Abstract
This paper continues the third cluster’s examination of contemporary domains in which the Teflon pattern operates, focusing on the broader phenomenon of technocratic governance and the managerial classes whose authority shapes the operation of contemporary institutions across many sectors of society. Where the preceding papers examined specific domains in which the pattern operates with particular visibility, the present paper examines the underlying institutional and ideological framework that produces the credentialed managerial classes whose conduct the preceding papers have documented. The argument proceeds through four interlocking analyses: the rise of technocratic morality as a distinct framework for the articulation of public obligation, in which credentialed expertise serves as the basis for authority and substantive accountability is correspondingly attenuated; the systematic patterns by which experts exempt themselves from the obligations they urge upon others, often through technical considerations that justify their distinctive treatment; the operation of managerial classes within the contemporary institutional landscape and the conditions under which they have come to occupy positions of substantial authority across many sectors of society; and the institutional dynamics of bureaucratic insulation that protect the credentialed classes from the consequences ordinary participants would face for analogous conduct. The paper applies the biblical critique developed in the first cluster to the patterns it documents, demonstrating that the dynamic identified by the Lord operates with particular force in the technocratic context, and that the recognition of this dynamic is essential for any adequate understanding of how the patterns examined in the preceding papers have come to be reproduced across so many domains of contemporary institutional life.
I. The Domain and Its Cross-Cutting Character
The contemporary domain examined in this paper differs from the domains examined in the preceding papers of this cluster in an important respect. Where the preceding papers have examined specific sectors of contemporary institutional life — environmental policy, public health response, financial regulation — the present paper examines the broader institutional and ideological framework that operates across many sectors and that produces the credentialed managerial classes whose conduct the preceding papers have documented. The technocratic framework is not confined to any particular sector; it operates across environmental policy, public health, financial regulation, education, healthcare administration, communications policy, social services, urban planning, transportation, and many other domains in which contemporary institutions exercise authority over the populations they purport to serve.
The cross-cutting character of the domain has several implications for the analytical work of the present paper. The first implication is that the patterns examined in the preceding papers are not isolated phenomena specific to the particular sectors in which they appear. They are, rather, manifestations of a broader institutional and ideological framework that produces similar patterns across the full range of sectors in which the framework operates. The recognition of the cross-cutting character allows the patterns examined in the preceding papers to be understood as related instances of a common underlying dynamic, rather than as unrelated occurrences that happen to share surface features.
The second implication is that the analytical framework developed in the first two clusters of this volume applies with particular force to the technocratic framework as a whole, not merely to particular sectoral manifestations of it. The institutional mechanisms identified in White Paper 6 produce the technocratic framework’s characteristic patterns of elite exemption. The sociological dynamics identified in White Paper 9 produce the technocratic framework’s characteristic patterns of moral insulation. The performative sacrifice dynamics identified in White Paper 10 produce the technocratic framework’s characteristic patterns of vocabulary corruption. The analytical framework therefore applies to the technocratic framework at the level of its general operation, and the application provides substantial explanatory traction in understanding why the patterns examined in the preceding papers have become so widely distributed across contemporary institutional life.
The third implication is that the technocratic framework has been the subject of substantial scholarly analysis across multiple disciplines, and the existing literature provides extensive resources for the analytical work the present paper undertakes. The literature includes work in the sociology of professions, the political economy of regulation, the history of public administration, the critique of expertise as a basis for authority, and the analysis of managerial culture as a distinct cultural formation. The paper draws on this literature to inform its analytical work, with the recognition that the existing literature provides substantial empirical foundation for the analytical claims the paper undertakes.
The fourth implication is that the technocratic framework, despite its cross-cutting character, exhibits sufficient internal consistency that it can be analyzed as a coherent phenomenon rather than as a collection of unrelated practices. The framework has characteristic patterns of authority claims, characteristic patterns of institutional organization, characteristic patterns of professional formation, and characteristic patterns of relationship to the populations it serves. The patterns are sufficiently consistent across sectors that the framework can be analyzed at the level of its general operation, and the analysis at the general level produces conclusions that apply, with appropriate adjustments, to the particular sectoral manifestations the framework produces.
The biblical perspective the volume maintains throughout does not commit the analysis to particular positions on the substantive questions about how contemporary societies ought to organize their institutional life, the relative weight of expertise and other considerations in the formulation of policy, or the substantive correctness of particular technocratic approaches to particular problems. The analysis is concerned, rather, with the consistency between what the technocratic class urges upon others and what the same class practices in its own conduct, and the analysis of that consistency does not depend upon the resolution of the underlying substantive questions about technocratic governance.
II. The Rise of Technocratic Morality
The first analytical task of the paper is to examine the rise of technocratic morality as a distinct framework for the articulation of public obligation. The framework has emerged across the past century through the convergence of several institutional and ideological developments, and the convergence has produced a distinctive mode of moral discourse that operates across the contemporary institutional landscape. The recognition of this mode of moral discourse as a distinct phenomenon is essential for understanding how the patterns examined in the preceding papers have come to be reproduced across so many domains.
Technocratic morality, as a distinct framework, exhibits several characteristic features that distinguish it from other modes of moral discourse. The first characteristic feature is the grounding of moral claims in technical expertise rather than in shared moral traditions or in democratic deliberation. The technocratic moral claim typically takes the form of an assertion that the credentialed experts in a particular field have determined that certain practices are correct or required, and that the populations subject to the determination ought therefore to conform their conduct to it. The assertion may be accompanied by some explanation of the technical considerations that produced the determination, but the substantive moral weight of the claim derives from the credentialed expertise of those who made it rather than from any independent moral grounding that the population can evaluate on its own terms. The technocratic moral claim therefore operates in a manner fundamentally different from traditional moral discourse, in which moral claims are grounded in shared traditions and evaluated by reference to standards that are accessible to the populations subject to them.
The second characteristic feature is the systematic privileging of measurable outcomes over considerations that are not easily measured. The technocratic framework operates through the application of analytical methods to the problems it addresses, and the methods typically produce results that are expressed in measurable terms. The privileging of measurable outcomes produces a corresponding marginalization of considerations that are not easily measured, including various considerations that have traditionally been central to moral discourse but that resist reduction to the measurable forms the technocratic framework favors. The marginalization of unmeasurable considerations is, in many cases, defended on the grounds that the technocratic framework cannot operate effectively if its analytical methods are not applied consistently, but the cumulative effect of the marginalization is the production of a moral discourse that systematically privileges certain considerations over others on grounds that are not themselves subject to moral evaluation through the framework.
The third characteristic feature is the institutional concentration of moral authority in credentialed bodies whose membership is drawn from those with appropriate technical training. The technocratic framework operates through institutions that are organized around the technical expertise of their members, and the institutions claim moral authority within their respective domains on the basis of the expertise their members possess. The institutional concentration of moral authority has the effect of removing substantive moral deliberation from the broader populations affected by the moral claims and locating that deliberation within institutional structures whose membership is drawn from a comparatively small portion of the population. The populations subject to the moral claims of the technocratic institutions therefore find themselves in a position of relative passivity with respect to the moral discourse that affects their lives, since the deliberation that produces the moral claims has been conducted by institutional bodies in which they have no substantive participation.
The fourth characteristic feature is the systematic deployment of moral pressure in support of compliance with technocratic determinations. The technocratic framework does not, in most cases, rely solely upon the formal authority of the institutions through which it operates; it supplements that formal authority with moral framings that characterize compliance with technocratic determinations as morally required and characterize non-compliance as morally deficient. The moral framings are integral to the broader operation of the technocratic framework, since the formal authority of the framework is in many cases insufficient to produce the universal compliance the framework requires for its effectiveness. The moral framings supplement the formal authority by producing the social pressure that the formal mechanisms cannot themselves generate, and the cumulative effect is the production of a moral discourse that operates in support of technocratic determinations even when those determinations would not be otherwise supported by independent moral evaluation.
The rise of technocratic morality has produced, across recent decades, a substantial transformation in the conditions under which moral discourse is conducted within contemporary societies. The transformation has affected the patterns of authority through which moral claims are produced, the modes of deliberation through which the claims are evaluated, the institutional structures through which the claims are enforced, and the relationship between the populations subject to the claims and the institutions that produce them. The transformation has been the subject of extensive scholarly analysis, and the patterns it has produced are documented across multiple academic disciplines. The recognition of the transformation is essential for understanding the broader institutional context within which the patterns examined in the preceding papers have come to be reproduced across so many domains of contemporary institutional life.
The biblical critique of this transformation requires careful articulation. The biblical literature does not condemn expertise as such, and the proper exercise of skill and learning in the service of others is a frequent biblical theme. The biblical literature also does not require the rejection of all formal institutional structures or all credentialed authority. The biblical critique addresses, rather, the specific dynamic by which a credentialed class comes to occupy a position of moral authority while exempting itself from the substantive obligations its moral claims would impose upon others. The dynamic, examined in the original religious context in White Paper 2, is identical in its formal structure to the dynamic that operates in the technocratic framework, and the biblical critique therefore applies to the technocratic dynamic with the same force it applies to the original religious dynamic. The technocratic framework is not, in itself, the object of the biblical critique. The dynamic by which the technocratic class exempts itself from the obligations it imposes upon others is the object of the biblical critique, and the dynamic operates with particular force in the contemporary technocratic context.
III. The Systematic Pattern of Expert Self-Exemption
The second analytical task of the paper is to examine the systematic patterns by which experts exempt themselves from the obligations they urge upon others. The patterns are documented across the various sectors examined in the preceding papers of this cluster, and they exhibit sufficient consistency across sectors that they can be analyzed as features of the broader technocratic framework rather than as features specific to particular sectoral contexts. The recognition of the systematic character of the patterns is essential for understanding how the technocratic framework produces, with depressing regularity, the asymmetric application of the obligations it articulates.
The first pattern of expert self-exemption operates through the construction of technical considerations that justify the distinctive treatment of expert conduct. The pattern operates by characterizing the conduct of experts as falling within categories that are distinct from the categories within which the conduct of non-experts falls, with the consequence that the same underlying conduct generates different categorizations depending upon whether it is engaged in by an expert or by a non-expert. The distinctions may involve technical considerations about the nature of the expertise involved, the procedural channels through which the conduct was conducted, the institutional context within which it occurred, or various other considerations that are technically defensible on their own terms. The aggregate effect of the distinctions is the production of a system in which the same conduct generates substantially different evaluations depending upon the institutional standing of the parties involved, and the differential evaluations consistently favor the experts whose conduct is being evaluated.
The second pattern operates through the construction of professional discretion as a category of conduct that is exempted from the obligations that apply to non-discretionary conduct. The pattern operates by characterizing expert conduct as inherently involving the exercise of professional judgment that the underlying obligations cannot adequately address, and by treating the exercise of such judgment as falling outside the scope of the obligations that would otherwise apply. The characterization is, in many cases, defensible on its own terms; the exercise of professional judgment does indeed involve considerations that mechanical rules cannot adequately address, and the recognition of this fact is integral to the proper operation of any professional field. The characterization also, however, provides the protective cover under which experts can engage in conduct that, when engaged in by non-experts, would be straightforwardly identified as violating the relevant obligations. The cover allows the patterns examined in the preceding papers to be reproduced across many domains while remaining technically defensible within each domain’s particular framework of professional discretion.
The third pattern operates through the construction of institutional channels for the resolution of disputes that the experts themselves dominate. The pattern operates by establishing that disputes about expert conduct are to be resolved through institutional procedures that are managed by other experts in the same field, and by ensuring that the procedures operate under standards that are themselves articulated by the experts who participate in the procedures. The cumulative effect is the production of a system in which the experts whose conduct is being evaluated are evaluated by other experts whose institutional positions and professional relationships create powerful incentives for the production of evaluations favorable to the experts being evaluated. The institutional channels are, in many cases, defended on the grounds that disputes about expert conduct require evaluation by those with the technical competence to assess the conduct, but the cumulative effect of the institutional arrangements is the production of evaluations that systematically favor the experts whose conduct is being evaluated over the non-experts who have raised concerns about that conduct.
The fourth pattern operates through the construction of professional codes that, in their formal articulation, impose substantial obligations upon the members of the relevant profession but that, in their practical operation, function primarily as instruments by which the profession defends itself against external scrutiny rather than as instruments by which the conduct of members is meaningfully constrained. The professional codes typically contain elaborate articulations of the ethical obligations that members are expected to fulfill, and the articulations are sufficiently impressive that they can be cited as evidence of the profession’s substantive commitment to high ethical standards. The codes, however, are typically enforced through institutional procedures that produce far fewer sanctions against members than the formal language of the codes would suggest, and the discrepancy between the formal articulation and the practical enforcement is sufficient to establish that the codes function primarily as protective devices rather than as effective constraints on member conduct.
The cumulative effect of these patterns is the production of a system in which the experts who articulate obligations for others operate, in their own conduct, under conditions that systematically attenuate the substantive force of those obligations as applied to themselves. The patterns are documented across the various sectors examined in the preceding papers of this cluster, and the consistency of their operation across sectors establishes that they are features of the broader technocratic framework rather than features specific to particular sectoral contexts. The recognition of the systematic character of the patterns is essential for understanding how the technocratic framework produces, with depressing regularity, the asymmetric application of the obligations it articulates.
IV. The Operation of Managerial Classes
The third analytical task of the paper is to examine the operation of managerial classes within the contemporary institutional landscape and the conditions under which they have come to occupy positions of substantial authority across many sectors of society. The managerial classes are distinct from but closely related to the expert classes examined in the preceding section. Where the expert classes are organized around technical expertise in particular substantive domains, the managerial classes are organized around expertise in the administration of institutional structures, and the two classes operate in complementary fashion within the broader institutional landscape of contemporary society.
The managerial classes have emerged across recent decades through the convergence of several institutional developments. The first development is the substantial growth in the scale and complexity of contemporary institutional structures, which has produced corresponding growth in the demand for personnel whose expertise consists in the administration of such structures. The second development is the professionalization of administrative work, which has produced credentialing systems, training programs, and institutional structures through which the administrative function has been organized as a distinct professional field. The third development is the institutional and ideological elevation of administrative competence as a basis for authority across many domains of contemporary institutional life, with the consequence that administrative expertise has come to be recognized as a form of authority that is substantially independent of the substantive expertise required for the underlying work that the administrative structures coordinate. The fourth development is the cross-sectoral movement of administrative personnel between different institutional contexts, which has produced a recognizable managerial class whose members move between healthcare administration, educational administration, governmental administration, corporate administration, and the administration of various other institutional sectors, with the movement reinforcing the recognition of administrative expertise as a distinct professional competence.
The operation of the managerial classes exhibits several characteristic features that connect them to the broader analytical framework this volume has been developing. The first characteristic feature is the systematic distance between the managerial class and the substantive work that the institutions they manage are organized to perform. The managers typically do not engage directly in the substantive work; their expertise consists in the coordination, supervision, and reporting of the work that others perform. The distance produces a corresponding distance from the substantive consequences of the institutional decisions that the managerial class makes, with the consequence that the managers can articulate policies whose practical effects fall upon others while themselves being insulated from those effects.
The second characteristic feature is the systematic protection of managerial discretion from substantive accountability. The managerial classes typically operate under conditions in which their judgments about administrative matters are accorded substantial deference, both within the institutions they manage and in the broader institutional environment within which the institutions operate. The deference is, in many cases, defensible on the grounds that the administrative expertise the managers possess is genuinely relevant to the judgments they make, and that the substitution of non-managerial judgment for managerial judgment would produce inferior outcomes. The deference also, however, produces the conditions under which the managers can engage in conduct that would be subject to substantive accountability in other contexts but that is, in the managerial context, protected by the deference accorded to managerial discretion. The cumulative effect is the production of a system in which the managerial classes operate under substantially attenuated accountability for the decisions they make and the policies they articulate.
The third characteristic feature is the substantial concentration of resources and benefits within the managerial classes themselves. The institutional structures that the managerial classes administer typically allocate substantial resources to the compensation, support, and various other benefits of the managers themselves, with the consequence that the managers operate within institutional environments that are calibrated to their interests in ways that the broader populations served by the institutions do not experience. The concentration is, in many cases, defensible on the grounds that the managerial expertise is genuinely valuable and that the compensation of the managers must be calibrated to attract and retain personnel of appropriate competence. The concentration also, however, produces the conditions under which the managers operate at substantial material distance from the populations served by their institutions, and the distance affects the substantive judgments the managers make about the operation of those institutions.
The fourth characteristic feature is the systematic alignment of managerial interests across institutions and sectors, which produces the broader managerial class as a recognizable social formation. The alignment operates through shared educational backgrounds, common professional associations, ongoing institutional relationships, and the cross-sectoral movement of personnel that the broader managerial career structures encourage. The alignment produces, across the various institutional sectors in which the managerial class operates, the kind of cross-cutting professional network that the sociological analysis developed in White Paper 9 has examined. The network operates to protect the interests of its members across the various institutional contexts in which they operate, and the operation produces the patterns of mutual protection that this volume has been documenting throughout.
The managerial classes are not, in themselves, the object of the biblical critique this volume has been developing. The administrative function is genuinely necessary in any complex institutional environment, and the proper exercise of administrative competence in the service of substantive institutional purposes is a legitimate vocation. The biblical critique addresses, rather, the specific dynamic by which the managerial classes have come to occupy positions of substantial authority while operating under conditions that systematically attenuate the substantive accountability they would otherwise face for the decisions they make and the policies they articulate. The dynamic operates with particular force in the contemporary technocratic and managerial context, and the recognition of the dynamic is essential for any adequate analysis of how the patterns examined in the preceding papers have come to be reproduced across so many domains of contemporary institutional life.
V. The Institutional Dynamics of Bureaucratic Insulation
The fourth analytical task of the paper is to examine the institutional dynamics of bureaucratic insulation that protect the credentialed classes from the consequences ordinary participants would face for analogous conduct. The dynamics operate through several specific mechanisms that, taken together, produce the conditions under which the patterns examined in the preceding papers and sections can be reproduced with the regularity they exhibit.
The first mechanism is the proceduralization of accountability, in which substantive accountability for decisions and policies is replaced by procedural accountability for the proper observation of administrative procedures. The mechanism operates by characterizing the central question for the evaluation of credentialed conduct as the question of whether appropriate procedures were followed, rather than the question of whether the substantive decisions produced appropriate outcomes. The characterization has the effect of redirecting accountability from the substantive matters that ordinary observers would identify as the proper objects of evaluation to procedural matters that are typically resolvable in favor of the credentialed parties whose conduct is being evaluated. The credentialed parties have substantial expertise in the relevant procedures and substantial resources for demonstrating that the procedures were properly observed. The substantive outcomes, however problematic they may be, are characterized as matters that fall outside the scope of accountability once the procedural requirements have been met.
The second mechanism is the distribution of decision-making responsibility across multiple institutional actors in ways that prevent the identification of any particular actor as responsible for any particular outcome. The mechanism operates through the institutional arrangements that produce decisions through committee processes, consultation procedures, hierarchical approval chains, and other distributed mechanisms that ensure that no single individual can be identified as the decision-maker for any particular decision. The distribution has, in many cases, legitimate institutional purposes, since the involvement of multiple parties in important decisions can produce better-informed outcomes than would result from individual decision-making. The distribution also, however, produces the conditions under which accountability becomes impossible to assign to any particular actor, since each actor involved in the decision can plausibly claim that the decision was the product of the broader process rather than of any individual contribution. The cumulative effect is the production of a system in which substantive accountability is systematically dissipated through the institutional arrangements that distribute decision-making responsibility.
The third mechanism is the construction of confidentiality requirements that prevent the public examination of the deliberative processes through which decisions are made. The mechanism operates through the institutional arrangements that classify various categories of information as confidential, and the classification produces the conditions under which the substantive considerations that informed particular decisions cannot be examined by external observers. The confidentiality is, in many cases, defended on the grounds that frank internal deliberation requires protection from external scrutiny, and that the quality of institutional decision-making would be impaired if every consideration discussed in deliberative processes were subject to public examination. The confidentiality also, however, produces the conditions under which decisions whose substantive merits might not survive public scrutiny can be made without the kind of accountability that public examination would impose. The cumulative effect is the production of a system in which substantive accountability is foreclosed by the confidentiality requirements that protect the deliberative processes from external evaluation.
The fourth mechanism is the institutional protection of long tenure within bureaucratic structures, which produces personnel arrangements that systematically protect credentialed officials from the consequences of their decisions. The mechanism operates through the various forms of job protection, including formal civil service protections, tenure systems, and the informal practices that produce the long careers of credentialed officials within particular institutional contexts. The protections are, in many cases, defensible on the grounds that they prevent the politically motivated dismissal of officials whose work would otherwise be vulnerable to such dismissal. The protections also, however, produce the conditions under which officials whose decisions have produced substantial damage can continue in their positions despite the damage, with the consequence that the institutional learning that would otherwise result from the connection between decisions and consequences is systematically attenuated. The cumulative effect is the production of a system in which the personnel arrangements protect officials from the consequences of their decisions, and the protection contributes to the broader pattern of attenuated accountability that the present paper has been examining.
The cumulative effect of these mechanisms is the production of a bureaucratic environment in which the credentialed classes operate under conditions of substantial insulation from the substantive accountability that ordinary participants would face for analogous conduct. The insulation operates through the combination of the procedural, distributive, confidentiality, and tenure mechanisms examined in this section, and the combination produces the conditions under which the patterns examined in the preceding papers can be reproduced with the regularity they exhibit. The recognition of these institutional dynamics is essential for any adequate analysis of how the technocratic and managerial framework produces, with depressing consistency, the asymmetric patterns this volume has been documenting throughout.
VI. The Biblical Critique Applied
The closing analytical task of the paper is to apply the biblical critique developed in the first cluster of this volume to the patterns the preceding sections have documented. The application requires several specific observations.
The first observation is that the technocratic and managerial framework, despite its secular framing, produces a dynamic that the biblical literature has identified and condemned in religious contexts. The dynamic operates by the same mechanisms in the contemporary technocratic context as it does in religious contexts, and the biblical critique that addresses the religious operation of the dynamic applies, with appropriate adjustments for context, to the technocratic operation as well. The technocratic class has articulated standards of conduct that, in their formal application, apply to the populations subject to the technocratic framework. The class has secured for itself, through the mechanisms examined in the preceding sections, substantial exemption from the substantive operation of those standards. The pattern is the pattern the Lord identified in Matthew 23, examined extensively in White Paper 2. The contemporary technocratic context provides a different institutional setting within which the same pattern operates, but the pattern itself is the pattern the biblical critique addresses.
The second observation is that the technocratic framework exhibits, with particular force, the connection between the patterns the biblical literature condemns and the substantial damage to institutional functions that those patterns produce. The technocratic institutions depend, for their proper functioning, upon the broad public acceptance of their authority to articulate the standards within their respective domains. The patterns examined in this paper, by establishing that the technocratic class operates under substantially different conditions from those that apply to the populations subject to the framework, undermine the broader acceptance upon which the framework’s authority depends. The technocratic class, in securing for its members the exemptions that the patterns produce, is therefore not merely engaging in conduct that the biblical literature condemns; it is undermining the institutional foundations upon which its own continued operation depends. The damage extends across the various sectors in which the technocratic framework operates, and the cumulative effect is the substantial corrosion of the legitimacy upon which the framework’s authority rests.
The third observation is that the analytical framework developed in the first two clusters of this volume applies with particular precision to the technocratic and managerial framework. The institutional mechanisms identified in White Paper 6 produce the conditions under which the technocratic class can secure favorable treatment in the construction and operation of the standards that govern its conduct. The sociological dynamics identified in White Paper 9 produce the social environments within which the technocratic class operates the resulting asymmetries without internal challenge. The performative sacrifice dynamics identified in White Paper 10 produce the rhetorical and symbolic frameworks within which the asymmetric application has been characterized as something other than what it is. The analytical framework developed in the second cluster of this volume therefore applies with particular precision to the technocratic and managerial framework, and the application of that framework provides substantial explanatory traction in understanding why the patterns examined throughout this cluster have come to be so widely distributed across contemporary institutional life.
The fourth observation is that the biblical critique demands a particular response in the technocratic context, and the response involves both individual and institutional dimensions. The individual members of the technocratic and managerial classes are called to undertake the difficult examination of their own conduct, with attention to whether their participation in the institutional dynamics this paper has examined has been consistent with the standards they would articulate for the populations subject to their authority. The institutional structures that have produced the patterns are called to be addressed through the construction of countermeasures that would prevent their continued operation, including reforms in the relationship between credentialed institutions and the populations they serve, in the patterns of accountability that operate within those institutions, in the procedural and confidentiality arrangements that have systematically protected the credentialed classes, and in the various other institutional features that the analysis has identified. The vocabulary of expertise and professional competence that has been appropriated as protective cover for the patterns is called to be returned to its substantive content, with attention to whether the public communications produced by the relevant institutions correspond to the substantive realities they purport to describe.
The fifth observation is that the recovery from the corrosion of legitimacy that the technocratic patterns have produced will require the kind of sustained institutional commitment that the analytical framework developed throughout this volume has identified as among the most difficult institutional projects. The corrosion cannot be reversed through declarations of reformed intent; it can be reversed only through demonstrated practice of consistent application across extended periods, and the demonstration requires the legitimacy that the previous patterns have depleted. The technocratic institutions involved must accept that the period of recovery will be lengthy, that their communications will be received with skepticism throughout much of that period, and that the demonstration of reform must continue even when the institutions are not receiving the trust that the demonstration is intended to rebuild. The recovery is not impossible, but it requires the kind of institutional self-examination and structural reform that the institutions have, to this point, largely declined to undertake.
The paper closes with the observation that the technocratic and managerial framework is the underlying institutional and ideological context within which the patterns examined throughout this cluster operate. The recognition of this fact has several important implications for the broader analytical work this volume is undertaking. The patterns examined in the environmental, public health, and financial regulatory domains are not isolated phenomena specific to those sectors; they are manifestations of the broader technocratic framework whose general operation has been examined in the present paper. The analytical framework developed in the first two clusters of this volume applies not merely to particular sectoral manifestations but to the technocratic framework as a whole. The biblical critique developed throughout the volume applies with particular force to the technocratic framework, since the framework operates across so many domains of contemporary institutional life and produces the asymmetric patterns with such consistent regularity. The remaining paper of this cluster will examine one further contemporary domain in which the broader pattern operates, and the fourth cluster of the volume will examine the comparative religious manifestations of the same dynamic. The analytical foundation supplied by the present paper, however, has established the general framework within which the contemporary applications of the pattern operate, and the framework will continue to inform the analyses that follow throughout the remainder of the volume.
Notes
Note 1. The analytical work of this paper does not undertake to settle the substantive questions about how contemporary societies ought to organize their institutional life, the relative weight of expertise and other considerations in the formulation of policy, or the substantive correctness of particular technocratic approaches to particular problems. The biblical critique that the paper develops applies to the question of consistency between what the technocratic class urges upon others and what the same class practices in its own conduct, and the application of the critique does not depend upon the resolution of the underlying substantive questions about technocratic governance.
Note 2. The rise of technocratic morality examined in the second section has been the subject of extensive scholarly analysis across multiple academic disciplines, including the sociology of professions, the political economy of regulation, the history of public administration, and the broader analysis of expertise as a basis for authority. The paper has drawn on this literature to inform its analytical work, with the recognition that the existing literature provides substantial empirical foundation for the analytical claims the paper undertakes.
Note 3. The patterns of expert self-exemption examined in the third section are documented across the various sectors examined in the preceding papers of this cluster, and they exhibit sufficient consistency across sectors that they can be analyzed as features of the broader technocratic framework. The paper has examined these patterns through the analytical framework developed in the first two clusters of this volume, with attention to how the institutional and sociological mechanisms identified in that framework produce the specific patterns that operate within the technocratic context.
Note 4. The operation of managerial classes examined in the fourth section has been the subject of substantial scholarly analysis, including work in the sociology of organizations, the political economy of bureaucratic structures, and the broader analysis of managerial culture as a distinct cultural formation. The paper has applied the analytical framework developed throughout this volume to the patterns documented in that literature, with attention to how the managerial classes operate within the broader technocratic framework.
Note 5. The institutional dynamics of bureaucratic insulation examined in the fifth section operate through mechanisms that have been documented in extensive academic literature on organizational behavior, public administration, and the political economy of bureaucratic structures. The paper has examined these mechanisms through the analytical framework developed in the first two clusters of this volume, with attention to how the mechanisms produce the conditions under which the patterns examined throughout this volume can be reproduced with the regularity they exhibit.
Note 6. The reference in the closing section to the technocratic framework as the underlying institutional and ideological context for the patterns examined throughout this cluster should not be taken to suggest that the framework is uniquely problematic among possible institutional arrangements. All institutional arrangements involve some allocation of authority among parties, and the proper allocation of authority is a continuing question for any society. The biblical critique addresses, rather, the specific dynamic by which the technocratic framework has produced the patterns examined throughout this volume, and the recognition of the dynamic is intended to support the kind of institutional self-examination that the addressing of the patterns requires.
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Niebuhr, R. (1932). Moral man and immoral society. Charles Scribner’s Sons. [Cited for analytical observations about institutional behavior; broader theological framework is not endorsed.]
Owen, J. (1668/1991). The mortification of sin in believers (W. H. Goold, Ed.). Banner of Truth.
Packer, J. I. (1973). Knowing God. InterVarsity Press.
Piper, J. (1995). Future grace: The purifying power of the promises of God. Multnomah.
Powlison, D. (2003). Seeing with new eyes: Counseling and the human condition through the lens of Scripture. P&R Publishing.
Ryle, J. C. (1879/2014). Holiness. Banner of Truth.
Scott, J. C. (1998). Seeing like a state: How certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed. Yale University Press. [Cited for analytical observations about technocratic governance; broader theoretical framework is presented as subject to ongoing debate.]
Sowell, T. (1995). The vision of the anointed: Self-congratulation as a basis for social policy. Basic Books. [Cited for analytical observations about credentialed discourse; broader theoretical framework is presented as subject to ongoing debate.]
Sproul, R. C. (1985). The holiness of God. Tyndale House.
Stott, J. R. W. (1984). Issues facing Christians today. Marshall Morgan & Scott.
Trueman, C. R. (2020). The rise and triumph of the modern self: Cultural amnesia, expressive individualism, and the road to sexual revolution. Crossway.
Veith, G. E. (1994). Postmodern times: A Christian guide to contemporary thought and culture. Crossway.
Watson, T. (1668/1965). A body of divinity. Banner of Truth.
Weber, M. (1922/1978). Economy and society (G. Roth & C. Wittich, Eds.). University of California Press. [Cited for analytical observations about bureaucratic structures; broader theoretical framework is not endorsed.]
Wells, D. F. (1994). God in the wasteland: The reality of truth in a world of fading dreams. Eerdmans.
Wilson, J. Q. (1989). Bureaucracy: What government agencies do and why they do it. Basic Books. [Cited for analytical observations about bureaucratic behavior; broader theoretical framework is presented as subject to ongoing debate.]
Wright, C. J. H. (2004). Old Testament ethics for the people of God. InterVarsity Press.
