Bureaucrats

How did the French Revolution change ordinary lives? "Bureaucrats and Bourgeois Society" asks this question in relation to office clerks working in Parisian administrations. Under new masters, these clerks faced radical changes to work practices as reforming politicians looked to implement new 'administrative science'. Many also faced the loss of family inheritances, as positions no longer passed down from father to son. Clerks were now expected to make their career as individuals. In practice, this meant increased job insecurity.  Administrators lived under the threat of regular cuts in pay and of personnel. In this situation, some believed that the way to get ahead was by playing office politics. In the early nineteenth century, however, clerks mitigated their situation by modifying occupational practices. Inside the offices, they settled new modes of judging individual merit. Outside, they accumulated other forms of individual credit, in the process helping to define nineteenth-century bourgeois social capital, ideals of emulation, honor, and masculinity.  Job insecurity, however, continued to set 'bureaucrats' apart from the bourgeoisie and their social identity came under question during the July Monarchy and 1848 Revolution.

Does a national research-focused organization need a technically competent leader? This study provides preliminary answers to that question using a natural experiment underway at the Department of Energy (DOE): a leader with significant high-level management experience superior to that of his predecessors, but no relevant technical experience was appointed to run the vast scientific research operation. The following hypothesis is proposed: A major risk of allowing technically-unqualified leadership is that an amateur can be more easily manipulated by special interests against the best interests of the nation. The hypothesis is tested by technically analyzing three case studies on proposals from the Secretary of Energy. The results show 1) requests for budget cuts undermining DOE's mission, 2) requests for redundant studies wasting DOE resources, and 3) counter-productive recommendations derived from a misrepresentation of the studies' results, which indicate technical competence is important for DOE leadership. These preliminary results indicate technical competency is important for leaders running organizations that oversee research. Finally, a potential policy safe guard to the risks of extreme technical incompetence is provided, which can be applied to either independent- or politically-appointed bureaucrats.

Resumo O presente artigo é uma etnografia da Secretaria de Estado para os Povos Indígenas (SEIND), órgão vinculado ao poder executivo do estado do Amazonas, Brasil. Trata-se de uma administração pública produzida tanto por servidores indígenas quanto não in-dígenas, e da ocupação de um lugar de poder inédito na estrutura estatal por parte das populações indígenas. O acompanhamento das atividades cotidianas na SEIND demonstrou que o imbrica-mento entre diferentes formas de "estar" na administração pú-blica (como indígena, servidor, indígena-servidor, representante, técnico, só para citar alguns) imprime grande fluidez às concep-ções de 'Estado' e de 'indianidade'. Assim, as rotinas administrati-vas, a percepção dos servidores a respeito de seus trabalhos e as interações interinstitucionais recriam e atualizam tal dualidade de diferentes formas: "Estado" e "índios", "governo" e "movimento indígena", "técnica" e "política", "indígenas" e "não indígenas".

Due to the involvement of various political institutions and agents, the structure of Saljuq dynasty (1040-1193 AD) is unique in comparison to the political structure of other Islamic regimes. "Saljuqnameh" written by Zahir al-din Nishabouri provides a brief objective narration about the establishment and development of Saljuq governmental structure. Nishabouri’s detailed attention to the military generals as an important factor in the political changes of this period, and to the attempts by the bureaucrats to curb and control their power and to its use effectively to strengthen the Saljuq Government is an interesting characteristic of the book.
This article looks at the dialectic relationship and the intense competition between the military and bureaucratic institutions in Saljuq Dynasty. The secret alliance between military agents and the lack of unity between the bureaucrats prevented the bureaucratic institution to stop the military and break their exclusive domination in power.