Chapter 13: The Bureaucracy

Question 1

Bureaucracy

Answer 1

the vast network of agencies that makes up the government’s executive branch

Question 2

Who works in the bureaucracy?

Answer 2

civil servants and political appointees who implement congressional or presidential decisions

Question 3

Civil servants

Answer 3

professionals who work for the government at the local or federal level
employees of bureaucratic agencies who work for the government in permanent positions

Question 4

Political appointees

Answer 4

people selected by an elected leader, such as the president, to hold a government position. hold short-term, usually senior positions

Question 5

Why is the bureaucracy also known as the administrative state?

Answer 5

it refers to the role bureaucrats play in administering government policies

Question 6

Who is nominally in charge of the bureaucracy?

Answer 6

the president (although they generally share this power with Congress members)

Question 7

Why are bureaucratic activities inherently political and often conflictual?

Answer 7

ordinary citizens, elected officials, and bureaucrats themselves often disagree about aspects of these activities, and they work to influence bureaucratic actions to suit their policy goals

Question 8

Bureaucrats have their own ideas about government policy, and they often push back against presidential or congressional directives. How does this influence what government does?

Answer 8

we should expect bureaucrats to do things that increase their control over government policy

Question 9

What is the task of the bureaucracy?

Answer 9

to develop and implement policies established by congressional acts or presidential decisions

Question 10

Do bureaucrats more commonly receive general or specific directions?

Answer 10

legislation often provides only general guidelines for meeting governmental goals. bureaucrats thus have considerable latitude to develop particular policies and programs

Question 11

How can members of Congress and the president intervene with bureaucratic procedures?

Answer 11

only by enacting a new bill that sets out a new process

Question 12

Regulation

Answer 12

a rule that allows the government to exercise control over individuals and corporations by allowing or restricting certain behaviors

Question 13

Where do bureaucrats gain the authority to write regulations?

Answer 13

from acts passed by Congress, either through the statute that initially set up their agency or through subsequent laws

Question 14

Notice-and-comment procedure

Answer 14

a process used by federal agencies to create most federal rules and regulations

Question 15

How does notice-and-comment procedure work?

Answer 15

proposed rules are published in the Federal Register and made available for debate by the general public. the agency then issues a final regulation that incorporates changes based on the comments

Question 16

Federal Register

Answer 16

an official journal that includes rules, proposed rules, and other types of government documents

Question 17

What are some downsides of the notice-and-comment procedure?

Answer 17

-it is VERY time-consuming
-it is highly political. Congress members and the president usually have strong opinions about how new regulations should look—and even when they don’t, they may still get involved on behalf of a constituent or an interest group

Question 18

Why do bureaucrats take account of the pressures from elected officials?

Answer 18

1. the bureaucrats’ policy-making power may derive from a statute that members of Congress could overturn
2. bureaucrats need congressional support to get larger budgets and to expand their agency’s mission

Question 19

Federal regulations affect most aspects of everyday life. Why are they often controversial?

Answer 19

because they involve trade-offs between incompatible goals, as well as decisions made under uncertain circumstances

Question 20

True or false: once regulations are in place, changing or repealing them is a lengthy process that often requires Congress to pass new laws

Answer 20

True

Question 21

True or false: bureaucrats are an important source of new government policies

Answer 21

True. Bureaucrats are not just policy implementers: they have significant influence on what government does and does not do
Ex. Department of Defense

Question 22

After Congress passes legislation and the president signs it, the transition from ___ to ___ begins

Answer 22

legislation ; regulation

bureaucrats interpret the passed law and design appropriate regulations. other bureaucrats disseminate regulations and monitor compliance

Question 23

State capacity

Answer 23

the knowledge, personnel, and institutions that government needs to effectively implement policies

Question 24

Bureaucrats are experts in their policy area. While having an expert bureaucracy seems like an obvious good idea, it creates a new problem for elected officials. What is this?

Answer 24

bureaucrats can bring expertise to their policy choices only if elected officials stop ordering bureaucrats around and instead allow them to act as they think best

Question 25

Problem of control

Answer 25

the difficulty that elected officials and their staff face when they try to interpret or influence bureaucratic actions

Question 26

Principal-agent game

Answer 26

the interaction between a "principal" (the president and Congress), who needs something done, and an "agent" (bureaucrats) who must carry out the principal's orders

Question 27

What is the conundrum for the principal in the principal-agent game?

Answer 27

giving the agent very specific orders prevents the agent from acting based on expertise, but if the principal gives the agent the freedom to make decisions based on expertise, the principal has less control over the agent's actions, and the agent could even use their freedom to pursue goals that have nothing to do with their assigned task

Question 28

How can the principal-agent game be framed in terms of citizens?

Answer 28

citizens may demand that elected officials control the bureaucracy—to reduce waste and inefficiency, or prevent bureaucrats from overly intruding into American society

Question 29

Regulatory capture

Answer 29

a situation in which bureaucrats favor the interests of the groups or corporations they are supposed to regulate at the expense of the general public

Question 30

What is one mechanism for regulatory capture?

Answer 30

when short-term political appointees come from (and will return to) the very industries they are supposed to regulate, a phenomenon known as the *revolving door*

Question 31

Our system places experts in positions of power, but the ultimate power is in the hands of elected officials and their appointees. How come?

Answer 31

bureaucrats are not immune to bias! many enter the bureaucracy with their own ideas about what government should do, and they make decisions in line with those goals. even if they wanted to remain impartial, they would still face a government in which many other people with their own policy goals would attempt to influence them

Question 32

True or false: the federal government often takes on problems that have no known solution—and may be unsolvable

Answer 32

True. Under these conditions, failing to meet a deadline says more about the feasibility of the goal than about a lack of bureaucratic expertise

Question 33

One consequence of the problem of control is the complexity of bureaucratic organizations and procedures. How come?

Answer 33

despite bureaucrats' policy expertise, their decisions often appear to take too much time, rely on arbitrary judgements of what is important, and have unintended consequences

Question 34

Red tape

Answer 34

excessive or unnecessarily complex regulations imposed by the bureaucracy

Question 35

Standard operating procedures (SOPs)

Answer 35

rules that lower-level bureaucrats must follow, regardless of whether they actually apply, when implementing policies

Question 36

Why are red tape and SOPs sometimes inevitable?

Answer 36

-the complexity of the tasks bureaucrats are given to do -elected officials' attempts to mitigate the problem of control (to make sure their constituency is treated fairly and reelects them)

Question 37

Why has the federal bureaucracy expanded over time?

Answer 37

America's expansion in size AND a combination of citizen demands for enhanced government services and officials' desires to increase the role of government in society

Question 38

Spoils system and one consequence of it

Answer 38

politicians dole out government service jobs in return for political support consequence: employees are hired in reward for political work rather than their qualifications

Question 39

Federal civil service

Answer 39

a system created by the 1883 Pendleton Civil Service Act in which bureaucrats are hired on the basis of merit rather than political connections today, virtually all full-time, permanent government employees other than senior political appointees have civil service protections

Question 40

True or false: while the Progressive Era reforms created an independent bureaucracy and state capacity, the New Deal reforms broadened the range of policy areas in which this capacity could be applied

Answer 40

True

Question 41

Explain the EOP in terms of the principal-agent problem

Answer 41

EOP employees aim to ensure that bureaucrats (agents) act appropriately to implement the president's (principal's) policy priorities and preferences is like a bureaucracy that monitors other bureaucracies

Question 42

Office of Management and Budget

Answer 42

an office within the EOP which prepares the president's annual budget proposal to Congress and monitors government spending and the development of new regulations

Question 43

Independent agencies

Answer 43

government offices or organizations that provide government services but are not part of an executive department ex. CIA, NASA, Federal Reserve System

Question 44

Independent regulatory agencies

Answer 44

subset of independent agencies that carry out policy in a narrow area ex. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Federal Communications Commission (FCC)

Question 45

True or false: the division of activities among executive departments and independent agencies does not always have an obvious logic

Answer 45

True

Question 46

Organizational decisions often reflect elected officials' attempts to shape agency behavior. How?

Answer 46

organizations that fall within an executive department can be controlled by the president (to some extent) through the president's appointees. but for independent agencies, the president and Congress have very little control over them outside the nomination and confirmation process

Question 47

Why does the location of agencies in the structure of the federal government matter?

Answer 47

it determines the amount of political control that other parts of the government can exercise over an agency, as well as who (the president or Congress) gets to exercise this power

Question 48

Budget maximizers

Answer 48

bureaucrats who seek to increase funding for their agency whether or not that additional spending is worthwhile. HOWEVER, the best explanation for the overall size of the federal government is the size of America itself

Question 49

Why are bureaucrats NOT to blame for the increasing size of the federal government?

Answer 49

presidential appointees scrutinize budget requests with an eye to cut spending as much as possible, so some agencies were eliminated and many saw their budgets shrink

Question 50

True or false: although people complain about the efficiency or motivations of federal bureaucrats, surveys show that many bureaucrats are passionate and actually want to do their job right

Answer 50

True

Question 51

What are benefits and drawbacks of civil service regulations?

Answer 51

good: merit-based hiring, job security, separate politics from policy bad: cumbersome requirements

Question 52

Legislation places limits on the political activities that federal employees can undertake. What are some examples?

Answer 52

The Hatch Act (1939): prohibits federal employees from engaging in organized political activities Federal Employees Political Activities Act (1993): modified Hatch Act. federal employees can now fundraise and serve as an officer of a political party

Question 53

Turkey farms

Answer 53

agencies where campaign workers and donors are appointed because their lack of expertise won't actually affect the bureaucracy

Question 54

Senior Executive Service (SES)

Answer 54

people in top agency positions, usually career bureaucrats. exempt from civil service restrictions (less job security but higher pay)

Question 55

Bureaucratic drift

Answer 55

bureaucrats' tendency to implement policies in a way that favors their own objectives rather than following the original intentions of the legislation

Question 56

How do elected officials reduce (not eliminate) bureaucratic drift while still reaping the benefits of their expertise?

Answer 56

1. changing the way agencies are organized and staffed 2. using standardized procedures for monitoring agency actions

Question 57

Why does simply giving very specific directions to an agency not work?

Answer 57

prevents bureaucrats from using their expertise bureaucrats can just ignore the directives and very little can be done to force compliance since they will still keep their job (civil service protections)

Question 58

Why could removing civil service protections easily lead to bad policy outcomes?

Answer 58

-bureaucrats' reluctance to behave as ordered may be a sign that something is wrong with the directive -mass firing will decimate agencies and make it impossible for them to function at all -replacement employees still face same resource/legal constraints -can be fired for simply voicing concerns or being disloyal to president, so no one would want the job

Question 59

Oversight

Answer 59

congressional efforts to make sure that laws are implemented correctly by the bureaucracy after they have been passed

Question 60

True or false: members of Congress, the president, and the president’s staff gain advance knowledge of planned bureaucratic actions through the notice-and-comment procedure

Answer 60

True. This delay gives opponents the opportunity to intervene

Question 61

Police patrol vs fire alarm oversight

Answer 61

police patrol: constant monitoring -takes a ton of time/money, often finds no wrongdoings fire alarm: wait until something goes wrong -much more common

Question 62

What can the president and Congress do once bureaucratic drift is discovered?

Answer 62

issue legislation or an executive order, move tasks and programs to an agency that is more closely aligned with elected officials’ goals, replace political appointees at an agency, or reorganize agencies **often requires joint action by president and congressional majorities to see any change** (Congress needs two-thirds majority to impose corrections, president can only make threats that cannot be carried out without congressional approval

Question 63

Addressing bureaucratic drift often requires joint action by president and congressional majorities to see any change. Why?

Answer 63

without presidential support, Congress needs two-thirds majority to impose corrections president can make threats, but they can only be carried out with congressional approval

Question 64

What is one of the most significant difficulties in dealing with bureaucratic drift?

Answer 64

disagreement between members of Congress and the president about whether an agency is doing the right thing—regardless of whether the agency is following its original orders means that agencies have significant freedom as long as they retain support of at least one branch

Question 65

How can agencies combat elected officials' attempts to control their behavior?

Answer 65

-by having a reputation for expertise (ex. FDA) -by appealing to groups that benefit from agency actions