Publieke Organisaties leeswerk
Organizations as rational system 1 – classic theories of bureaucracy and
administration
A. Early definition of organization and management
Weber was a rational systems theorist who believed that bureaucracy was the most
efficient form of organization and a pillar of modern society. Weber compared modern
bureaucratic authority to two other kinds of authority, charismatic and traditional.
Charismatic authority is based on the unique personal qualities of an individual. The
emerge is unpredictable, and charismatics often oppose established rules and
routines in favor of a leader’s vision. Traditional authority (monarchy) is based on
long-standing and seldom questioned, often sacred, principles such as the hereditary
superiority of nobles, religious positions or status, or other reasons not necessarily
related to one’s ability to perform a role. It has great stability.
Weber described bureaucracy as a rational-legal form of authority. Bureaucracies are
governed by a set of impersonal rules and procedures that are applied universally.
They employ technically qualified, full-time experts assigned to unique areas of
responsibility. There is a hierarchy of superiors and subordinates.
For Weber, the use of expert specialists, impersonal norms, written documents, and
the discipline of a command hierarchy give bureaucratic organizations a reliability,
regularity, and precision in the execution of tasks that no other form of authority
equals. It is not surprising that Weber famously described bureaucracy as a giant
human machine, symbolizing not only its efficiency, but also its dehumanizing
potential; and he also believed its further extension into all areas of social life was
inevitable.
Weber suggests that bureaucratic authority is based on position in the hierarchy of
command, but other times he suggests it is based on expert knowledge; indeed,
Weber considered them closely related so that those making most decisions had
highly developed expertise. Weber did not clearly distinguish managers, who give
directions, form professionals, wo apply technical knowledge.
Weber believed bureaucracy and democracy were complementary, because
democracy requires equality before the law and bureaucratic principles include the
uniform application of riles and the use of meritocratic qualifications, rather than
social status, to recruit office holders.
Weber saw bureaucracy as efficient, modern, and compatible with democracy, he did
not view the growth of bureaucracy as an unmixed blessing
Henri Fayol is the second classic theorist of administration and a rational systems
theorist. Fayol described the bureaucratic organization in terms similar to Weber’s. A
division of labor and specialization of function allows administrators to develop
specialized knowledge and proficiency in their tasks. Above all, Fayol emphasized
the need for order, discipline, and rationality, citing the military as a positive example.
He wrote that the function of management is to plan, organize, command, coordinate,
and control. Unlike Weber, Fayol seemed less troubled by the possible human
implications of his view.
, B. Scientific Management and the Position of Labor
Frederick Winslow Taylor is best known for his views on how to organize factory work
and manage blue-collar workers. Taylor developed a method and philosophy later
called scientific management. Taylor recognized an important fact about all
organizations: if one works alone, the problem of work discipline is only one of self-
discipline; but in a cooperative or collective work process, there is a problem of
control or how to ensure that other people will do what you want them to do,
sometimes known as the principle-agency problem.
Taylor determined what he thought was the one best way a job should be performed.
Until this time, engineers had standardized only physical inputs: now they would
standardize the human inputs. Taylor believed that people worked smarter not harder
when they used the best methods devised by scientific management.
Taylor believed that scientific management was in the best interests of both workers
and management, because it eliminated disputes over the distribution of the
economic pie by raising productivity and expanding the pie. Workers who used to
perform whole tasks, such as craft workers, found their jobs subdivided into narrow,
simple tasks with a sperate individual assigned to each. Workers lost all discretion
and now simply followed management’s orders.
Taylor believed that workers would not mind the restructured jobs even if they were
dull, repetitive, and stripped of all decision making, because the tasks would involve
less physical strain and because workers could make more money than they would
earn using the existing, less productive work methods.
Braverman views Taylorism as a management device to wrest power form workers
rather than merely as a neutral technique for enhancing efficiency. The purpose of
scientific management, in Braverman’s view, is to lower labor costs, increase worker
effort, limit workers’ autonomy, and enhance management control.
1. Bureaucracy and Legitimate Authority – Max Weber
There are three pure types of legitimate dominations:
1. Rational grounds – resting on a belief in the legality of enacted rules and the
right of those elevated to authority under such rules to issue commands (legal
authority)
2. Tradition grounds – resting on an established belied in the sanctity of
immemorial traditions and the legitimacy of those exercising authority under
them (traditional authority)
3. Charismatic grounds – resting on devotion to the exceptional sanctity, heroism
or exemplary character of an individual, and of the normative patterns or order
revealed or ordained by him (charismatic authority)
The following may be said to be the fundamental categories of rational legal
authority:
1. A continuous rule-bound conduct of official business
2. A specified sphere of competence (jurisdiction)
3. The organization of offices follows the principle of hierarchy
4. The rules which regulate the conduct of an office may be technical rules or norms
,5. In the rational type it is a matter of principle that the members of the
administrative staff should be completely separated from ownership of the means
of production or administration
6. In the rational type case, there is also a complete absence of appropriation of his
official position by the incumbent
7. Administrative acts, decisions, and rules are formulated and recorded in writing,
even in cases where oral discussion is the role er is even mandatory
8. Legal authority can be exercised in a wide variety of different forms which will be
distinguished and discussed later.
Bureaucratization offers above all the optimum possibility for carrying through the
principle of specializing administrative functions according to purely objective
considerations. Individual performances are allocated to functionaries who have
specialized training and who by constant practice increase their expertise. “Objective”
discharge of business primarily means a discharge of business according to
calculable rules and without regard for persons.
2. The Principles of Scientific Management – Frederick Winslow Taylor
In order to have any hope of obtaining the initiative of his workman the manager must
give some special incentive to his men beyond that which is given to the average of
the trade.
Management of initiative and incentive = Broadly speaking, the best type of
management in ordinary use may be defined as management in which the workmen
give their best initiative and in return receive some special incentive from their
employer.
Manager duties scientific management under rule of thumb method:
1. They develop a science for each element of work, which replaces the old rule
of thumb method
2. They scientifically select and then train, teach and develop the workman
3. They heartily cooperate with the men to insure all the work being done in
accordance with the principles of the science which has been developed
4. There is an almost equal division of the work and the responsibility between
the management and the workmen.
Under the management of initiative and incentive practically the whole problem is up
to the workman, while under scientific management fully one-half of the problem is up
to management.
Perhaps the most prominent single element in modern scientific management is the
task idea. The work of every workman is fully planned out by the management at
least one day in advance. Scientific management consists very largely in preparing
for and carrying out tasks.
, 3. The Degradation of Work in the Twentieth Century – Harry Braverman
Scientific management is an attempt to apply the methods of science to the
increasingly complex problems of the control of labor in rapidly growing capitalist
enterprises. It lacks the characteristics of a true science because its assumptions
reflect nothing more than the outlook of the capitalist with regard to the conditions of
production.
Taylor’s system was simply a means for management to achieve control of the actual
mode of performance of every labor activity, from the simplest to the most
complicated.
“A fair day’s work”, to this term Taylor gave a crude physiological interpretation: all the
work a worker can do without injury to his health, at a pace that can be sustained
throughout a working lifetime.
Conclusion drawn by Taylor: workers who are controlled only by general orders and
discipline are not adequately controlled, because they retain their grip on the actual
processes of labor.
First principle: The dissociation of the labor process from the skills of the workers -
The managers assume the burden of gathering together all of the traditional
knowledge which in the past has been possessed by the workmen and then of
classifying, tabulating, and reducing this knowledge to rules, laws, and formulas
Second principle: The separation of conception from execution (separation of mental
and manual labor) - All possible brain work should be removed from the shop and
centered in the planning or laying-out department.
Third principle: The essential idea of the ordinary types of management. Taylor said,
“is that each workman has become more skilled in his own trade than it is possible
for a one in the management to be, and that, therefore, the details of how the work
shall best be done must be left to him.” But, by contrast: the task idea exists. The
essential element is the systematic pre-planning and pre-calculation of all elements
of the labor process.
The first principle is the gathering and development of knowledge of labor processes,
the second principle is the concentration of this knowledge as the exclusive province
of management (together with its essential converse, the absence of such knowledge
among the workers), then the third is the use of this monopoly over knowledge to
control each step of the labor process and its mode of execution.
A necessary consequence of the separation of conception and execution is that the
labor process is now divided between separate sites and separate bodies of workers.
The production units operate like a hand, watched, corrected, and controlled by a
distant brain.
Organizations as rational system 1 – classic theories of bureaucracy and
administration
A. Early definition of organization and management
Weber was a rational systems theorist who believed that bureaucracy was the most
efficient form of organization and a pillar of modern society. Weber compared modern
bureaucratic authority to two other kinds of authority, charismatic and traditional.
Charismatic authority is based on the unique personal qualities of an individual. The
emerge is unpredictable, and charismatics often oppose established rules and
routines in favor of a leader’s vision. Traditional authority (monarchy) is based on
long-standing and seldom questioned, often sacred, principles such as the hereditary
superiority of nobles, religious positions or status, or other reasons not necessarily
related to one’s ability to perform a role. It has great stability.
Weber described bureaucracy as a rational-legal form of authority. Bureaucracies are
governed by a set of impersonal rules and procedures that are applied universally.
They employ technically qualified, full-time experts assigned to unique areas of
responsibility. There is a hierarchy of superiors and subordinates.
For Weber, the use of expert specialists, impersonal norms, written documents, and
the discipline of a command hierarchy give bureaucratic organizations a reliability,
regularity, and precision in the execution of tasks that no other form of authority
equals. It is not surprising that Weber famously described bureaucracy as a giant
human machine, symbolizing not only its efficiency, but also its dehumanizing
potential; and he also believed its further extension into all areas of social life was
inevitable.
Weber suggests that bureaucratic authority is based on position in the hierarchy of
command, but other times he suggests it is based on expert knowledge; indeed,
Weber considered them closely related so that those making most decisions had
highly developed expertise. Weber did not clearly distinguish managers, who give
directions, form professionals, wo apply technical knowledge.
Weber believed bureaucracy and democracy were complementary, because
democracy requires equality before the law and bureaucratic principles include the
uniform application of riles and the use of meritocratic qualifications, rather than
social status, to recruit office holders.
Weber saw bureaucracy as efficient, modern, and compatible with democracy, he did
not view the growth of bureaucracy as an unmixed blessing
Henri Fayol is the second classic theorist of administration and a rational systems
theorist. Fayol described the bureaucratic organization in terms similar to Weber’s. A
division of labor and specialization of function allows administrators to develop
specialized knowledge and proficiency in their tasks. Above all, Fayol emphasized
the need for order, discipline, and rationality, citing the military as a positive example.
He wrote that the function of management is to plan, organize, command, coordinate,
and control. Unlike Weber, Fayol seemed less troubled by the possible human
implications of his view.
, B. Scientific Management and the Position of Labor
Frederick Winslow Taylor is best known for his views on how to organize factory work
and manage blue-collar workers. Taylor developed a method and philosophy later
called scientific management. Taylor recognized an important fact about all
organizations: if one works alone, the problem of work discipline is only one of self-
discipline; but in a cooperative or collective work process, there is a problem of
control or how to ensure that other people will do what you want them to do,
sometimes known as the principle-agency problem.
Taylor determined what he thought was the one best way a job should be performed.
Until this time, engineers had standardized only physical inputs: now they would
standardize the human inputs. Taylor believed that people worked smarter not harder
when they used the best methods devised by scientific management.
Taylor believed that scientific management was in the best interests of both workers
and management, because it eliminated disputes over the distribution of the
economic pie by raising productivity and expanding the pie. Workers who used to
perform whole tasks, such as craft workers, found their jobs subdivided into narrow,
simple tasks with a sperate individual assigned to each. Workers lost all discretion
and now simply followed management’s orders.
Taylor believed that workers would not mind the restructured jobs even if they were
dull, repetitive, and stripped of all decision making, because the tasks would involve
less physical strain and because workers could make more money than they would
earn using the existing, less productive work methods.
Braverman views Taylorism as a management device to wrest power form workers
rather than merely as a neutral technique for enhancing efficiency. The purpose of
scientific management, in Braverman’s view, is to lower labor costs, increase worker
effort, limit workers’ autonomy, and enhance management control.
1. Bureaucracy and Legitimate Authority – Max Weber
There are three pure types of legitimate dominations:
1. Rational grounds – resting on a belief in the legality of enacted rules and the
right of those elevated to authority under such rules to issue commands (legal
authority)
2. Tradition grounds – resting on an established belied in the sanctity of
immemorial traditions and the legitimacy of those exercising authority under
them (traditional authority)
3. Charismatic grounds – resting on devotion to the exceptional sanctity, heroism
or exemplary character of an individual, and of the normative patterns or order
revealed or ordained by him (charismatic authority)
The following may be said to be the fundamental categories of rational legal
authority:
1. A continuous rule-bound conduct of official business
2. A specified sphere of competence (jurisdiction)
3. The organization of offices follows the principle of hierarchy
4. The rules which regulate the conduct of an office may be technical rules or norms
,5. In the rational type it is a matter of principle that the members of the
administrative staff should be completely separated from ownership of the means
of production or administration
6. In the rational type case, there is also a complete absence of appropriation of his
official position by the incumbent
7. Administrative acts, decisions, and rules are formulated and recorded in writing,
even in cases where oral discussion is the role er is even mandatory
8. Legal authority can be exercised in a wide variety of different forms which will be
distinguished and discussed later.
Bureaucratization offers above all the optimum possibility for carrying through the
principle of specializing administrative functions according to purely objective
considerations. Individual performances are allocated to functionaries who have
specialized training and who by constant practice increase their expertise. “Objective”
discharge of business primarily means a discharge of business according to
calculable rules and without regard for persons.
2. The Principles of Scientific Management – Frederick Winslow Taylor
In order to have any hope of obtaining the initiative of his workman the manager must
give some special incentive to his men beyond that which is given to the average of
the trade.
Management of initiative and incentive = Broadly speaking, the best type of
management in ordinary use may be defined as management in which the workmen
give their best initiative and in return receive some special incentive from their
employer.
Manager duties scientific management under rule of thumb method:
1. They develop a science for each element of work, which replaces the old rule
of thumb method
2. They scientifically select and then train, teach and develop the workman
3. They heartily cooperate with the men to insure all the work being done in
accordance with the principles of the science which has been developed
4. There is an almost equal division of the work and the responsibility between
the management and the workmen.
Under the management of initiative and incentive practically the whole problem is up
to the workman, while under scientific management fully one-half of the problem is up
to management.
Perhaps the most prominent single element in modern scientific management is the
task idea. The work of every workman is fully planned out by the management at
least one day in advance. Scientific management consists very largely in preparing
for and carrying out tasks.
, 3. The Degradation of Work in the Twentieth Century – Harry Braverman
Scientific management is an attempt to apply the methods of science to the
increasingly complex problems of the control of labor in rapidly growing capitalist
enterprises. It lacks the characteristics of a true science because its assumptions
reflect nothing more than the outlook of the capitalist with regard to the conditions of
production.
Taylor’s system was simply a means for management to achieve control of the actual
mode of performance of every labor activity, from the simplest to the most
complicated.
“A fair day’s work”, to this term Taylor gave a crude physiological interpretation: all the
work a worker can do without injury to his health, at a pace that can be sustained
throughout a working lifetime.
Conclusion drawn by Taylor: workers who are controlled only by general orders and
discipline are not adequately controlled, because they retain their grip on the actual
processes of labor.
First principle: The dissociation of the labor process from the skills of the workers -
The managers assume the burden of gathering together all of the traditional
knowledge which in the past has been possessed by the workmen and then of
classifying, tabulating, and reducing this knowledge to rules, laws, and formulas
Second principle: The separation of conception from execution (separation of mental
and manual labor) - All possible brain work should be removed from the shop and
centered in the planning or laying-out department.
Third principle: The essential idea of the ordinary types of management. Taylor said,
“is that each workman has become more skilled in his own trade than it is possible
for a one in the management to be, and that, therefore, the details of how the work
shall best be done must be left to him.” But, by contrast: the task idea exists. The
essential element is the systematic pre-planning and pre-calculation of all elements
of the labor process.
The first principle is the gathering and development of knowledge of labor processes,
the second principle is the concentration of this knowledge as the exclusive province
of management (together with its essential converse, the absence of such knowledge
among the workers), then the third is the use of this monopoly over knowledge to
control each step of the labor process and its mode of execution.
A necessary consequence of the separation of conception and execution is that the
labor process is now divided between separate sites and separate bodies of workers.
The production units operate like a hand, watched, corrected, and controlled by a
distant brain.
