Legal Definition and Related Resources of Bureaucracy

A government by departments, each under a chief; a word to describe the system used in an invidious sense. Wharton.

What does Bureaucracy mean in American Law?

The definition of Bureaucracy in the law of the United States, as defined by the lexicographer Arthur Leff in his legal dictionary is:

A form of organization, as an ideal type characterized by a hierarchically organized control structure, specialized participants carrying out differentiated roles, and impersonal, formal, and formally rational procedures. Bureaucracy has been said to be to politics and administration what the assembly line is to manufacturing, and as such it has been seen as indigenous to, or perhaps even necessitated by, any large scale enterprise, public or private, which seeks efficiency and predictability.

In many quarters “bureaucracy” has become a term of abuse, with the word having come to stand for its worst aspects: cold impersonality, nondemocratic authority, formality in human interaction and communication (engendering nonresponsiveness and red tape), and the ultimate inefficiency, unpredictability, and unfairness of a structure seeking to treat the administration of human wants, needs, and rights as a matter solely of rules and regulations. That actual bureaucracies are often characterized by such results is easily established.

In any event, most real bureaucracies fall short in actual operation of their ideal type, with a good deal more of individuation, human interaction, discretion, and independence from hierarchy than their formal organization would imply. For some of them this leads to a softening of bureaucracy”s worst tendencies; for others, it adds to those all of the worst tendencies of nonbureaucratic modes of organization.

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This definition of Bureaucracy Is based on the The Cyclopedic Law Dictionary . This definition needs to be proofread..

Vocabularies (Semantic Web Information)

noun

• administration
• agency
• authorities
• delegated authority
• departmentalization
• governance
• government
• government by bureaus
• government office
• governmental procedure
• governmental system for decisionmaking
• inflexible routine
• management
• ministration
• official procedure
• officialdom
• officiation
• organization
• powers that be
• process of governing
• red tape
• regulation
• reins of government
• rigid routine
• rule
• service
• sovereignty
• state management
• strict procedure
• system

Definition of Bureaucracy

The Canada social science dictionary [1] provides the following meaning of Bureaucracy: A formal organization with defined objectives, a hierarchy of specialized roles and systematic processes of direction and administration. Bureaucracy is found in earlier times in history, for example in administration of agricultural irrigation systems, the Roman army, the Catholic church, but it becomes most prominent in the large-scale administration of agencies of the modern state and modern business corporations. Max Weber (1864-1920) gave particular attention to bureaucracy and saw this form of social organization becoming dominant in modern society due to the commitment to the value of rationalization – the organization of social activity so as to most efficiently achieve goals. See: RATIONALIZATION in this legal dictionary and in the world encyclopedia of law.

Bureaucracy: Resources

Notes and References

• Drislane, R., & Parkinson, G. (2016). (Concept of) Bureaucracy. Online dictionary of the social sciences. Open University of Canada

Resources

Legal English Vocabulary: Bureaucracy in Spanish

Online translation of the English legal term bureaucracy into Spanish: burocracia (English to Spanish translation) . More about legal dictionary from english to spanish online.

Related to the Legal Thesaurus

Resources

See Also

• Enterprise
• Joint Enterprise
• Joint Venture

Bureaucracy

See Also

• Governance
• Bureau Shaping
• Contracting Out
• Government
• Government Department
• Hierarchy
• Iron Law of
  Oligarchy
• Logic of Appropriateness
• Natural Resource
  Management
• New Public Management
• Politics-
  Administration Dichotomy
• Public Administration

Further Reading

• Albrow, M. (1970). Bureaucracy. London: Pall Mass Press.
  Beetham, D. (1996). Bureaucracy. Minneapolis: University
  of Minnesota Press.
  Gerth, H. H., & Mills, C. W. (Eds.). (1973). From Max
  Weber: Essays in sociology. Oxford, UK: Oxford
  University Press.
  Merton, R. K., Gray, A. P., Hockey, B., & Selvin, H. C. (Eds.).
  (1952). Reader in bureaucracy. Glencoe, IL: Free Press.
  Page, E. C. (1985). Political authority and bureaucratic
  power. Brighton, UK: Wheatsheaf Books.
• Bureaucracy in the Encyclopedia of Governance, Mark Bevir – University of California, Berkeley, USA, 2007, SAGE Publications