| This article fundamentally misunderstands the role and purpose of bureaucracy. Bureaucracy is tool to manage large, complex, and heterogeneous systems. Ideally, efficient and effective bureaucracy goes unnoticed. Why can I plug my laptop into the power outlet anywhere in Miami or in Vancouver and it just works? Why can I drive on the right side of the road from Toronto to San Diego and be reasonably sure that everyone else will drive on the right side as well? Because humans have self-organized into a multitude of governments, standards organizations, and corporations that all align to produce the same shape of power plug and teach compatible rules-of-the-road across vast geographical distances and unrelated communities. Without bureaucracy, we humans would not be capable of building a global society. Pointing to broken, ineffective, and inefficient processes to scapegoat “the bureaucrat” reveals an ignorance of the underlying mechanisms that make human society function. EDIT:
To those of you downvoting this comment, please let me elaborate. I am tired of the trope of the lazy bureaucrat because I refuse to believe that inefficient government and corporations are inevitable. I do believe that we must strive for efficient and effective government to improve our society because the potential benefits are immense. Those improvements must be driven by competent and qualified leaders who understand and foster the advantages that result from collaboration, communication, and making choices that benefit society as whole. A failure of bureaucracy is a failure of leadership! |