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Bureaucratic Structure

  • Living reference work entry
  • First Online:
Global Encyclopedia of Public Administration, Public Policy, and Governance

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Synonyms

Governance: Actual decision-making processes

Bureaucratic structure: A formalized set of role expectations

Organizational capacity: Availability of relevant organizational units and staff

Organizational specialization: The separation of labor within organizations (horizontally and vertically)

Organizational affiliation: Organizational members’ level of involvement in organizations (primary, secondary, and so on)

Definition

Bureaucratic structure: A codified set of role expectations specifying who is expected to do what, how, and when.

Introduction

Governance takes place within and through bureaucratic structures (Bevir 2009). Bureaucratic structure provides the resource basis for governments to govern broadly speaking, and also the cement of modern political order and civilized political life (Fredrickson 2005; Fukuyama 2014; Kristof 2016; March and Olsen 2006). This chapter applies an organizational approach to account for how bureaucratic structure shapes governance (see...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. ARENA – Centre for European Studies, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Jarle Trondal

  2. Department of Political Science, University of Agder, Kristiansand, Norway

    Jarle Trondal

Authors
  1. Jarle Trondal
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Correspondence to Jarle Trondal .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, Florida, USA

    Ali Farazmand

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Trondal, J. (2017). Bureaucratic Structure. In: Farazmand, A. (eds) Global Encyclopedia of Public Administration, Public Policy, and Governance. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_643-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_643-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-31816-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-31816-5

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