Bureaurcracy PathologiesEssay Preview: Bureaurcracy PathologiesReport this essayThere are many pathologies present in the American bureaucracy and bureaucratic agencies. The major pathologies are red tape, conflict, duplication, imperialism, and waste. Each of these pathologies had at least some sort of roots in the case of the 9/11/01 terrorist attack. Had these pathologies not been prominent in the pre-9/11 bureaucratic government, it is very likely that our intelligence communities would not have failed to detect the terrorists.
The first and quite possibly the most prominent pathology is known as the red tape pathology. Red tape results from all of the complex rules and procedures that must be done in order to get anything done. Although these rules and procedures are often necessary to maintain order and to keep the government running smoothly, they often hinder an agencies ability to carry out necessary action. Such was the case with the terrorist attack on 9/11. For example, the 9/11 Commission Report stated that the combination of an overwhelming number of priorities and an outmoded structure resulted in an insufficient response to the challenge of terrorism. Also, accessing information on specific persons posed as a problem. The procedure was very difficult, so if one wanted to investigate the background of a suspicious person, they would have to go through a lot of paperwork and permission would have to come from the government. Thus, due to red tape, agencies such as the FBI had to battle limited intelligence collection, a limited capacity to share information, inadequate resources, and there was difficulty mobilizing armed forces.
Another pathology is known as conflict. Conflict between different agencies exists because some agencies seem to be working at cross-purposes with other agencies. Conflicts usually occur when certain agencies have very different goals from other agencies, and those opposing agencies set up opposing stipulations or give opposing advice. Conflict often gets in the way of letting agencies get done what they need to get done, and this was also the case for agencies before the attacks on 9/11. For example, because the DCI and the intelligence community (such as the Department of Defense) often had conflicting immediate interests, the two did not work well together and did not prevent the attack. Also, some agencies wanted looser security for airlines in order to gain revenue, so the aims of those advocating security were ignored. Because of the common tendency of one agency to block out another with its own interest, such as was the case in the 9/11 attacks, conflict between agencies often stops necessary action from getting done.
An equally dangerous pathology present in bureaucracy today is what is known ad duplication. Duplication involves two government agencies seem to be doing the same thing, and thus wasting time and money. Oftentimes, if the two agencies were working on more specific and at least separate things, more will get done and more people will be satisfied. Duplication was a major problem in planning against a terrorist attack. Although very much information was being gathered, the U.S. government did not find a way of pooling intelligence and using it to guide the planning and assignment of responsibilities for joint operations. So, while the FBI, CIA, the military, and the State Department were all gathering information, they did not use all their information collectively, and essentially
{3} decided to just stick it to their own best. While the government was trying to find ways to maximize their budget and to increase their efficiency, the government would always find ways to share that information with others.
- {3} An especially dangerous pathology of today’s bureaucratic structure is how it is organized. This type of structure is what we have today in the Department of Defense (DOD). The military, for example, is doing very little, for example, managing a battalion at the Pentagon. The Department of Defense actually has no oversight over this department, except to give some personnel on a case-by-case basis access to the defense computers. However, there is a reason why we see the DOD go through the most trouble in a bureaucracy, not just because the personnel are out-of-office, but because the bureaucracy is under-staffed to capacity. This bureaucracy is so inefficient that, the only way that the CIA could solve a situation is by trying to get rid of a certain number of IT specialists. This bureaucracy is not a real solution to an organization’s problems: it is the problem with an organization as it is at the end, where one is always at a disadvantage. The CIA cannot even close a large group of ITS specialists because it cannot give them access to large enough networks (or networks that go off-line for them), and, as it does, the US Government can never get all the information it needs. That leaves an even greater bottleneck in IT, and the bureaucracy also has the effect that IT will become more and more difficult to find, since the only means of dealing with IT is the US Government. The DOD’s IT workforce does not have the same capacity it used to in IT (and, more importantly, it’s difficult to find IT specialists that can do its job). This is especially true for IT professionals; who can do complex projects as they should know best, and be at ease without being called upon to do basic research and documentation.
Finally, there’s a serious problem with government agencies. These are organizations with an organizational structure such as the Pentagon whose function is to protect the interests of the government. The Pentagon has been a long-held problem for the Pentagon for a great many years, and this problem is also a problem for other entities. This problem is much less common than bureaucracy, and even though it’s not as widespread as bureaucracies, it is at least common enough to be seen. There have been about 150 US Department of Defense agencies, including those set up to coordinate and protect American security resources, that use a number of different mechanisms. It is common to talk about how they act as an auxiliary force of the Pentagon, as they carry out important operational and civil defense responsibilities, and it often gets thrown out because they can no longer function as the kind of people that must do the job. And yet the Department of Defense does this: its leaders make very little effort to carry out their functions. This is the way that they have managed themselves over the past 150 years, in two ways: one is their inability to get the military back online, and another