in original. (fn. I3), III, I394; emphasis
215
feature ofvarious feudal separation) as a distinguishing andprebendal forms. Marx, in TheEighteenth Brumaire formuofLouisNapoleon, ofmanifest in themodern whenhe latedtheissue state appropriation observed that, fora timeat least, "theexecutive powersubordinated an equitoitself." The classstruggle hadproduced a stalemate, society ofsorts left no classdominant, enabled librium that which thebureauundertheleadership of NapoleonII to rulein its own cratic state of a ruling class (the "other" it was neither an instrument interest; instrument of theRechtsstaat Marx),northeneutral (Weber),the of 'legal "abstract bearer and the creator of sovereign prerogatives in whichthe "43 Other of manifest norms.' examples appropriation functional and legaldifferentiation ofthepolitical and administrative in coupsbymilitary realms is obscured can be found and/or bureausuchas those in 1952 in Egypt, cratic structures and interests, in 1958 in Pakistan, of Himmler's or in therecord SS in theThirdReichas itexpanded from internal tomilitary, itsscope security administrative, The Eisenand political functions. inability of Presidents Truman, hower, Kennedy, and Nixonto replace Johnson, J.EdgarHooveras ofInvestigation administrative Director oftheFederal Bureau despite regulations and statutes inter his retirement, and that, alia, required and personal reasons fordoingso-prodespite compelling political a dramatic instance ofhowan individual's andbureauvides political cratic in the personal of publicaupowercan result appropriation thority. under administraof manifest Examples appropriation patrimonial in Japan; the tions comeeasily to hand:theshogun of theEmperor RanasoftheKingin Nepal;theNizamin Hyderabad, andmany like him, under theMughalemperors in India.As theMughalinstances suggest, underpatrimonial manifest ruleoccurs appropriation more result at theperiphery-a related to extant commonly technology. But as wellas other forms feudal patrimonialism, ofprebendal administrawhere andresources-particularly thecontrol tion, authority ofphysicalforce-are andloyalty andobedience highly arebased decentralized, ona formally voluntary contractualism, may produce seizures ofpublic atthecenter as well;thereigns authority oftheDukesofBurgundy in and Henry France Tudorin 15th-century England areexamples that come tomind. latent Theextent towhich involves for appropriation struggles power itis notexplicitly because is lessapparent political. Nevertheless, strug43"Bureaucracy," in Gerthand Mills (fn. 4), 239.
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glestoinsure job security, retirement andwelfare schemes, promotion byseniority, themanipulation ofaffect and efficiency andother forms of "retreatism," and work-to-rule and other forms of "ritualism," the selective gathering, suppression, andrelease ofinformation via secrecy and leaks,constitute various forms of struggle within organizations whichare designed to appropriate and reorganizational authority sources.44 Security oftenure and promotion by seniority areregarded as necessary ifcareer services areto perform independently and to attract talent. Both areusually conceptualized as an aspect ofprofessionalism. At thesametime, they arethemodern administration's equivalent ofhereditary office andcarry thesame implication ofappropriation that hereditary office does.Our research on princely state administrationin Indiaindicates thathereditary claimsto office provided less security in thefaceof thecontradictory normof service at themaharaja's pleasure thando thestatutory provisions and thesupporting political power ofcareer-service interests under conditions ofrationallegalauthority andbureaucratic administration.45 routines fertile for Operational provide ground participants, particularly those atthemiddle andlower levels, toappropriate organizational goals, authority, andresources. Mastery andapplication ofoperational routines notonly contradict "rational actor" assumptions about organizational performance, butalso putpower in thehandsof those with little or no authority. a significant routines constitute Operational barrier to theformulation or implementation ofnewgoalsor policies or Likethespurious torule; techniques. involved in working compliance and releasing selecting, withholding, and using"discreinformation; in situations ofuncertainty, tion" theapplication ofroutines constitutes a realm that ofpower enables functionaries and sometimes higher-ups toappropriate andmeans organizational purposes latently byexercising in authority. those power against Ehrlichman's (John accusation comes to mindthatF.B.I. Director the file"in J.EdgarHoover"papered with White Houserequests theEllsberg toinvestigate case complying was an old theDirector friend of Ellsberg's because father-in-law.)
are dealt with,interalia, in MortonH. Halperin, 44Aspects of thesephenomena Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution i974); David Wise, The Politics of Lying: GovernmentDeception, Secrecy,and Power (New York: Random House I973); Harold Seidman, Politics, Position, and Power: The Dynamics of Federal Organization (2d ed., New York: Oxford UniversityPress I976); and Hugh Heclo, A Governmentof Strangers:Executive Politics in Washington (Washington, D.C.: Brookings InstitutionI977). 45See Rudolphand Rudolph,"A Bureaucratic India" (fn. 6). Lineage in Princely
WEBERON BUREAUCRACY
217
IN BUREAUCRATIC A DIFFERENTIATED PATRIMONIALISM ADMINISTRATION: HISTORIES VIEW OF NATIONAL
thatin allocating adWe havesuggested attributes to patrimonial assigned "living," "huministration andbureaucracy, Weber generally man"motives ones(suchas preto patrimonialism, and machine-like that We havealso suggested cise, habitual obedience) to bureaucracy. assertion of it is the resistance participants-their of organizational values andinterests; their efforts nottobe subsumed byorganizational increates a power-authority roles; their struggles forautonomy-that that andgenerates conflict. We nowwanttosuggest patricongruence arecommon monial features totraditional andmodern administration, thatarise and thatthey conflicts can resolve (as well as exacerbate) andauthority." from theincongruence between power institutions underconditions or raIf administrative of traditional areconceptualized as a dual system of authority tional-legal authority offormal effectiveness lessa matter andpower becomes relationships, thanofthe or instrumental technology constant) rationality (holding In between of congruence and power authority relationships. degree other in thesetting andaccomplishwords, administrative effectiveness andinterests ment ofgoals is more tobe optimal thevalues when likely and authorities arecongruent. This finding is as true offunctionaries monarchs as forthe"servants" ofdynastic, or constitutional absolute, in industrial and civilservants it is for executives economies corporate in thepersonal authority in modern states. Patrimonialism expressed ofleadership, thecharisma andin theappropriation of (parofoffice,47 influence overor control rules, goals,and ticipant of) organizational rationality bycountering the resources can"'save" something offormal sense ofalienation that breeds resistance to itsreand/or exploitation It is in thissensethatpatrimonialism can "correct" the quirements.
46 We are temptedto use the word neopatrimonialism when examining how personal authority,personalism, particularism,and appropriation can close the gap between power and authority in modern bureaucraticcontexts,and we shall occasionally do so. Such usage raises theoreticaldifficulties because it bears the imprint of the very dichotomywe are attemptingto revise. Daniel Edwards suggests that there may be problems to employing the word patrimonialismin modern contextsbecause of the intellectual baggage it carries.Our decision to use it is based on the belief that a rhetorical device of this kind will break through the persistent belief that "patrimonial" features have a traditionallocation only. See Edwards's "Bureaucracy in Nepal: Developments in Administrationfrom the Rana Years to Present," Ph.D. diss. (Department of Political Science, Universityof Chicago I977). 47For this concept and its application, see Etzioni (fn. 29), chaps. xii and xiii.
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to authatare generated by resistance and pathologies dysfunctions itsuse. over andpower struggles thority of in thehistory figure casesthat of theleading A re-examination recent concerns ofthe tosome with attention combined modernization, and patrimonial thattraditional suggests on organizations, literature administration. for effective evident in andimportant areboth features in compelling is most ofbureaucracy (and politics) analysis Weber's Prussian and and particularly of continental (i.e.,French thecontext of English It is lessso in thecontext historical experience. German) experience. and American to eastand of Europewithopenfrontiers in themiddle Situated thelatei7ththrough the from survival and expansion Prussia's west, most effort that exposed enormous military an century required i9th The result to military was to "militraining. ofthemalepopulation and butalsoPrussian society administration, Prussian notonly tarize" of Romancivil of thetradition The revival and application culture. anddeepened, more than it administration complemented law tostate The habitual created theorientations by militarization. contradicted, tookfor thebasisofall social Weber order, that andprecise discipline he identified that and hierarchy and thecentralization, specialization, ofPrussia's wereas mucha product military formal with rationality, as they wereelements and historical experience and legalinstitutions theessential nature of that revealed of culture of a universal history themodern.48 Weberultimately took his astonishing reach, comparative Despite his ideal typeof whichto construct from as the ground Germany andpolitical industrial ofBritain's In the face pre-eminent bureaucracy. herpatrimonial he perceived administrative rolein the i9thcentury, thetechnical ofachieving that superiority as lagsintheprocess features thanas possible rather can bring, of what explanations bureaucracy workso well: madethesystem structure rests bureaucratic "technical superiorofthe upon Theadvance of technique, field to the as in thewhole leadshere, Thisfact ity." where most older has beenrealized theadvance slowly following: andfunctionally welldeveloped been forms have technically structural at hand.Thiswasthecase, for instance, to therequirements adjusted was andhence in England England ofnotables in theadministration tobureaucratization tosuccumb ofall countries or,indeed, theslowest
of doingso." is still onlyin theprocess
Bureaucracy, Aristocracy, and Autocracy See, for example,Hans Rosenberg, (Boston:BeaconPress I958). 49 "Bureaucracy," added. in Gerthand Mills (fn. 4), 228; emphasis
48
219
Prussianor France,but England that Yet, it was afterall neither becamethe world'sfirst and, foralmosta century, leadingindustrial power.It was the British Empirethatcircledtheglobe and has never been equalled. And the English experience was verydifferent. An islandkingdom as a trading and navalpower,Engmakingitshistory land missedthemilitarization thataffected bothFranceand Germany, remaining "civilian"fromthe i7th to the i9th century. basically Parand common-law were dominated liamentary politics tradition by the ofcollegiality and a principled practice affirmation ofdoingbusiness case butnoterasedbystare bycase (mitigated administradecisis).Britain's tivelifewas profoundly shapedbythepatrimonial orientation, practices, and powerofthelandedaristocrats and gentry, and ofguildsand corporations. Administration was notin the handsof professionals and spebut of gentlemen amateurs who were proud to be known as cialists, It was typically generalists and all-rounders. decentralized, collegial, or and carried outthrough local courts and unpaidjustices private, of the and trade,chartered peace, boardsof control companies, and distant it was affected colonialgovernments; member bills in parby private of honor,duty,and decency. liament,and disciplined by standards WhereGermaneducation forpublicservants stressed publiclaw and politicaleconomy-theStaatswissenschaften-British school and unieducationin the i9th century featured in character, versity training noneofwhichwould qualify and theclassics, as specialized leadership, The public-school professional forexperts.50 training prefect who comand obedienceof his house in termsof personal mandedthe loyalty thelighttouch, a senseof style, and a capacity qualities, good manners, to do theright the modelforpublic thingpersonby person, provided menexercising and specialized Cleverness publicauthority. knowledge was less admiredthan determination and character. The bonds that unitedold boysto each other in politics and service werethebondsof and previously shared experience. friendship Personalistic networks ofthepublicschools. werean institutionalized The socialorder product to be the first thatenabledBritain and greatest of themodernnations
50Weber was, on the one hand, emphatic that bureaucracyfurthers the specialist at the expense of the "cultivatedman." "The modern development of full bureaucratization brings the systemof rational, specialized and expert examinations irresistibly to the fore." Ibid., 241. On the other hand, he qualified his main assertion empirically without letting the qualification either weaken the dominant theme or break it into a multifacetedgeneralization: "Expert examinations are neither indispensable to nor concomitant phenomena of bureaucratization. The French, English and American bureaucracies have for a long time foregone such examinations entirelyor to a large extent, for training and service in party organizations have made up for them."
Ibid., 240.
220
WORLD POLITICS
than in bureaucratic in the more wasgrounded in patrimonial features, ofduty, deference and manners-not anddecency, ofhonor discipline thelaw,or theoffice thediscipline of thebarracks, basedon orders, commands, and expert authority. of administration from boththeformal American patterns diverge rationality approximated bythe Prussian paradigm andthepatrimonial of Britain-although democratic arrangements structures, curiously more than onewould enough, preserve patrimonial features An expect. whattheBritish examination confirms case of theAmerican pattern thedisproportionate influence of thePrussian on suggested: example in Weber's theimage ofbureaucracy thought. in Germany, and Britain Civilservants benefited from the France, ofthestate andthestanding andmystique conferred history on those wereno status it.In America there whoserved orders, no lords ofthe no educated and cultivated robeor the sword, professionals whose orabsolute service topatrimonial rulers ofhonor, wasa source prestige, The dominant in andlayennoblement. Jeffersonian tradition, contrast that theleastgovernment with therecessive was Hamiltonian, taught and producing the bestgovernment. landowners and Independent ofthecorruption free in a society and degradation farmers of urban couldand should commerce andindustry livewith as little aupublic The Jacksonian as possible. and deepened thority legacy compounded toward attitude stateservice. the negative By "democratizing" the andknowledge for state service tothe standards, competence, required and attacking intellect and expertise, of distrusting and by espoint in office" to counter theallegedprivileged, "rotation tablishing selfofpermanency, andmonopolistic theJacksonian serving, consequences thedoctrine that"to thevictor to establish the legacy helped belong and spoils, whencombined Rotation ofoffice. withtheJefferspoils" tobelittle and disesteem andJacksonian sonian tendency thestate, led extreme viewthat state totheevenmore service meant "feeding at the public trough." theJacksonian Weber understood buthe believed legacy, that civilofthecentury, reform setAmerica service onthe had,inthelatter part roadtobureaucratic rationalization: bears thecharacter States still ofa polity The United which, at least is notfully bureaucratized. in thetechnical Butthegreater sense, the with theoutside andthemore offriction zones theneeds urgent for at home themore administrative thischaracter is inunity become, andgradually bureaucratic structure.5' evitably giving waytoformally
51lbid.,
2II.
221
theextent to which and anti-state He did notrecognize idepopulist thestatus todifferentiate andauthority ofcivil continued servants ology Nordidhe recognize those in Prussia or Britain. in America from the American andtheBritish towhich federalism derived extent affection for localgovernment sustained andamateurparticularities, variations, from German were absent ismthat parallel settings. that administration in America was moving His belief toward "full arosein partfrom his technocratic bureaucratization" misreading of to American whenapplied theword"machine" parties: as itis significantly ofthe ... the rise "machine," called in theUnited of officialdom and thegrowing . . . States, importance everywhere of . . . [bureaucratization]. The partly areall stages unbureaucratic in theUnited ofthestate structure States is materially form balanced more bureaucratic structures ofthose formations bythe strictly which, theparties in truth, dominate under theleadership politically, namely, or experts in organization and election of professionals tactics.52 and patrimonial In thedispersed, discontinuous, baronies staffed by American he thought full-time amateurs that characterized he parties, German SocialDemocratic saw thebureaucratized as depicted Party Michels: byRobert broken have mass with traditional Democratic notable parties completely on personal relations andpersonal esteem. . . . Democratic rule based under the ofparty mass are parties bureaucratically organized leadership union andtrade et cetera. ... officials, professional party secretaries, In theUnited both since administration have States, parties Jackson's developed bureaucratically.53 for Two recent works some Weber's readrevisionist provide support in America. Martin "machines" Shefter thatby ing of party argues New York'spolitical the i88o's, clubsweremorebureaucratic than and Ira Katznelson that thesepaliterature stresses prior suggested;54 from ethnic communities ration of workplace openedthe way for evenif it did notovercome thenegative working-class organizations on classformation and organization.55 effects of ethnicity But such and ethnicity doesnotjustify newworkon party Weber's interpretain America as paralleling tionofparty bureaucratized Europe's workto believe It was a mistake that the"moonlighting" ing-class parties.
52
"The Emergenceof the PoliticalMachine: An Alternative 54 Shefter, View," in Willis Hawley and Michael Lipsky,eds., Theoretical Perspectives on Urban Politics (EnglewoodCliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall 1978). 55See aspects of Katznelson's City Trenches (New York: Pantheon, forthcoming).
53lbid., 225.
Rothand Wittich (fn. Ii),
in Gerthand Mills (fn. 4), I398; "Bureaucracy,"
2I.
222
WORLD POLITICS
welfare favors, access, who dispensed on publicpayrolls employees with themysandwhohelped andrecognition, esteem, goods, public of an impersonal, preweretheproducts teries of "Americanization" rather thanof obedience to bureaucratic authority cise,and habitual thatmarks and communities patrito persons thedisciplined loyalty relations.56 monial a highly varied distribution ofpatinstances Thesehistorical suggest modern sysadministrative features across and bureaucratic rimonial hischaracterization ofbureaucracy couched bycontrast, tems. Weber, Attheheuristic tendencies, inuniversal level, in universal language.57 or cultural areat work:it is theinner context, ofnational dependent and democracy forthe that account coherence and logicofcapitalism and logicofbureaucracy. inner coherence a major rolein thedeplayed The capitalist has undeniably system hascreated an urgent ofbureaucracy.... Itsdevelopment velopment It is this administration. intensive andcalculable stable, strict, need for central a crucial role inoursociety as the bureaucracy gives need which oflarge-scale administration.58 element in anykind aboutthe symbiotic relations statements Webermadeevenstronger and democracy, "massdemocracy."59 especially between bureaucracy
to the whichhe associated withtheUnitedStatesand attributed [Weber'semphasis], absenceof a parliamentary and ideological system, parties(Weltanschauungsparteien), oriented to the realization of "substantive [Weber'semphasis] political ideals,"which he associated with continental the GermanSocial Democratic parties, pre-eminently Party. Poor statemanagement of the economy by dilettanti could be tolerated in the abundanceof economicopportunities. United States "in view of the limitless The increasing necessity of replacingthe untrained partyprotegeand sometime-official trained careerofficial diminishes with the technically the parties'beneprogressively in a bureaucracy ficesand results inescapably of theEuropeankind." Whether, when, or to whatdegree theconditions mentioned byWeberhavechanged areopenquestions. His observation that"despite theresulting corruption [ofpatronage appointments] this system was popular[in theUnitedStates]sinceit prevented theriseof a bureaucratic in theUnitedStates thatbureaucracy caste"suggests at a minimum was notand has not become"of theEuropeankind." Rothand Wittich(fn. I3), 1397-98. "On Weber'sAnalysis of Bureaucratic 5 AlvinGouldner, Rules,"in Merton(fn. i, betweenmultiple p. 48), briefly to the contradiction attends historical manifestations and its commonfeatures. of bureaucracy characterization of theories JohnMarkoff's since Weber'stimealso makesthe case for autonomous of the causesof bureaucracy . . ." (fn. i); in "Governmental Bureaucratization and pluralexplanations, see p. 480 forhis summary. 58Parsons (fn. 3), 338. 59 Weberdid attend between to the contradictions and bureaucracy and democracy when he observedthat democracy triesto preventthe development capitalism of of a universal of office," whenit tries "closedstatus groupsin theinterest accessibility of officialdom in the interests of expandingthe sphere to minimize"the authority
of 'public opinion' . . . ," and when it attemptsto make "a clean sweep of . . .-at
and Mills (fn. 4), 224-25. Weberidentified twoprinciples 56"Bureaucracy,"in Gerth that distinguishedpolitical parties in modern states-"organizations for job patronage"
223
and empirical At the historical level,Weber,as usual,qualifiedhis He explainedhow bureaucracy universalism. emergesindependently and democracy. of both capitalism He observed, as we have already with statusorders pointedout, thatabsolutist statesin collaboration bureaucratize administration. More generally, he argued that,while democratization of society "in its totality" and "in the modernsense of the term. . . is an especially favorable basis of bureaucratization," it is "by no meanstheonlypossibleone." He had similar reservations withrespect to capitalism: model Earlymodern capitalism did not originatein thebureaucratic Adrationalism. states was a product where bureaucracy of thestate's in fact countries, vanced capitalism, too, wasat first notlimited to these capitalism and notevenprimarily located in them.... Today, however, havefound one another and belong intimately together.60 bureaucracy Yet at thetheoretical or heuristic level-and in thissense, ultimately -Weber clungto theviewthatbureaucracy has general characteristics, structural and motivational and a logic thatlinks themtofeatures, of nationalhisgether in an ideal typein ways thatare independent toricaldifferences. A differentiated and experience view of historical indicates thatthe its imprint on cultural orientations and institutions in his analysis do notadethatWeberfeatured ofbureaucracy qualities administration. Parquatelyand equallyexplainthenature of effective as the instances of Gerticularhistorical constellations, suggested by and America,rather than the logic of impersonality, many,Britain, and rationalization in bureaucratizaas expressed calculation, levelling, seem to explain tion and as re-enforced or democracy, by capitalism more adequatelyhow these (and other) nationsbecame "modern."
PATRIMONIALISM IN BUREAUCRATIC ADMINISTRATION: PERSONAL LEADERSHIP
Our comparative and historical viewof effective administration, parthe finding or neopatrimonial thatpatrimonial features play ticularly an important of economicand politicalas partin the modernization well as administrative concerns of withsome recent life,is consistent the literature on formal important in our organizations.6" Particularly
least in intent-the plutocraticprivileges in administration.""Bureaucracy," in Gerth and Mills (fn. 4), 226 and 225. 60 Roth and Wittich (fn. IA), I465; emphasis in original. 61 There is, of course, an extensive literatureon leadership in administration, some of which is relevant to our prospective analysis. Among the most influentialwriters are Chester Barnard, The Functions of the Executive (Cambridge: Harvard University
224
WORLD POLITICS
viewhasbeentheattention given topersonal leadership andauthority, theflexible, "particularistic," and"diffuse" team playthat accompanies it,anditscapacity to counter ifnot"cure" bureaucratic In pathology. constructing hisidealtypes oflegitimate Weber authority, recognized the importance of personal leadership fortraditional he authority; madeit thecentral feature of charismatic authority, butvirtually exitfrom pelled rational-legal authority.62 With tohisanalysis of respect and bureaucratic patrimonial he followed administration, a parallel andconsistent in theform ofpersonal ofusage:leadership authority, and ficecharisma, other in of personalism forms figure prominently butnotat all in bureaucratic patrimonial, administration. Leadership and personalism, alongwithaffective and communal relationships, tofunctional differentiation fallvictim andspecialization as impersonto bureaucratic is assigned and roles, and personalism ality structures to thevocation ofpolitics. It is politicians notbureaucrats, whobring as demagogues, personalism intoplayby appealing of the to "irrational" matters elements, andtheemotions rooted in communal andhistorical heart, sentiments. Thosewho inhabit theworldof formal and bureaucratic rationality
interests.
sine ira ac studio,live as a race apart,innocent of politics, authority, underthe aegis of strict and habitualdiscipline and without wills or
enters such a worldformanyreasons.In the form Patrimonialism of personal it can come intoplay to cope withbureaucratic authority, pathology by bringing into closercongruence. power and authority RobertMcNamara's experience as Secretary of the Department of theworld's and most bureaucratic Defense, perhaps largest bureaucracy, There are at leasttwo sides suggests just one aspectof thisprocess.63 to RobertMcNamara. There is the Harvard BusinessSchool,Ford Motor Company,DoD management who first technician, made his markby setting statistical up a "revolutionary control program" as an Air Force officer World War II and who "tamed"themilitary during service brassand putan end to their wasteful, counterproductive rivalry forresources and missions by cost-effectiveness techniques. And there is theRobert McNamarawho captained thewhiz kids (a metaphor that
Press I938), and Philip Selznick, Leadership in Administration(Evanston, Ill.: Row, Peterson I957). 62 Etzioni (fn. 47, chaps. xii and xiii) arguesthat "personal (or pure) charisma BrockBrower, "McNamaraSeen Now, Full Length,"Life (May io, i968). All citations on McNamaraare fromthisarticle. subsequent
63
may be originallyachieved in organizational offices"(p.
307;
emphasis in original).
225
of Illinoisin teamat the University basketball invokesan unbeatable the mid-I94os)" in the Air Force and at Ford, and theirfunctional RobertMcin the DoD. It is this second,less celebrated equivalent dimenofthepatrimonial toan understanding Namarawho contributes of teamleadin themetaphor as it is expressed sionof administration ership. offer at Defense,he laid When he agreedto acceptJohnKennedy's down one condition-"absolute authority in his choiceof people."He people of intelligence, instance, got thepeople he wanted:in the first people he knew. and wisdom; but in the finalinstance, experience, he said,"hiring people you don't "It's a verydangerous proposition," know." The group he assembledstayedwith him almostto a man his sevenyearsat Defense,movingfromjob to job "with throughout However expertor versatility." ease and administrative intellectual skilledtheywere-and some,at least,were-theirspecial virtueand to McNamaraand a sensitive, intuitive loyalty lay in personal strength who knewtheir As teamplayers of his viewsand style. understanding captain'smind,theystayedat leastone stepahead of the opposition, "Mcway of thinking." based on "a disciplined, cannypre-emptive them scouting personally, Namara,"we are told,"usedthesemenvery and agencies all around the Pentagonto bringthe variousservices him overcome the to and enabling into mesh with his own office," and organizational vestedinterests, complexity routines, operational the obstaclesto of the DoD. They were the means for overcoming and spethatformalrationality-division effectiveness administrative "He and oflabor, cialization job specifications, hierarchy-impose. had when rethesepeople,"and he used them, his own linesout through location.His team was of theirorganizational quired,independently and realizenew policies," of people"who could understand composed to particular and broad-"not just oriented people who were flexible to his personalauthority responding jobs." It was McNamaraloyalists as much as his penchantfor and skill at formalraand leadership administration for effective made that duringhis termas tionality And it was theMcNamaramodelthatPresidents of Defense. Secretary increasingly adopted in searchof means to controland directthe branchenclavesof the executive and bureaucratic baronies political to the nation'speril.65 sometimes
64 The term "whizkid" passedintocolloquialusage as "Whiz Kid. Slang. A youthor intelligent executive, agent or advisor."Random successful ful and exceptionally Edition i967). House Dictionary of the English Language (Unabridged efforts to control and direct theforeign-policy 65 For a favorable viewof Presidential agencieswith Presidential and colonizingexecutive through penetrating bureaucracy
226
WORLD
POLITICS
CONCLUSION
assumptions Weberused We havetried to showthatthesimplifying and bureaucratic adto createformalcontrasts betweenpatrimonial when to used historical change and administrative ministration, explain the degree of theirindependent existence and behavior, exaggerate of bureaucratic We foundthatpatrithe superiority administration. are moreakin to a field and charismatic features monial,bureaucratic, offorce on circumstances, variably conditions administhat, depending and effectiveness. thecourse trative behavior Weber'sefforts tointerpret in termsof Westerncivilization's of universalhistory pre-eminence world led him civilizations to the and dominanceamong overstate features sharedby Westernnations.In the process,he bureaucratic the waysin whichnationalhistorical experiences exhibited neglected of patrimonial and bureaucratic in the variouscombinations features world eminence. Finally, courseof becomingmodernand achieving at theheuristic levelthedistincto recognize (ideal-typical) his failure and power and, at the empiricallevel, their tion betweenauthority him from theextent in to be appreciating tendency conflict, prevented can helptoovercome features bureaucratic towhichpatrimonial patholbehaviorin termsof organizational loyaltyand ogies by orienting discipline. in terms of conflicts administrative behavior beBy conceptualizing thatpatrimonially and powerand suggesting tweenauthority oriented the bureaucratic such conflicts can alleviate behavior pathologies gento provide to "save" it is notour intention yetanother technique erate, We do not want to be and bureaucratic formalrationality authority. can or ought to be read as holdingthat complianceand efficiency or coercedin orderto eliminate conflict and to bought, manipulated, What is of for the triumph bureaucracy. good organizations promote tobe good fortheir or forsociety. What cannot be assumed participants fororganizations or costly is dysfunctional, maybe funcpathological,
see I. M. Destler,Presidents, Bureaucrats, and Foreign and team players, loyalists Press I974). For a critical view and suggesUniversity Policy (Princeton: Princeton see Rudolphand Rudolph,The Coordinationsforalternative modesof coordination, is featured in George tion of Complexityin South Asia (fn.6). The perilto thenation Company Reedy,The Twilight of the Presidency (New York: World Publishing M. Schlesinger, Jr.,The Imperial Presidency (Boston: Houghton I970), and Arthur Mifflin I973). Hugh Heclo's A Government of Strangers (fn. 44) assumesa critical
of the leadership and coordinainterpretations stancetowardthe President-centered such as RichardNeustadt's of the executive Presidential branch, tion requirements Power: The Politics of Leadership With Reflections on Johnson and Nixon (New York: WileyI976).
227
or beneficial for participants or for society. tional,efficient, Indeed, conflict insideorganizations, and efforts regulated amongparticipants in their in environments to influence or control by actors organizations orderto affect organizational goals and behavior, may promotedeinterests sirable values and legitimate and enhance administrative effectiveness.

Authority and Power in Bureaucratic and Patrimonial Administration

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IDEAL TYPES IN THE SERVICE OF CONTINGENT AND DETERMINED

infact them existed. AsWeber about sumptions putit:

in Gerthand Mills (fn. 4), "Bureaucracy,"

23Protestant Ethic (fn. 2),

reaucratic authority entails.26 Powerstruggles in organizations are con-

Press I951). University

ton Mifflin I973).

34 "Bureaucracy,"in Gerth and Mills (fn. 4),

IN BUREAUCRATIC A DIFFERENTIATED PATRIMONIALISM ADMINISTRATION: HISTORIES VIEW OF NATIONAL

Rothand Wittich (fn. Ii),

in Gerthand Mills (fn. 4), I398; "Bureaucracy,"

may be originallyachieved in organizational offices"(p.

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