Important Terms
Committees
The Federal Bureaucracy Today
Constraints
Bureaucracy Basic Knoledge
100
A bureaucratic pathology in which some agencies seem to be working at cross-purposes to other agencies.
What is bureaucracy conflict?
100
When A law is first passed and an agency is first created
What is when Legislative committees are most important?
100
Modest increase in number of government employees
What is direct and indirect growth?
100
Constraints come from citizens: agencies' responses to demands for openness, honesty, fairness, etc.
What is the reson of so manny constraints?
100
A large organization composed of appointed officers in which authority is divided among several managers.
What is bureaucracy?
200
Money formally set aside for a specific use and is an issue by the House Appropriations Committee.
What is appropriation?
200
Has power to influence an agency's policies through "marking up" an agency's budget
What is when Appropriations Committee is most powerful?
200
The Primary areas of delegation are... a. Subsidies to groups b. Grant-in-aid programs c. Enforcement of regulations
What is growth in discretionary authority?
200
An informal understanding among fellow employees of an agency as to how they are supposed to act.
What is bureaucratic culture?
300
A job description by an agency which is tailor-made for a specific person. These appointments occur in middle- and upper-level positions in the bureaucracy.
What is the buddy system?
300
Trust funds operate outside the regular government budget and annual authorizations
What is when Appropriations Committee becomes less powerful from?
300
The competitive service: most bureaucrats compete for jobs through OPM
What is the factors explaining behavior of officials
300
Administrative Procedure Act (1946) Freedom of Information Act (1966) National Environmental Policy Act (1969) Privacy Act (1974) Open Meeting Law (1976)
What is examples of general constraints?
300
Congressional supervision of the bureaucracy.
What is oversight?
400
Congressional veto of an executive decision during the specified period it must lie before Congress before it can take effect. The veto is effected through a resolution of disapproval passed by either house or by both houses. These resolutions do not need the president's signature. In 1983, the Supreme Court ruled such vetoes were unconstitutional, but Congress continues to enact laws containing them.
What is legislative veto?
400
When individual members of Congress can seek privileges for constituents
What is informal congressional controls over agencies?
400
Most bureaucrats cannot be fired, although there are informal methods of discipline
What is firing a bureaucrat?
400
Easier to block action than take action Reluctant decision making by lower-ranking employees, Red tape,
What are effects of constraints?
400
A bureaucratic pathology in which two government agencies seem to be doing the same thing.
What is duplication?
500
A special classification for high-level civil servants created by the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978. Members of this service can be hired, fired, and transferred more easily than ordinary civil servants. They are also eligible for cash bonuses and, if removed, are guaranteed jobs elsewhere in the government. The purpose of the service is to give the president more flexibility in recruiting, assigning, and paying high-level bureaucrats with policy-making responsibility
What is Senior Executive Service?
500
Congressional committees may seek committee clearance: right to pass on certain agency decisions and the legislative veto
What is informal congressional controls over agencies?
500
Assures continuity and expertise but also gives subordinates power over new bosses: can work behind boss's back through sabotage, delaying, etc.
What is the agencies' point of view?
500
Hiring, firing, pay, procedures, etc., established by law, not by market.
What is the reason of constraints being much greater on government agencies than on private bureaucracies?
500
A bureaucratic pathology in which complex rules and procedures must be followed to get things done.
What is red tape?
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