Final Exam

A bureaucracy is a way of administratively organizing large numbers of people who need to work

Throughout the rigmarole of political history of the United States of America, the growth of the “fourth branch of government”, the Bureaucracy, has been a prominent, controversial topic. Peter Woll, in his article “Constitutional Democracy and Bureaucratic Power”, and James Q. Wilson, in his article “The Rise of the Bureaucratic State”, discuss this developing administrative branch. The Constitution has no written mention of an “administrative branch”, and today’s Bureaucracy is often tedious, corrupt, and even undemocratic. But such a branch’s development and expansion is necessary in order to keep par with an evolving and changing society.

The concept of power is a divisive matter in the American political system, as the actors holding it are sometimes unable to impose it as a result of their limited authority to do so. The legislative, executive, and judicial branches in the national government depend on each-others point of view. Part of the Constitution was designed with the purpose of making it impossible for either of these three to become more powerful than the others. Each of them has the ability to check and balance the way that the other two function. In spite of the fact that this system was created with the intention of preventing power from being shared unequally in the country, it sometimes serves as a tool for political gridlock, considering that the judicial branches can debate in regard to a particular topic for unlimited amounts of time before actually reaching a conclusion regarding the respective issue.

In his book, Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies do and why they do it, James Q. Wilson’s main objective is to better define the behavior of governmental bureaucracy, believing traditional organizational and economic theory does not adequately explain their actions. Wilson believes that government agencies are doomed to be perceived as inefficient entities by the public. He gives examples of commonly held perceptions of bureaucracies and reveals how these are mostly misconceptions. He points to the environment of bureaucracy, where rules and procedures, dictate goals, along with context, constraints, values, and norms.

There is no doubt that the United States of America is a democracy, but how democratic are some of the components of our system of government? For example, the Electoral College is used when selecting the president of The United States, but the founders developed the Electoral College based on a theory of how it should work with no practical, real-world example of how it realistically works. Based on the three core principles of democracy which are popular sovereignty, political equality, and political freedom, the Electoral College falls short when assessed using these democratic values.

The federal bureaucracy is the group of government organizations that implement policy. The federal bureaucrats belong, for the most part, to the group of government agencies led by the president’s cabinet (the collection of appointed officials tasked with leading various federal government departments such as the State Department, Department of Homeland Security etc.) (Geer et al.). These department heads, known as cabinet secretaries, are appointed by each new president. The federal bureaucracy is responsible for writing regulations that implement the laws. In this, the federal bureaucracy’s importance cannot be understated. Congress passes laws, the president signs them, but it is the responsibility of the bureaucracy to actually implement them in the most effective, unburdening way.

The Constitution is supposed to divide war powers between the president and Congress, but in today’s society that has not always been the case. We live in a country with competing views, but our Constitution was created through disagreement. While the Constitution is a source of cherished and unifying political ideas, it can provoke some of the most intense quarrels because of its principles and protections. It is also debated and applied to present circumstances daily. To get back to the presidential power argument, President Barack Obama sent United States military into combat without the consent from Congress. “As a presidential candidate in 2007, Senator Obama stated, “The President does not have power under the constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation” (Yoo). President Barack Obama announced four years later, that he was acting on his constitutional authority to conduct U.S. foreign relations as the commander in chief/chief executive by the intervention with Libya. Throughout our history, neither presidents nor Congress have carried out the beliefs that the constitution requires a declaration of war before the U.S can allow for the military to act. “We have forced abroad more than 100 times but declared war in only five cases: The War of 1812, the

For the common American citizen a major concern, as suggested by a recent Gallup poll, centers around the idea that the President, as Chief Executive of the nation, has too much power and influence in the shaping of the United States (Americans' Belief). In particular, there exist a strong belief that the bureaucracy is directly managed by presidential preference (Roff). In contrast, it is a rarely suggested opinion that the President does not have enough power, control, or influence over the bureaucracy. With these two opinions in mind, to what extent does the President have control of the bureaucracy?

The U.S. President is the president of the U.S. military. He additionally manages each state civilian army if the local army is called vigorously for the United States. In spite of the fact that the President can go into arrangements with different countries, a settlement requires endorsement from the Senate. The President likewise makes assignments for judges of the U.S. Incomparable Court, and his arrangements are likewise subject to endorsement of the U.S. Senate. He likewise makes suggestions to Congress as to enactment that he trusts matters to the matter of the

Since the creation of the United States of America, the power of the President has increased dramatically. Specifically, regarding foreign affairs, the power of the President has greatly increased. According to foreign policy specialist Michael Cairo, the Constitution originally gave Congress the majority of war powers. While the formal powers of Congress include the power to declare war, raise and support an army, and regulate commerce, the President was only meant to mainly be Commander in Chief and negotiate treaties in regard to foreign affairs. The President’s role of leading the armed forces may seem like it would give him the authority on all issues regarding foreign affairs, but this power was granted to the President so that he could react quickly if a national emergency occurs. Although Congress was originally given the majority of war powers, Presidents have begun to utilize unilateral authority in the realm of foreign policy. In the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and more recently in Iraq and Afghanistan, the President deployed troops without a declaration of war from Congress.

This allows for the bureaucracy to make laws through rule-making, which is delegation of authority. The bureaucracy delegates authority to the department or agency that will be responsible for its implementation. The bureaucracy in the United States is partly made up civil service agencies, that regardless of who has been elected to an office, the bureaucracy continues, despite the decisions made in the political process. Because of the framework of bureaucracy, it has been considered politically neutral.

The president has specific roles when it comes down to military power. The president must send a written report to Congress within forty-eight hours after American troops have been sent into threatened or actual war situations (Volkomer, 223). Then, it is up to Congress to declare war or not and if they do not the president

There is a long standing debate in American politics over whether or not the President has unilateral war powers. Article II, Section 2, Clause 1 of the United States Constitution states that the President will be Commander in Chief of the navy and army and thus has the power to organize and lead military operations. However, the power to declare war officially lies in the hands of Congress based on Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the Constitution. This division of war power between the executive and legislative branches seems to have been designed to give the President the power to defend the nation in times of crisis, but also to give some power to Congress in order to ensure that the President does not

The word “bureaucracy” has a negative connotation to many people. The fact is that our current system of government would not be able to survive without bureaucracies. The bureaucracy has become the “fourth branch” of the government, it has quasi-legislative and judicial powers and in it’s own field its authority is rarely challenged. The presence of these large, inefficient structures is necessary if the American people want to continue receiving the benefits that they expect.

Bureaucracy was one of the most popular theories developed and is used in some modern organisations such as the NHS and the Police. Through the years bureaucracy has developed a bad reputation for de-humanizing jobs (Grey, 30) “In the ideal-type, people are no more than parts in a well-oiled machine –devoid of passion, prejudice and personality”, although some people prefer this structure (Handy, 22) “No one, it seems, approves of bureaucracy except, interestingly, lots of people in organisations who like to know where they stand.”