Bureaucracy

The study of bureaucracy has to deal with an elemental paradox. The role of bureaucracy has obviously increased dramatically in modern times. This is true not only of government bureaucracies but business bureaucracies as well. Though there were a few bureaucracies of significant size in pre-industrial times, such as the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church and the civil services of various Chinese empires, they were clearly exceptional. By contrast, a very large proportion of the total resources in the developed nations are controlled by either governmental or private bureaucracies. The role of governmental bureaucracies, at least, has increased with some rapidity within the last few decades. The increase in the use of bureaucracies has occurred in so many countries that it could hardly be due entirely to chance, and thus must be due to what are, in some sense, social choices to use more bureaucracy.