ABSTRACT
The concept "nation-state" is another case in point. It refers to attributes of public authority which are most unequivocal when contrasted with the attributes of medieval political life. Access to important political and administrative posts in the governments of nation-states can be facilitated by wealth and high social position through their effect on social contacts and educational opportunities. The process of bureaucratization may be interpreted as the manifold, cumulative, and more or less successful imposition of these employment conditions since the nineteenth century. The problems of management arising from this process can be characterized in a general way by contrasting each bureaucratic condition of employment with its nonbureaucratic or antibureaucratic counterpart. Several conditions impinge on the hierarchy as a whole: the structure of supreme authority, the bureaucratic culture pattern which forms the prevailing outlook of public officials, and the contacts between administrators and the public.
