070519 FS Research Module History of Austria (2011W)

The building of the modern state is coeval with the creation of an efficient, bureaucratically organized public administration apparatus. For this reason, state power was felt mostly through the working of the state administration, as Max Weber has already noticed. The reach of state and public administration was expanded significantly with the emergence of state services in the areas of infrastructure, insurance, and education during the 19th century. This gave new weight to administrative procedures and state state officials for the daily lives of citizens. The prominent role of state administration for society, economy, and politics explains the passionate interest of the wider public, of the experts, and of political actors in the organization of state administration and its position within the state structure. These debates intensified during the 1910s and 1920s with the establishment of two commission for a general overhaul of state administration.