Bureaucracy, the Bureaucratic Auditor, and the Ombudsman: An Ideal-Type Analysis

Abstract

During the first quarter of the twentieth century, Max Weber used a method he called “ideal-type analysis” to describe an emerging phenomenon, bureaucracy, that allegedly was destined to displace traditional forms of public and private administration. In the century’s final quarter, it is manifest that Weber’s prophecy has been fulfilled: bureaucracy is everywhere triumphant. That this is so is a frequent cause of lament, because as bureaucracy has become ubiquitous, some serious problems have arisen, particularly problems concerning the impact of public bureaucracy on citizens. This chapter’s purposes are to identify the main problems with bureaucracy; to develop an ideal type of the bureaucratic auditor, an institution designed to deal with the problems; and to analyze an increasingly popular office—the Ombudsman, as it exists in several countries and particularly in Israel—against the ideal type.

Earlier versions of a considerable portion of this chapter were presented as a paper at the national conference of the American Society for Public Administration in Syracuse, New York, on 5 May 1974; as a lecture, sponsored by the Minnesota Humanities Commission and the National Endowment for the Humanities, at Moorhead State College on 31 March 1975; and as a paper at the biennial conference of the International Bar Association in Sydney, Australia, on 12 September 1978. Elaborations of the chapter’s contents will be found in the writer’s forthcoming book, Ombudsmen, Bureaucracy, and Democracy. Thanks are due to Stanley Anderson, Karl Friedmann, Walter Gellhorn, William Gwyn, Hugh MacNiven, Ira Sharkansky, and David Whitney—all of whom provided valuable comments on earlier versions of this chapter.