Bureaucratic Structure and Personality.

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Jahangier Rouf                Management

MN100

Course Assignment 1

Bureaucratic Structure and Personality

The aims of the article are quite clear cut. Robert K Merton examines the structure and dysfunctions of a bureaucracy, also structural sources of over conformity. He has provided this article to give the reader an understanding of how an organisation is structured describing the ideal form of bureaucracy in giving us theories, he shows hierarchy (chain of command). In demonstrating different theories or indeed behaviour in the work place Robert K Merton adopts views from theorists; the theorists give their opinions on how an organisation or a business is run bureaucratically. Each case has some strength’s and some weaknesses.

Bureaucracy is a system of control, managing an organisation.  

Bureaucratic organizations are broken up into specialized departments or ministries, to each of which is assigned responsibility for pursuing a limited number of official goals. Weber has said that “in such an organisation there is integrated a series of offices, of hierarchized statuses” (p1). He goes on to say that each office has different jobs and responsibility, there is a pecking order in terms of how and what work is carried out, this pecking order is a way of “distribution of authority within the system” (p1). This can be identified with what is known as chain of command. Certain rules and regulations need to be followed, without these rules there will be no real order, people not working efficiently as there is a lack of discipline.

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Here is a summery of Weber’s concept of bureaucracy that is known as the ‘ideal type’, we have division of labour among officials, definite hierarchy of offices, systems of rules and regulations, selection to office is by technical qualifications and discipline over the incumbent of each office.

With Webers view of positive, there is also aspects of negative bureaucracy, Merton highlights this so called dysfunction of bureaucracy using Veblens concept  that bureaucracy leads to ‘trained incapacity’ (P562) which means that a person is trained to be weak? In other words you are limited to what you can do, because ...

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