17 2.8 – NON-CONSTITUTIONAL ACTORS: THE BUREAUCRACY

NON-CONSTITUTIONAL ACTORS: THE BUREAUCRACY

The term bureaucracy refers to the non-elected professionals in government who are responsible for carrying out government policies. Bureaucrats in government are, by definition, influential in the policy process, due to their policy implementation responsibilities. Max Weber (1922) provided the best-known description of the bureaucratic model by identifying six characteristics of public bureaucracies: specialization and identifiable divisions of labor, organizational hierarchy, formal rules governing actions, maintenance of formal records, impersonality, and professionalism based on merit-based hiring practices (Bond and Smith, 2016).

After a series of civil service reforms during and after the Progressive Era, the federal bureaucracy became a more professional organization designed to influence and implement public policy. Over time, a more technically proficient federal bureaucracy went beyond carrying out public policy to interpreting laws and influencing the final policy products. Federal bureaucrats are also significantly involved in the formation of new public policies. The accumulation of policy expertise in the merit-based bureaucracy creates a system where non-elected bureaucrats know more about specific policy areas than do elected officials passing legislation. Contemporary federal bureaucrats have the knowledge required to introduce policy directives and influence the passage of new laws they will be responsible for executing on a daily basis (Whitman-Cobb, 2020).

Bureaucrats are usually most influential during the policy implementation stage of the public policy process. New policies introduced by the legislative branch are generally vague, so they require policy experts within the bureaucracy to implement specific rules governing individual situations. Bureaucrats are also called upon to interpret the meaning of the flexible language used in legislation in order to put specific policies into actual practice. An example of this explication occurred with the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010. The final version of the ACA legislation was almost 1,000 pages in length, while the subsequent bureaucratic rules attached to it were over 20,000 pages long (Whitman-Cobb, 2020).

Another advantage of the bureaucracy’s influence over the policy process is that bureaucrats are usually both informed and accountable. The specialized knowledge accumulated by career bureaucrats in government agencies gives them a unique ability to understand which public policy options are best for the public. This expertise gives them an advantage over elected political leaders responsible for making policy decisions in areas with which they may not be overwhelmingly familiar. The accountability of public bureaucrats to public institutions can make bureaucratic policy decisions superior to recommendations from interest groups that are not beholden to legitimate sources of authority (Goodsell, 1983). We will now examine the impact of the general population on policy making. 

2.8.1.  Citizens

Voting is one of the most effective ways for the public to exercise its political power over the elected branches of government. Voting allows citizens to have a direct impact on the policy process by installing elected leaders into office who align with citizen policy preferences. Aside from voting, citizens have many opportunities to influence the policy process. Public opinion is especially influential in a liberal democracy like the U.S. A general understanding of democratic theory suggests that representative government will provide, within reason, what the public demands. While several exceptions exist when the public is passionate and united about an issue, elected leaders tend to make policy decisions in line with public opinion. Policy areas showing high levels of opinion-policy congruence indicate the potentially significant influence of the public on public policy decisions (Bardes and Oldendick, 2012). Such congruence occurs, for example, in a state where the majority of the population favors the death penalty and the state government creates policies that allow for capital punishment.

The general population can also influence public policy decisions by taking direct action. Protections in the First Amendment allow Americans to speak and publish their political opinions, directly address grievances to elected government, and peacefully assemble in order to affect policy decisions. Civic activism, marches, and public protests against unpopular public policies have successfully influenced policy decisions throughout American history. For example, members of the civil rights movement, led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., marched on Washington D.C. in 1963 to bring the public’s attention to the racial inequalities existing in America. Coupled with protests earlier that year in Birmingham, Alabama, growing public pressure influenced Congress to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964 the next year. While not constitutionally protected, civil disobedience has also been used to successfully achieve policy goals protecting minority and women’s rights (Simon et al., 2020). In the next section, we will discuss the ability of policy makers to be influenced by the actions of interest groups.  

2.8.2.  Interest Groups

Interest groups influence public policy decisions that favor a specific population. Interest groups are especially powerful in the U.S. due to the constitutional protections afforded to free expression and their ability to have direct contact in representative government. Scholars argue that multiple interest groups clashing over different issues furthers the public good better than any other system (Dahl, 1961). According to this argument, multiple factions (large and small) competing in an open forum to advance their specific causes, create fertile ground for vibrant policy formulation. This argument is known as pluralist theory and will be discussed in greater detail in chapter three.

Interest groups affect public policy in the U.S. in several ways. First, lobbying is one of the most recognizable methods used by interest groups to promote government action advantageous to their goals. Lobbying is any attempt by interested individuals or groups to influence the votes of policy makers. Generally, lobbyists meet directly with lawmakers to discuss policy preferences, but lobbying can take the form of campaign contributions or other gifts. Recent court decisions equating money spent on political campaigns with First Amendment speech, which is constitutionally protected, have reduced limitations on campaign contributions. This development has increased the influence interest groups have on elected leaders who must raise money for election expenses (total campaign spending in the 2016 election cycle approached $7 billion).

While campaign contributions are an important way interest groups influence legislative decision makers in the policy process, many interest groups do not have the disposable income to invest in elections or direct lobbying. In these cases, the policy-specific expertise developed by interest groups over time often makes information their most valuable commodity. For instance, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce spent the most money on lobbying in 2019 ($77 million). The Chamber is powerful, but compare this level of influence to the exceptionally dominant National Rifle Association (NRA) which spent only $3 million during that same time frame. Lastly, we will briefly discuss the impact of the media on the policy making process. 

2.8.3.  The Media

The media’s influence on policy decisions is also protected by the First Amendment. While the framers of the Constitution disagreed on many policy areas, the protection of open and free expression was one area that enjoyed their near-unanimous support. The marketplace of ideas was viewed as an instrumental piece of the democratic puzzle that deserved special constitutional protections. The free exchange of ideas in public is important for the health of any democratic government because the people must be able to express individual opinions and be knowledgeable and informed when they make political choices. The American media still thrives in this extraordinarily protected area of the U.S. democratic experiment (Bond and Smith, 2016).  The media impacts public policy in several ways. One of the most important involves the media’s role in educating the populace. The media serves the public by providing information on what representatives in government are doing. Due to the understandably biased information provided by political candidates and parties, many voters rely on the media to provide a theoretically nonpartisan view of government policy. The independent media also serves a watchdog function by bringing to the public’s attention any harmful government actions. For example, in 1971, the New York Times published a classified Defense Department study detailing the history of U.S. policy in the Vietnam War. What became known as the “Pentagon Papers” raised public awareness of the difficulties of securing victory in Southeast Asia and increased demand to end combat activities.The media also influences public policy by determining what issues are covered. This function of the media is called agenda setting, which will be discussed in greater detail in chapter four, and determines what policy areas are discussed by the voting population. Media focus on certain topics can influence the subsequent actions taken by representatives in government. In 1965, for example, the media’s coverage of the treatment of African American protesters marching from Selma, Alabama to Montgomery, Alabama led to a public outcry that resulted in the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The attention the media gives to one policy area over another will significantly affect how important most people think those policy areas are (Whitman-Cobb, 2020).