Unit Seven
Executive Branch
Governmental Bureaucracy
Bureaucracy-an efficient and effective way to
organize people to do work
• What is the bureaucracy of our school?
• 3 Features of Bureaucracy
• Hierarchiacal authority
• Job specialization
• Formalized rules
• The Constitution gives the President the power to have Executive
departments
• It mentions the military and ambassadors but is silent on any others
Executive
Departments
Many politicians have discussed getting rid of
some of the executive branch departments
because they argue that the government has
gotten too big:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCyTQEA
NlmM
In groups look at the list of executive branch
departments on page 417 and try to come up
with some departments your group thinks the
Types of Agencies
• Staff Agencies- serve in a support capacity to the President-National
Security Council, Office of Management and Budget, White House
Office
• Line Agencies- perform the tasks for which the organization exists- all
others
Independent Agencies
• The agencies outside of the Executive Departments and the White
House Departments
• There are over 150 of these agencies
• Independent Regulatory Commissions are largely beyond the reach of
presidential direction and control
• They have been structured to be beyond the reach of any one
President
• Government Corporations- set up by Congress to carry out certain
business like activities
• Post office, FDIC, Amtrak
Civil Service
• Spoils system- giving government jobs to those who supported you in
gaining office- Andrew Jackson- “patronage”
• The Pendelton Act of 1883 created the current system for most civil
service jobs based on merit