Structuring Bureaucratic Rules to Enhance Compliance

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Abstract
To test the hypothesis that certain structural characteristics of bureaucratic rules affect their ability to control participants' behavior, two experiments were conducted to measure compliance with rules of different structural types. In both experiments the rule types were the simple rule statement, statement plus designation of an enforcing agent, plus sanctions for compliance, plus sanctions for enforcement. In the first experiment faculty and administrators reported the probability of compliance expected for university rules appearing in the different statement types. The second experiment measured the frequency of compliance with a rule governing participation in small group discussions when the rule was structured in the different ways. In both experiments the probability of compliance was increased when the rule designated an enforcing agent and specified sanctions for compliance and sanctions for enforcement. The results of the two experiments converge on the interpretation that bureaucratic rules can be structured to ensure compliance at levels over and above that which would be expected on the basis of the social and psychological commitment of participants in a group or organization.

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