What does Lipsky mean by the term street level bureaucrat?
Street-level bureaucrats are “public service workers who interact directly with citizens in the course of their jobs, and who have substantial discreation in the execution of their work” (Lipsky 1980).
What is an example of a street level bureaucrat?
Street-level bureaucracy is the subset of a public agency or government institution where the civil servants work who have direct contact with members of the general public. A few examples include police officers, border guards, social workers and public school teachers.
What does street level mean?
: at the same level as the street Our apartment is at street level.
What is the meaning of freight?
cargo, shipment
What does discretion mean?
2 : the quality of having or showing discernment or good judgment : the quality of being discreet : circumspection especially : cautious reserve in speech. 3 : ability to make responsible decisions. 4 : the result of separating or distinguishing.
Why does bureaucracy exist?
Why do bureaucracies exist and why are they needed? Bureaucracies are created in government to carry out a broad range of tasks, to provide necessary services, and to act as experts in particular areas of policy.
What are the three main features of a bureaucracy?
Bureaucracies have four key characteristics: a clear hierarchy, specialization, a division of labor, and a set of formal rules, or standard operating procedures. America’s bureaucracy performs three primary functions to help the government run smoothly. It implements the laws and policies made by elected officials.
What are the 5 principles of bureaucratic management?
The principles of Bureaucracy theory are formal hierarchy structure, formal rules and norms, specialization, equality, recruitment based on abilities and qualification, an “up-focused” or “in-focused” mission and systematic filling.
Is bureaucracy a good thing?
Bureaucracy in Government and Business In government or large organizations, bureaucracy is indispensable in administering rules and regulations. A bureaucratic structure is designed to administer large-scale and systematic coordination between many people working at different levels to achieve a common goal.
What are the pros and cons of bureaucracy?
The advantages and disadvantages of a bureaucracy show that a well-structured environment can improve efficiencies and reduce barriers that could limit production. A bureaucracy that is not structured well can be inefficient and cost more in time and financial resources than it will save.
Why bureaucracy is inefficient?
Public bureaucracies are less efficient than private organizations in many of their activities. While private organizations can easily channel this surplus energy into value-creating activities, public bureaucracies are less able to do that, and they have to rely on rules and other constraints to cope with it.
Is bureaucracy efficient or inefficient?
Weber saw bureaucracy as the most rational organizational form and thus as superior to any other form of organiza- tions. Subsequent authors, however, found that bureaucracy is far from being perfectly efficient. On the contrary, several scholars concluded that bureaucracy is overly inefficient.
Is federal bureaucracy efficient?
The evidence is persuasive that government bureaucracy is inherently inefficient precisely because it is not faced with any of the forces which make private business management its opposite.