Leopards in the temple: bureaucracy and the limits of the in-between
- 1997
- p.507-28
- Nov
This article examines a core problematic of bureaucracy. It suggests that the study of bureaucracy should make a clearer nonbureaucratic turn, focusing appropriately on what is described as the in-between. Analysis of structural limits of the in-between - hierarchy and lateralization - should center on the nonbureaucratic. Structure is not the central issue. Rather, structure is a surrogate for competing manifest and latent nonbureaucratic perspectives. Hierarchy is a surrogate not only for a rational order of justice but also for the feasibility of epistemological certainty. Lateralaization is a surrogate not only for human autonomy but also for skepticism and hesitation in knowing. The study of bureaucracy cannot be limited satisfactorily to "bureaucratic man." Rather, humans are irreducibly bio-psycho-spirituo-social-cultural beings. - Reproduced