Julie Colgan commented "In my opinion, it is regulation of government that drives bureaucracy; records management is a symptom."

I respectfully disagree with you. 

While I have not yet read Ben Kafka's book (and what a coincidence of author's name!!), I believe bureaucracy springs from many sources. It is NOT limited to government, or to government regulation.

It is not really possible for one person to manage an unlimited span of control (viz., the development of the General Staff concept for military organisations after the Napoleonic Wars). A bureaucracy is a tool for managing a wider span of control.

Many people in power distrust the capacity of individuals, within organisations or without, to self-regulate their use of power. Bureaucracy is a means of limiting the use of power.

Many individuals in organisations have discovered, to their cost, the tendency of those having greater power to collect all praise for themselves, while liberally dispersing blame to all around, themselves excepted. Bureaucracy is a means of self-defense by those at lower levels of power.

Not all bureaucracies are inefficient, nor are all bureaucracies unable to improve their efficiency. 

Case in point:  I was brought up in France, during the 1950s and part of the 1960s, when the French government bureaucracy had achieved amazing heights of inefficiency and pure nastiness. I can tell you from recent personal experience that the French government bureaucracy has, in recent years, fallen far from those heights. It is now fairly efficient and lacks the elemental nastiness of its predecessors.

So let's be realistic:  it's no more possible for a complex society to live without some form of bureaucracy, than it is for a complex society to live without some form of records management (or Information Governance). 

Perhaps, rather than just throwing stones and making faces at bureaucracy, we should work together to make it more efficient and more .... family-friendly.

Best regards,

Fred
---------------------------------
Frederic J. Grevin
[log in to unmask]
212-312-3903
Vice-President, Records Management
New York City Economic Development Corporation

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