MINNESOTA STATE UNIVERSITY, MANKATO
Department of Government
MPA Program
Instructor:
N. Doran Hunter, Ph.D.
Course:
PS 665 – Bureaucracy and the Administrative Process.
Text:
James Q. Wilson, Bureaucracy: What Government Agencies Do and Why
They Do It. Basic Books, 1989.
There will be many other sources of reading material to be found in the
attached bibliography, and coming from websites.
Grades:
20% of the grade will be based on classroom discussion, 20% on the book
review requirement, and 60% based on the take home, case based, final
examination.
Comments on Class Requirements
We are all fortunate in that most students, and the professor, have extensive experience in
working for federal, state or local government bureaucracies. This fact means that we all
bring to the class knowledge of how bureaucracies work, their problems and foibles, and
we also bring a sense of what needs to be done to make bureaucracies work better and to
serve the public at a higher level of performance. This means that students, and the
professor, should engage in substantial and extensive discussion as we digest the reading
materials, identify the principles that define and drive bureaucratic practice, and then
apply these principles to our own work places. Students should have read the assigned
readings before coming to class and be prepared to participate in the process of
understanding why bureaucracies operate as they do.
Below you will please find a suggestive bibliography of some books and articles that are
well known in this field of public administration. Each student is required to select one
book from the list of books, or two learned journal articles from the list of articles, and to
then write a ten-page book or article review. The ten-page review should assume 250
words per page and lay out the following elements: what is the thesis of the work; how is
the thesis supported; what principles of bureaucratic practice are demonstrated; and, how
do those principles apply to your work place. Each student should provide a copy of their
report to all other students, and the instructor, the week before the report presentation is
to be made. Each student will have thirty minutes to present the report to the class, ten
minutes of which should be devoted to student and professor questions. The review
presentations will come during the last few weeks of the semester. One purpose of this
requirement is to begin preparing students for the MPA Comprehensive Examination,
which is partly literature based.
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The final examination is a take home, case based effort. The final examination product is
to be at least fifteen pages; information gleaned from the books and articles read for the
class should be used to address the questions attached to the case; footnotes from the
reading materials are to be properly cited; and, personal workplace experiential acumen
touching on the case and its problems are welcomed by the instructor. The case will come
from the public administration case study file index sponsored by Hallway, a University
of Washington case study writing program. The case will spell out practical, troublesome
conditions faced by a rather typical public sector bureaucracy and will allow the student
to apply knowledge learned in the class, and from his or her own practical work
experience, to the problems and bureaucratic situations laid out by the case writer(s).
Students will receive the case some nine weeks into the semester and can begin planning
for the experience well before the final examination due date, which will be on December
8, 2011.
Course Outline
Note
The purpose of discussing the materials found in the textbook is to begin
identifying the basic characteristics of bureaucracy that describe the operations of
the typical public sector organization (if such a thing exists).
1.
Introductions and description of course requirements.
What is a high performing organization?
Definitions of “bureaucracy” and “administrative process.”
Reading assignments: Chapters One and Two from the text.
August 25, 2011
2.
Book review (article) assignments.
Discussion from Chapter One (Organizations) and Chapter Two (Organization
Matters).
Taking apart and designing complex organizations.
Reading assignments: Chapters Three through Six.
September 1, 2011
3.
Lecture on the subject of Organizational Culture and Bureaucracy.
Discussion from Chapter Three (Circumstances), Chapter Four (Beliefs),
Chapter Five (Interests) and Chapter Six (Culture).
Reading assignments: Chapters Seven through Nine.
September 8, 2011
4.
Lecture on the subject of the functions of executives and managers.
New techniques of managing knowledge workers in complex bureaucracies.
Discussion of Chapter Seven (Constraints), Chapter Eight (People) and Chapter
Nine (Compliance).
Reading assignments: Chapters Ten through Twelve.
September 15, 2011
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5.
Continuing lecture on managing decision making processes using interactive,
group based techniques.
Simulation using three interactive, group based decision techniques.
Discussion of Chapter Ten (Turf), Chapter Eleven (Strategies) and Chapter
Twelve (Innovation).
Reading assignment: Chapters Thirteen and Fourteen.
September 22, 2011
6.
Lecture on the subject of the administrative process: Rule Making.
The rule making process and the complexities of bureaucracy.
Discussion of Chapter Thirteen (Congress) and Chapter Fourteen (Presidents).
Reading assignments: Chapters Fifteen and Seventeen.
September 29, 2011
7.
Lecture on the subject of the administrative process: Adjudication.
The adjudicatory process and the complexities of bureaucracy.
Discussion of Chapter Fifteen (Courts) and Chapter Seventeen (Problems).
Reading assignments: Chapters Eighteen through Twenty.
October 6, 2011
8.
Lecture on the subject of the administrative process: Executive Function.
The executive function and the complexities of bureaucracies.
Discussion of Chapter Eighteen (Rules), Nineteen (Markets) and Twenty
(Bureaucracy and the Public Interest).
October 13, 2011
9.
An evening with Stephen B. Young, Global Executive Director of the Caux
Round Table.
Good Governance and Ethical Practices in Public Sector Bureaucracies.
The case for the final examination will be handed out. Oh, goodie.
October 20, 2011
10.
Book Reports 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
October 27, 2011
11.
Book Reports 6, 7, 8, 9.
November 3, 2011
12.
Book Reports 9, 10, 11, 12.
November 10, 2011
13.
Book Reports 13, 14, 15, 16.
November 17, 2011
14.
Thanksgiving Break.
November 24, 2011
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15.
Book Reports 17, 18, 19, 20.
December 1, 2011
Course Bibliography
Some Classics
Chris Argyris, Some Causes of Organizational Ineffectiveness. CISR Press, 1967.
David Armstrong, Bullets and Bureaucrats. Greenwood Press, 1982.
Douglas Arnold, Congress and the Bureaucracy. Yale University Press, 1979.
Chester Barnard, The Functions of the Executive. Harvard University Press, 1938.
Jonathan Bendor, Parallel Systems: Redundancy In Government. U of Cal Press, 1985.
Peter Blau, The Dynamics of Bureaucracy. University of Chicago Press, 1955.
Martha Derthick, Agency Under Stress. Brookings Institution, 1974.
Anthony Downs, Inside Bureaucracy. Little, Brown, 1967.
Peter Drucker, The Effective Executive. HarperBusiness, 1966.
Charles Goodsell, The Case for Bureaucracy, 2nd ed. Chatham House, 1985.
Morton Halperin, Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy. Brookings Institution,1974.
Hamilton, Madison, and Jay, The Federalist Papers, Clinton Rossiter, ed. Mentor, 1961.
Hugh Heclo, A Government of Strangers. Brookings Institution, 1999.
Irving Janus, Victims of Group Think: A Psychological Study of Foreign Policy,1972.
Daniel Katz, et alia, Bureaucratic Encounters. University of Michigan, 1975.
Robert Katzmann, Regulatory Bureaucracy. MIT Press, 1980.
Herbert Kaufman, The Forest Ranger. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981.
David Lilienthal, Democracy on the March. Harper, 1953.
Michael Lipsky, Street Level Bureaucracy. Russell Sage Foundation, 1980.
James March and Herbert Simon, Organizations. John Wiley and Sons, 1958.
Malcolm McConnell, Challenger: A Major Malfunction. Doubleday Press, 1987.
Jerry Mashaw, Bureaucratic Justice. Harvard University Press, 1993.
Frederick Mosher, Governmental Reorganization. Bobbs- Merrill, 1967.
Robert Nathan, The Plot That Failed. John Wiley and Sons, 1975.
Richard Neustadt, Presidential Power. John Wiley, 1960.
William Niskanen, Bureaucracy and Representative Government. Aldine-Atherton, 1971.
Harvey Sapolsky, The Polaris System Development. Harvard University Press, 1972.
Edgar Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership. Jossey-Bass, 1985.
William Scott and David Hart, Organizational America. Houghton Mifflin, 1980.
Herbert Simon, Administrative Behavior, 3rd ed. Free Press, 1976.
Lloyd Warner, et Alia, The American Federal Executive. Yale University Press, 1963.
Donald Warwick, A Theory of Public Bureaucracy. Harvard University Press, 1975.
Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Scribner, 1930.
Max Weber, Economy and Society. Stanford University Press, 1922.
Graham Wilson, The Politics of Safety and Health. Clarendon Press, 1985.
James Wilson, Varieties of Police Behavior. Harvard University Press, 1968.
Douglas Yates, Bureaucratic Democracy. Harvard University Press, 1982.
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Some More Contemporary Works
Ronald C. Moe and Robert S. Gilmore, “Rediscovering Principles of Public
Administration: The Neglected Foundations of Public Law,” Public Administration
Review 55, no. 2 (March-April 1995):135-146.
Jerrell D. Coggburn and Saundra K. Schneider, “The Quality of Management and
Government Performance: An Empirical Analysis of the American States,” Public
Administration Review 63, no. 2 (March-April 2003): 206-213.
Charles Barrilleaux, “Statehouse Bureaucracy: Institutional Consistency in a Changing
Environment,” in American State and Local Politics, ed. Ronald E. Weber and Paul
Brace (New York: Chatham House, 1999).
Elliot Sclar, You Don’t Always Get What You Pay For. Cornell University Press, 2000.
J. Norman Baldwin, “Public versus Private Employees: Debunking Stereotypes,” Review
of Public Personnel Administration 12 (winter 1991): 1-27.
Kenneth J. Meier, “Bureaucracy and Democracy: The Case for More Bureaucracy and
Less Democracy,” Public Administration Review 57, no.3 (May-June 1997): 193-199.
Elizabeth G. Hill, “California Legislative Analysts Office: An Isle of Independence,”
Spectrum: The Journal of State Government 6, no. 4 (2003): 26-29.
Sally Selden, The Promise of Representative Bureaucracy: Diversity and Responsiveness
in a Government Agency. M.E. Sharpe, 1997.
Donald E. Kettl, The Global Public Management Revolution: A Report on the
Transformation of Governance. Brookings Institution, 2000.
Darrell M. West, Assessing E-Government: The Internet, Democracy and Service
Delivery by State and Federal Governments. The World Bank, 2003.
Ramona McNeal, Caroline J. Tolbert, Karen Mossberger, and Lisa J. Botterweich,
“Innovating in Digital Government in the American States,” Social Science Quarterly 84
no.1 (March 2003): 52-70.
Darrell West, State and Federal Electronic Government in the United States. Brookings
Institution, 2008.
Morris P. Fiorina, “Flagellating the Federal Bureaucracy,” Society (March-April 1983):
73-92.
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David Rothkopf, Running the World: The Inside Story of the National Security Council
and the Architects of American Power. Public Affairs Press, 2005.
Bob Woodward, Bush at War. Simon & Schuster, 2002.
Bob Woodward, Obama’s War. Simon & Shuster, 2010.
Douglas Brinkley, The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the
Mississippi Coast. HarperCollins, 2006.
N. Doran Hunter, “The Moral Instinct and Organizational Excellence: An American
Perspective, Caux Round Table Publications, Spring, 2010.
Daniel Goleman, Social Intelligence. Bantam, 2006.
David Brooks, The Social Animal. Random House, 2011.
David Moshman and Molly Geil, “Collaborative Reasoning, Evidence for Collective
Rationality,” 4, no. 3 (July 1998): 231-248.
Benjamin Ginsberg, The Fall of the Faculty: The Rise of the All-Administrative
University and Why It Matters. Oxford University Press, 2011.
John Brehm and Scott Gates, Working, Shriking, and Sabotage. University of Michigan
Press, 1997.
Learning Objectives
To become familiar with the structure and processes of complex organizations and the
bureaucracies that serve within them. To identify the traits and characteristics of complex
bureaucracies. To understand how bureaucracies can become effective or ineffective
given certain conditions and circumstances within and without complex organizations. To
learn about decision making in bureaucracies and how to improve bureaucratic
performance. To appreciate how complex the bureaucratic interaction is between and
among the branches of government, and within the larger departments of government,
and the independent regulatory agencies of government.
Note
Every attempt will be made to accommodate qualified students with disabilities. If you
are a student with a documented disability, please see early in the semester as possible to
discuss the necessary accommodations, and/or contact the Disability Services Office at
507-389-2825 or 1-800-627-3529 ((MRS/TTV).
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