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Profession: an occupation in which individual members abide by a set of best practices developed by all members
Introduction: The Professional Bureaucracy
In 1968, Frederick Mosher observed that “For better or worse—or for better and worse—much of our government is now in the hands of professionals” (Mosher 1968, 132, cited in Teodoro 2011, 11). While professional organizations are well known in legal, medical, and scientific fields, they also serve an important role in bureaucratic organization, policymaking, and service delivery. Professional organizations establish shared standards and norms that members adhere to (Abbott 1988). They help policy innovations diffuse across agencies (Brehm and Gates 1997; Teodoro 2011; Wilson 1989). They also help develop public legitimacy and encourage public demand for services (Brint 1994). Since most agency heads in American bureaucracy at both the local and federal...
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References
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Hughes, A.G. (2017). Bureaucracy and Professionalism. In: Farazmand, A. (eds) Global Encyclopedia of Public Administration, Public Policy, and Governance. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_621-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_621-1
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