Bureaucracy

Weber used bureaucracy as his central example of rational-legal authority -- a mode of organisation resting on a clear separation between the public role an official occupies and that person's private life, in which behaviour in the public role is governed by explicit rules rather than personal whim, and in which even officials with authority do not have unlimited power. He identified five defining features. First, functioning of officials: each official has a fixed area of jurisdiction, laid down by rules and regulations, within which duties are carried out on a regular basis by people who are qualified to perform them, and the position itself continues to exist independently of whoever currently holds it. Second, hierarchical ordering of positions: offices are arranged in a graded hierarchy, so that a decision by a lower official can be appealed to a higher one. Third, reliance on written documents: the organisation's business is conducted and preserved through files and records, kept as part of the public domain, separate from an official's private life. Fourth, office management as a specialised activity: running a bureaucratic office is a skilled, modern task requiring trained personnel. Fifth, conduct in office: an official's behaviour while in office is governed by exhaustive, legally binding rules that keep it distinct from private conduct, and because these rules carry legal force, officials can be held accountable for how they use their authority. Taken together, these features show why Weber saw bureaucracy as such a significant achievement of the modern, rational-legal world: it recognises an individual's skill and training, gives that indivi …