Agreement as to when and how the word bureaucracy was invented is widespread and precise. ‘The late M. de Gornay…’ notes Baron de Grimm, the French philosopher, in a letter dated 1 July 1764, ‘sometimes used to…invent a...

Bureaucracy, in its most general sense, describes a way of organizing the activities of any institution so that it functions efficiently and impersonally. The major theorist of bureaucracy was Max Weber, and most subsequent research and theorizing has...

The system of organization and administration associated with most large organizations, including educational...

The origin of the term bureaucracy can be traced to eighteenth-century French literature (Albrow 1970). The early usage referred to an official workplace (bureau) in which individual activities were routinely determined by explicit rules and...

Bureaucracy is the structure and set of regulations in place to control activity, usually in large organizations and government. It is characterized by standardized procedure (rule-following), formal division of responsibility, hierarchy, and impersonal...

As a former lower-to mid-level bureaucrat for 11 or so years in the U.S. government, I was amused to read Stephen Barr's March 8 Federal Page article, "Title Creep Reported at Agencies," as well as your March 11 editorial "Federal Operetta." As a...

Why is it that small lean companies can react like gazelles and achieve incredible productivity, while larger corporations just seem to be plodding along? More often than not, it's because the larger elephants become bogged down in the molasses of their own bureaucracy. ...

Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon formally endorsed a radical streamlining of United Nations operations Monday, delivering a report to the General Assembly that urges the elimination of unnecessary bureaucracy.The sprawling U.N. system contains 16 specialized agencies, 14 funds and programs, and 17 departments and offices, leading to...

Two years after the nation's commando forces were given broad authority to attack terrorist networks, the elite units remain hampered by uncertainty over coordination, says the admiral chosen to head the U.S. Special Operations Command.Navy Vice Adm. Eric Olson said that while the command has...

Red tape. Sluggishness. Files. Layers. All of these things are characteristics of what we call a modern day bureaucracy. By definition, however, bureaucracies were never intended to be something negative.

Critical essay about the dangers of bureaucracy. Questions the cost of numerous rules and regulations. Uses the pretext of a preschool to illustrate the point.