RP2006/21
Grzegorz W. Kolodko:
Institutions, Policies and
Economic Development
Institutions are not only created and built, but also, and especially,
need to be learnt. It is
a process which takes place in all economies, but acquires a special
importance in less
advanced countries. Not only theoretical arguments, but also the
practical experience
over the past 15 years demonstrates that faster economic growth, and
hence also more
broadly, socioeconomic development, is attained by those countries
which take greater
care to foster the institutional reinforcement of market economy.
However, progress in
market-economy institution building is not in itself sufficient to
ensure sustained
growth. Another indispensable component is an appropriately designed
and
implemented economic policy which must not confuse the means with the
aims.
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RP2006/52 John Toye:
Modern
Bureaucracy
(PDF 181KB)
Max Weber believed that bureaucracy could be understood by analysing
its ideal-typical
characteristics, and that these characteristics would become more
pervasive as the modern age
advanced. Weber’s horizontal account of bureaucracy can be criticised
on various grounds,
including its unrealistic notion of bureaucratic rationality. An
alternative view is proposed,
namely, that the development of state bureaucracies is driven by the
trajectory of the highpower
politics in which they are nested.
This claim is examined in the light of historical examples of the
evolution of bureaucracies – in
Prussia, Britain, the USA and Japan. In analysing these cases, the
paper examines the original
visions behind different institutional designs in different countries,
and discusses how the vision
was formed and how durable it proved to be. In contrast to sociological
and historical
explanations, the analytical contribution of new institutional
economists to understanding the
problems of bureaucratic evolution is assessed.
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B. Bowornwathana,
1997
Thailand: bureaucracy under
coalition governments
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Pratikno, 2002
Initiating
citizen participation in local policy making in Indonesia
Abstract
Citizen participation in public policy making was absence in Indonesia
during the centralized and military-bureaucratic authoritarian regime,
1965-1998. Following the felt down of the government in 1998,
decentralization was promoted and the first free and fair election in
the last 44 years was conducted. The emerging of civil society
organizations and freedom of the press has been coloring the political
reform.
This paper shows that the political reform for decentralization and
democratization do not guarantee the increase of citizen participation
in public policy making. The getting much stronger local parliament in
local government structure does not intensify people’s involvement and
control over policymaking and implementation. Local bureaucracy tends
to be defensive and reluctant the change the exclusive policymaking.
The more politically active society, civil society organization and
local press are able to speak loudly but unable to develop more
effective participation. |
A. A. Syed, 2002
Pakistan: establishment vs.
bureaucracy
Bureaucracy (normally known as bura-karey-see) was and is involved in
corruption but it is a bitter reality that it certainly is the
strongest Mafia of the country since 1947. Bureaucracy has always been
in the background of every coming and going government. This is no way
to deal with Bureaucracy the way NRB is proposing. It will only start a
cold war between the Establishment (Armed forces) and the Bureaucrats.
Results could be predicted keeping in view the history of all Military
leaders of Pakistan in the past. Wear and tear of bureaucracy is on in
NRB and ED(Establishment Division) camps. Only Military men are
involved in these new planning’s and no worthy representation granted
to the mainly affected department of bureaucrats. President should
realize that he needs to keep everyone with him at this juncture and
country cannot afford another cold war between or among giants of
Pakistan i.e. Military and Bureaucracy. It will only result in more
problems. |
A. A. Akhtan,
2003
A tale of loot and plunder
In any case, there is now a new force encroaching, and one that
official data often conveniently misses out on. The state is
increasingly grabbing land, along with the state elite’s own autonomous
corporate entities. There is a fair bit of land in Pakistan that
remains uncultivated (or under-cultivated), which in many areas is
referred to as shaamilaat, or commons. Livestock rearing remains a
significant source of income for many rural dwellers, as does low-cost,
organic, rain-fed agriculture. In many cases, such activities take
place on shaamilaat. Under the guise of “development” projects, a large
amount of such land is being usurped by the state. This is done by
conveniently assuming that shaamilaat land is state land. Therefore,
when such land is acquired, the state does not even bother to account
for the destruction of livelihood and eco-systems that takes place, let
alone accommodate the losses that are inflicted on local communities. |
R. Bedi, 1999
India-Pakistan. Defense
bureaucracy takes on real soldiers |
G. Kandelaki,
2002
Military corruption in Georgia |
P. Gizewski/ T.
Homer-Dixon, 1996
Environmental scarcity and
violent conflict: the case of Pakistan |
D. A.
Sotiropoulos, 1995
The remains of
authoritarianism: bureaucracy and civil society in post-authoritarian
Greece |
F. W. Riggs, 1996
Bureaucracy and
Constitutional Democracy
Although we usually think about "bureaucracy" in the context of public
administration, the system of appointed officials, military and civil,
in every state also has great political significance, not only in the
sense that officials exercise direct influence on the shaping of public
policies but they also affect the capacity of regimes to survive.
Maladministration not only leads to popular dissatisfaction with
governments but it can provoke public officials, led by military
officers, to seize power and become a ruling elite. They may do this to
abort revolutionary movements and rebellions, or simply to replace a
regime that cannot govern. Explanations based on the ambitions of
military officers strike me as quite inadequate. |
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Keith Hart, 2005
Formal Bureaucracy and the
Emergent Forms of the Informal Economy
The following essay has three parts. The first is a story about
fluctuations in the balance
of the relationship between impersonal and personal principles of
social organization.
This draws heavily on Max Weber’s interpretation of western history.
The second part
reviews the concept of an ‘informal economy/sector’ from its origin in
discussions of
the Third World urban poor to its present status as a universal feature
of economy. The
third part asks how we might conceive of combining the formal/informal
pair with a
view to promoting development. In conclusion I suggest how partnerships
between
bureaucracy and the people might be made more equal. |
B. Martin et al,
1997
Challenging Bureaucratic Elites
The word 'bureaucracy' makes most people think of government --
departments of taxation, welfare, police, you name it. But actually
bureaucracies are found everywhere: corporations, churches, the
military, trade unions, political parties, schools, hospitals. Most
people accept them as a necessary part of life, although they may
complain about them. Nobody likes getting caught in bureaucratic
regulations, popularly called 'red tape'.
Yet most bureaucracies are pretty new. Several hundred years ago there
were hardly any bureaucracies like the familiar ones today.
Bureaucracies have gradually become the main way to organise work.
Their key characteristics are:
- hierarchy: bosses at the top, workers at
the bottom;
- division of labour: different people do
different specialised tasks, such as salespeople, secretaries and
accountants in a company;
- rules describing the duties of workers;
- standard operating procedures.
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D. Isenberg, 1999
The other bloated educational
bureaucracy
U.S. training of foreign military personnel has long been
controversial. Liberals, for example, have long criticized
installations such as the School of Americas for training Latin
American military personnel, who use their newly learned skills to
better repress the citizenry of their own countries, for example,
Noriega in Panama, or the soldiers in El Salvador. For years, Amnesty
International has documented human-rights abuses in countries that
receive security assistance... |
E. Mandel, 1993
Bureaucracy, East and West
Mandel defines the bureaucracy as a social layer which has appropriated
administrative functions previously exercised by society as a whole.
He characterises the bureaucracy's actions in the former Soviet Union
as aiming not to restore capitalism nor to build a classless socialist
society, but to defend and extend its own power and privilege. It did
not have the social, historical and economic roots of a new ruling
class, but it did have sufficient autonomy to defend itself. Its
historic basis was the decline and later disappearance of independent
mass activity, international isolation and industrial backwardness. |
M. N. Rothbard,
1995
Bureaucracy and the civil
service in the United States
One of the most important sociological laws is the “Iron Law of
Oligarchy”: every field of human endeavor, every kind of organization,
will always be led by a relatively small elite. This condition will
hold sway everywhere, whether it be a business firm, a trade union, a
government, a charitable organization, or a chess club. In every area,
the persons most interested and able, those most adaptable to or suited
for the activity, will constitute the leading elite. Time and again,
utopian attempts to form institutions or societies exempt from the Iron
Law have fallen prey to that law: whether it be utopian communities,
the kibbutz in Israel, “participatory democracy” during the New Left
era of the late 1960s, or the vast “laboratory experiment” (as it used
to be called) that constituted the Soviet Union. What we should try to
achieve is not the absurd and anti-natural goal of eradicating such
elites, but, in Pareto’s term, for the elites to “circulate.” Do these
elites circulate or do they become entrenched? |
B. Martin, 1990
The Military
Superficially, military forces are a prime root of war. They are
responsible for fighting, the organised use of force against human and
technological opposition. Without military forces, there would be no
war as currently conceived.
At a deeper level, military forces may seem to be a consequence of the
war system, namely as agents of ruling groups. Modern military forces
are mobilised by the state, as a defence of the interests of state
elites against external and internal enemies. Without addressing the
dominant social interests in the state, a focus on eliminating the
military alone is quite inadequate.
But although military forces do indeed serve the interests of the
state, the military is not purely a tool. Military personnel, and
especially military elites (the officer corps) have their own special
interests. Military elites will not sit by idly while state power is
dissolved or transferred to interests seen as hostile to military
interests. The many military regimes around the world testify to the
potential semi-independent political role of military forces. Military
forces may serve state interests, but this is often contingent on state
interests serving military interests. The state and the military
support each other, and they need to be addressed both separately and
jointly. |
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