ABSTRACT
In the analysis of the literature on bureaucracy and various forms of postbureaucratic organizations, it was argued that the conventional view of bureaucracy has gradually lost its status because it is incompatible with more recent and fluid images of society, the market and the world of business. However, as suggested by du Gay (2005), for instance, bureaucracy is not a once-and-for-all unified and enclosed organization form but, instead, appears in many forms and in many arrangements. Such a more fluid and permeable image of bureaucracy, which still remains affirmative of functional organization, is more representative of how bureaucracy emerges in real-life settings. In addition, such an image eliminates the dual separation between bureaucracy and non-bureaucracy and undermines the supplementary role of bureaucracy in management discourses. In this and the following chapter, a study of innovation work in two contemporary bureaucracies will be examined. Rather than assuming that bureaucracy is a poorly functioning organization form in terms of providing favourable conditions for innovation and creativity, it will be examined in terms of being an organizational arrangement actually supporting and reinforcing innovation while, at the same time, being able to respond to external changes. Thus, the research question is not whether bureaucracies can be sites for innovation or not, because in the two cases under consideration this is undoubtedly the case, but under what conditions innovations takes place in large, functionally organized organizations, hosting many different expert and specialist groups.
