The Japanese Political System

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.

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.

Political authority over the bureaucracy is not in one set of hands, but shared among several institutions

Although some might believe that bureaucrats are always trying to expand their agencies, researches have proved that is not always the case. Instead, they try to validate their position by doing a good job for the people.

However, among the causes which negatively connote bureaucracy, but which are debunked in the article, we can find also the need for a privatization for bureaucracy in order to successfully create an efficient system and a more standardization of the latter which treats citizens as simple numbers.

Kernaghan, K. 2000. The Post-Bureaucratic Organization and Public Services Values. Interational Review of Administrative Sciences 66. 2000, pp. 92-93.

However, despite Max Weber’s theory that bureaucracies are like iron “iron cages” that are a efficient form of administration. Prior to modern government reform patronage, spoils, and bribery were just part of the political environment for Public Administrators. In today’s, modern government Public Administrators are hired based on the merit and technical qualifications that secure the individual can carry out the duties of the office. However, Public Administrators are forced to work in a hierarchical organization

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.

The Civil Service Act of 1883 created the merit system by requiring that appointees to public office be qualified for the job, thereby ending the spoils system.

With the creation of new states and the intervention of government in everyday life of citizens necessitated the need for ideal-type of bureaucracy. Everywhere whether in developed or developing nations, bureaucratic structure is a common phenomenon.

During this time, there was an inefficient use land, labor and resources, which resulted in an economic slackening. Bureaucrats were paid for loyalty with

They documented the historic and geographic patterns in the evolution and profile of political dynasties. According to Mosca, even when political positions are open to all, a family tie to those already in power would confer various advantages. They conducted the research by creating two indicator variables to characterize political dynasties. The first one is called Postrelatives which is equal to a legislator who has a relative entering congress after he did. And the second one is called Prerelative which is equal to a legislator who had a relative entering congress before he did. The results showed that the prerelative legislator had the chance to occupy a position in the congress compared to the postrelative legislator. This indicates that the more relatives that entered in the congress before the candidate running for a position, the more likely he will succeed compared to the other legislator who has no relatives inside the congress. An implication is that the political class is partly shaped by the luck of previous politicians, and that holding political power reinforces the effects of other potential sources of elite persistence such as differing dynastic traits (Bó, Bó, & Snyder,

In the following paragraphs, I will explain the dominant theory in public administration practice and elaborate on the major theoretical assumptions of the Old Public Administration. As stated in the question, the world has transformed through globalization, information technology, and devolution of authority since the latter part of the last century. The dominant theory in public administration has been replaced from the traditional rule-based, authority-driven processes of the Old Public Administration with market-based, competition-driven tactics in the New Public Management, beginning in the 1980s (Kettl, 2000, p. 3). This was an effort to privatize government and streamline public administration to maximize efficiency and productivity. Heavily relying on market mechanisms to guide public programs, public administrators in the New Public Management are encouraged to “steer, not row,” meaning they should not bear the burden of delivering services, but instead define programs that others will carry out, through contracting or other means (Denhardt & Denhardt, 2011, p. 13). Core values of the New Public Management include using private sector and business approaches to the public sector, squeezing as many services as possible from smaller revenues, market style incentives, providing customers more choices, and focusing on outputs and outcomes instead of mainly processes.

“Bureaucracy is becoming more and more independent and powerful and the rules governing the exercise of that power are not clearly defined; hence bureaucracy poses a threat to the democratic political structure and to the politicians who run it. And yet, a, powerful, independent bureaucracy is also necessary for the prevention of political corruption and for the safe guarding of proper democratic procedures.” Therefore having bureaucracy as party of the democracy it’s the best because it helps to maintain corruption, it’s also helps increasing the economy and social activities, helps with the delivering of services to the people. Examples of everyday bureaucracies include governments, armed forces, corporations, hospitals, courts. The people who

The word Bureau means office and Kracy means usage. So, bureaucracy refers to a form of social organization which is managed by strict rules and regulation and which has a goal of achieving technical superiority over any social organization. But