Breaking the Rules: Bureaucracy and Reform in Public Housing

This is a study of how a bureaucracy allocates a commodity or a service­ in this case, public housing. In the broadest sense, it seeks to understand how bureaucrats try to resolve two often conflicting goals of regulatory justice: equity (treating like cases alike on the basis of rules) and respon­ siveness (making exceptions for persons whose needs require that rules be stretched). It analyzes the extent to which such factors as bureaucratic norms, the task orientation of workers, third-pa...