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Bureaucracy

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Submitted By kirstywallace3
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A bureaucracy is defined as a form of organisation that centres on precision, speed, reliability, and efficiency achieved through the creation of job specialisation, hierarchical structure and detailed rules and regulations. (Visitchaichan, n.d. p.5) Bureaucratic organisations have been around for a very long time. They began as primarily the structure for just a few political and religious organisations (e.g. the US Government and the Roman Catholic Church). But by the second half of the 19th century, businesses were becoming larger and more complicated, and there was a move from small, primarily family run organisations to huge companies with hundreds or even thousands of employees. It became clear that a new form of organisation was required to deal with the increasing administrative problems of these larger companies. (Volti, 2008, p.80)
Max Weber created the idea of bureaucratic structure of organisation that he believed would counteract these issues. His theory, however, is permeated by scepticism. He describes the bureaucracy as the most dominant form of modern control, both positively and negatively. Although he describes bureaucracies as the fairest and most efficient method of control, he was alarmed by their rapid spread through state, business and institutions and concerned about the effect that they would have on the people within the bureaucratic structure. He argued that due to their technical superiority, bureaucracies would come to dominate all forms of human organisation like an “iron cage” in which humans are eternally trapped. (Barker, 1993, p.408)
In order to fully understand the impact that bureaucracies have on contemporary work and organising, we must understand the factors that make up a bureaucracy. Weber describes six major traits that he regarded as fundamental. The first is a formal hierarchical structure where each level has

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