Bureaucracy Size and Scope

President Cabinet DepartmentsInd. Executive Agencies White House StaffExecutive Office of the President Independent Regulatory Commissions Independent Govt. Corporations

The Politics of Agency Structure Creating agency = issue’s importance Structure (degree of independence from executive, cabinet departments) can – Affect policy-making latitude – Allow non-political considerations (like efficiency) to take center stage

The Politics of Agency Structure: The Unitary Executive Remember Hamilton: unified, or unitary, executive necessary for “energy” Structure of agencies affects unitary executive – Unitary executive goal of first Bush pres – Others prefer “plausible deniability”

The Politics of Agency Structure: The Regulated Interests Agency devoted to your issue means it is important, gives you visibility Iron triangles – don’t want to disturb these relationships!

What Bureaucratic Agencies Do Short answer: implement laws and policies Inspection and Enforcement Rule-making Adjudication Legislation Litigation

Forces Affecting Bureaucratic Action Congress – “Oversight” – Funding – Legislative mandates President – “Unitary executive” – Appointment and removal Clientele – “Iron triangles”

Problem # 1: Slow and Inefficient Congress and President try to maintain CONTROL – Prevent “policy slippage” Fairness and equal treatment “One person’s red tape may be another’s treasured procedural safeguard.”

Problem # 2: Ineffective Impossible tasks – Complex social problems – Goals vague and changing Results difficult to measure – What would conditions be like in the absence of agency action? – What could the agency reasonably accomplish with its resources?

Problem # 3: Slow to Change, Prone to Expansion and Waste “Parochialism” (narrow perspective) Self-Interest – Desire for a big budget – Desire for more personnel – Desire for control over visible policy areas Example – War on Drugs – Leads to redundancy and waste Point of View – Internal culture – Who is drawn to work with the agency? – Interaction with clientele

Ways to “Fix” the Bureaucracy (and Why They Don’t Work) Termination (simply cut whole agencies) – Political backlash from clientele Deregulation – “Works” – but we sometimes miss the regulation Devolution – Creates flexibility, but also inequality Privatization – Private firms not always more efficient – Additional oversight required increases costs – Political backlash from lost fed jobs – Many of the functions of government don’t translate into private action