On The Administrative State

 

The bureaucracy is a circle from which one cannot escape. Its hierarchy is a hierarchy of knowledge. The top entrusts the understanding of detail to the lower levels, whilst the lower levels credit the top with understanding of the general, and so all are mutually deceived.

---

The bureaucracy takes itself to be the ultimate purpose of the State

---

In the bureaucracy, the identity of State interest and particular private aim is established in such a way that the State interest becomes a particular private aim over against other private aims.

---

Taxes are the source of life for the bureaucracy, the army and the court, in short, for the whole apparatus of the executive power. Strong government and heavy taxes are identical.

- Karl Marx

Excerpts from: " Marxist Approach to Bureaucracy: Introductory, Origin and Other Details"

In the Manifesto of Communist Party (hereafter only Manifesto) Marx and Engels wrote: “The executive of the modern state is a committee for making the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie” Marx and Engels here did not directly refer to bureaucracy. Needless to say that in all capitalist states the executive power is vested in the hands of a group of administrators who are called bureaucrats and these persons represent the interests of the capitalists.

Marx observed that in France and several other states of Europe the entire state administration was run by the bureaucrats and these state officers were dictated by the king or any type of dictator. The bureaucracy was so common in his time that he very frequently used the phrase bureaucratic phenomenon. This implies that the entire administration was under the full control of few officers known as bureaucrats.

In the materialist conception of history Marx has endeavoured to show that the idea of bureaucracy has not fallen from heaven. In primitive and slave societies there was no existence of state and no bureaucracy. So one can say that the system of bureaucracy was deliberately created by a group of men who controlled the state. Their sole aim was to ensure the good management of state so that the capitalists can exploit the working class without any problem. In the German Ideology Marx and Engels have thrown light on this aspect. In the German Ideology they have said: “the state is the form in which the individuals of a ruling class assert their common interests”.

We thus find that, according to Marx and Engels, the emergence of state and rise of bureaucracy are, in fact, inseparable from each other. Marx has said that during feudal period there was a clear existence of state but it had no separate and powerful existence of bureaucracy. The state was more or less controlled by various forces and feudal lords were the most prominent. Marx and Engels have said that, in capitalism, state came to establish its separate existence and capitalists encouraged this phenomenon.

But subsequently the capitalists came to realise that in its attempt to safeguard its objective of profit motive the help of state was necessary. It also thought that the state must be brought under proper administration. Bureaucracy was the consequence of this plan. An unholy nexus was created, under the aegis of the bourgeoisie, between the state and the capitalists. In Marx’s view the rise and growth of bureaucracy must be viewed in the light of capitalism.

Marx observed that Louis Bonaparte was gradually accumulating more and more power and dictatorial power was exercised by him. In this attempt (or we may call it a process) he was assisted by bureaucracy and military. Particularly the former helped to make and execute laws and to strengthen the base of despotism. The bureaucracy became rather an indispensable part of Bonaparte’s administration and despotism.

There were legislature and other organs of government but in the face of Bonaparte’s growing power which may be called dictatorship they were simply puppets. Marx has said: “Bureaucracy must, therefore, make it its job to render life as material as possible”. In the German Ideology Marx and Engels saw that in most of the states in Germany bureaucracy was acquiring more and more power and independence.

Bureaucracy in Advanced Capitalism:

Ralph Miliband, a noted Marxist thinker, in his The State in Capitalist Society. The Analysis of Western System of Power (1973) has analysed bureaucracy and its role in advanced capitalism. The Servants of the State—he has analysed the important aspects of bureaucracy that prevails in capitalist states. He has said that the political leaders of advanced capitalism have clear party colour, the bureaucrats have no such colour—they are neutral or are supposed to be neutral.

Even the top leaders of the party, after coming to power, bring their men and give important posts to them. But they do not work for party —they are politically neutral. “The claim insistently made, not least by civil servants themselves, that they are politically neutral, in the sense that, their overriding, indeed their exclusive concern, is to advance the business of the state under the direction of their political masters”. The so-called fact is that civil servants or bureau­crats in capitalist states such as USA are, in their administrative functions, neutral.

But Miliband does not accept this general view about bureaucracy in capitalist countries. The neutrality of bureaucrats in capitalist countries is a myth. Miliband says. …these men do play an important part in the process of governmental decision—making, and therefore constituting a considerable force in the configuration of political power in their societies” We therefore, find that the bureaucrats of capitalist countries are indispensable parts of administration and they also carry political colour with them. In other words, they are part of politics.

Another aspect of bureaucrats of capitalist countries is that while making policy and implementing it they claim that they are neutral. We thus find that politically they claim to be neutral and in policy implementing affairs they are neutral. Political consideration never influences them while executing the adopted policies. We find Miliband to make the following observation: “As for the manner in which this power is exercised, the notion of neutrality which is often attached to it is surely in the highest degree misleading; indeed a moment’s reflection must suggest that it is absurd”. In every advanced capitalist country individual civil servants (bureaucrats are also called in this name) have occasionally played a notable part in social, administrative and military functions.

It is not expected that the top civil servants come from the power elite groups or policy making organisations. They have obtained their education from the most important and top academic institutions. These persons have built up their own political ideas and inclination and when they become top administrators their policies will be influenced by their political inclinations and family background. The consequence is whenever a government decides to introduce “reforms” for the general benefit of public these civil servants are not supposed to be neutral, rather they oppose the reforms of the government.

Conservatism is another feature of bureaucrats. These officers do not want any change-a change for the better-“top civil servants in these countries are not simply conservative in general, they are conservative in the sense that they are the conscious or unconscious allies of existing economic and social elites. They favour existing social and economic structures of society.”

The civil servants are very often protectors and propagators of private capitalism and this role has expanded from the eighties of the last century due to the advancement of globalisation. Ralph Miliband has said that after the World War II a close nexus has developed between top civil servants and corporate capitalism; and bureaucracy helps the corporate capitalism in the attainment of objectives. Miliband says that bureaucracy is a great supporter of corporate capitalism and help in various ways. In recent years the state, being pressurised by public opinion, intervenes with the functioning of economic sector and in this affair the civil servants play a crucial role. Miliband has studied the American system and then concludes.

Both bureaucrats and politicians claim that they are the well-wishers and partners of national economic interests. But politicians do not always find scope or time to discuss policy matters with the magnates of private capitalism. This job is done by the top bureaucrats. Miliband’s observation is worth noting: “The world of administration and the world of large scale enterprise are now increasingly linked in terms of an almost interchanging personnel. More and more businessmen find their way into one part or the other of the state system at both political and administrative levels”. This type of interchangeability between top civil servants and important leaders of corporate or private capitalism in US or other mature capitalism is not new or uncommon: Nobody criticises it. The moot point is in advanced capitalist state bureaucracy is not busy with public administration alone but with other functions.

Lenin on Bureaucracy:

Lenin in his The State and Revolution (1918) has elaborately discussed bureaucracy. Like Marx and Engels, Lenin believed that bureaucracy was a machine used by the bourgeoisie to exploit the common people-particularly the working class. But to him in this affair the bureaucracy is not alone, it performs this job in collaboration with the military. Lenin quotes few lines from Marx’s letter to Kugelman written on April 12, 1871. Marx wrote “the next attempt of the French Revolution will no longer, as before, to transfer the bureaucratic military machine from one hand to another but to smash it” Lenin accepted this view of Marx that both bureaucracy and military are the two arms of capitalist government and the chief aim of the revolutionaries would be to smash it.

Lenin in his The State and Revolution has said that the real aim of all revolutionaries would be to smash or destroy the military and bureaucratic alliance so that it cannot get any scope to exploit the working class. Earlier I have specifically noted that, to Marx, bureaucracy was nothing but a machine used by the bourgeois class. Lenin does not depart from this fundamental premise, he has simply elaborated and emphasised Marx’s contention.

Lenin fully realised that there was immense utility of bureaucracy and other forms of bourgeois administration. Naturally, it is quite Utopian to think of abolishing all forms of older administration but to utilise them for the furtherance of proletarian interests. For example, Lenin has said “The way out of parliamentarism is not the abolition of representative institution and the electoral principles, but the conversion of the representative institutions from talking shops to working bodies.

Similarly, Lenin did not want to destroy the bureaucratic system of bourgeois administration but to keep it for the use and benefit of proletarian rule. That’s why we find him saying: There can be no thought of abolishing the bureaucracy at once everywhere and completely. That is Utopia. But to smash the old bureaucratic machine at once and to began immediately to construct a new one that will permit us to abolish gradually all bureaucracy—this is not Utopia” Lenin further observes — “We are not Utopians. We do not include in “dreams” of dispensing at once with all administration, with all subordination”.

From the above observations made by Lenin it is crystal clear that he fully realised the importance of state administration in general and bureaucracy in particular and for that reason he did not suggest the abolition of bourgeois administrative system of which the bureaucracy constitutes the chief part. He realised the importance of bureaucracy in administration. From his analysis it is also clear that Lenin did not dispense with the importance of bureaucracy.

But the kernel of his thought is that this type of bureaucracy is to be used for the interest of the proletarians. Lenin in his analysis made endeavour to assert that he was neither a Utopian nor an anarchist thinker. He thought that the abolition of the bureaucracy of capitalist regime will lead to great anarchy or turmoil and this he did not prefer. The function and character of bureaucracy must be changed for the benefit of the working class.