ipl-logo

Bureaucratic Theory In The Organizational Theory Of The Bureaucracy

2073 Words9 Pages
1. Introduction
Bureaucracy is the administrative structure and a set of regulations established to control activities, generally in large organizations and government (Dimock, 1959). This concept has a long historical background both in Europe and in Asia. The term "bureaucracy" is generated from "bureau" and has been in use since the early 18th century in Western Europe to refer to an office, i.e., a place of work. The term bureaucracy came into use just before the French Revolution in 1789 and from there onwards rapidly spread throughout the world (Albrow, 1970).
Political scientists, sociologists, management professionals and economists have involved in studies on bureaucracy extensively. Political scientists consider bureaucracy as administration of the state and economists use this term for describing non-market organizations (Meyer, 1985). Max Weber is the best known sociological writer on bureaucracy. He explained it as technically superior to all other forms of organization and hence indispensable to large, complex enterprises (Bendix, 1966).
Bureaucracy may be considered with respect to two view points, namely, organizational framework and public choice approach. Public choice theories are concerned with bureaus and bureaucratic behaviours. They have the tendency of being individualistic, atomistic and economic in their assumptions. Organizational theory shows a preference for structure of holism and power. In the economic model of bureaucratic behaviour within the
Open Document