Classic Theory Analysis

A Bureaucratic Response to Theory Y:

Since the description of Bureaucracy other theories of management, specifically Human Relations, have been developed to address critiques of Bureaucracy. Many of these theories either address phantasmic issues or go to a level of specificity not intended to be addressed via bureaucratic organizational structure. Among these critiques are those of McGregor and his Theory Y. Key to his critique of Bureaucracy and related theories is summed by these four core postulates: Management is responsible for distribution of resources; employee’s resistance to achieving organizational objectives is a learned behavior; people are inherently motivated, management need only allow employees discover these interests; the key Human Relations roles of managers is positioning individuals to allow for alignment of individual and organizational interests (McGregor, n.d.). At least some of these propositions are supposedly in contravention to the ideas spelled out in bureaucracy either explicitly or implicitly.

The idea that management is responsible for the distribution of human, capital and real resources is widely accepted through all theories of Human Relations. Note that human resources may be distributed and as previously stated, key to management is the positioning of scarce resources to achieve organizational goals. This means that positioning individuals within a bureaucracy such that their interests are aligned with the organization is core to the idea of bureaucracy, this is a phantom issue. The functional implementation of bureaucracy is not focused on sub-managerial positions and roles, instead it is the positioning, granting of authority and expertise of the manager who then has the authority, responsibility and knowledge to enact those sub-managerial alterations (Gerth & Mills, 2014). While this is not explicitly described within bureaucracy, it is a necessary presupposition of the manager’s role latent within bureaucracy meaning this is not a novel distinction between Theory Y and bureaucracy, but in fact a point of agreement.

The idea that a lack of motivation is a learned behavior within an organizational context and environment is largely irrelevant to the work of bureaucracy. The focus of bureaucracy is on the role and responsibility of the manager whether in a public bureau or private office, within a hierarchy. As such, an expert manager within a bureaucratic hierarchy with the explicitly given authority to organization such a hierarchy would be able to prevent such a lapse in individual behavior. That is to say, the sub-managerial positions are not the focus of bureaucracy and if fully adhered to, a full bureaucratic hierarchy with a suitably skilled manager would address this issue. If such an issue were to arise then I posit this would be due to one of two factors: the lack of a proper hierarchical structure where each position is governed by an explicitly given role, responsibility and authority or the lack of an expert manager.

Beyond the explicitly given propositions of McGregor’s Theory Y is a slew of supposed individual needs. These needs are individually so minute as to be an afterthought of management: The role of an expert manager is first and foremost the distribution of various resources, including the flow of monetary resources to individual employees. That is, the role of the manager is not the allocation of physiological, safety, social, ego, or self-fulfillment needs; instead, it is the manager’s responsibility to allocate sufficient monetary resources and alter the distribution of human resources through the hierarchy such that individuals are able to address these individual level needs. Put differently, the role of the manager is the distribution of resources to achieve organizational goals, not individual goals and fulfillment.

In summation, there is a fundamental disconnect between bureaucracy as a theory of Human Relations and McGregor’s critique and construction of Theory Y. Both theories may be perfectly valid points of view that may even be employed simultaneously as they are fundamentally concerned with different levels of analysis. Bureaucracy is concerned with the organizational level of analysis with an emphasis on the height of the hierarchy and Theory Y with the individual level of analysis. Many of the critiques and modifications from McGregor simply do not apply to bureaucracy and the rest are suitably, though implicitly, addressed through the strict adherence to bureaucracy.

References

Gerth, H. H., & Mills, C. W. (Eds.). (2014). From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203759240

McGregor, D. (n.d.). The Human Side of Enterprise, Annotated Edition (PB). Retrieved November 11, 2025, from https://www.mheducation.com/highered/mhp/product/human-side-enterprise-annotated-edition-pb.html