Bureaucracy refers to administrative systems that prioritize process over purpose, form over function, and compliance over clarity.

In medicine and academia, bureaucracy often manifests as:

*A dense web of rules, approvals, forms, and hierarchies that consume time and energy — without improving patient care or knowledge.*

• Endless paperwork for procedures that used to rely on clinical judgment
• Research projects delayed by irrelevant ethics hoops or institutional politics
• Committees formed to discuss things no one will act on
• Protocols that no one questions — even when outdated or harmful
• Evaluation systems that reward checkbox completion over critical thinking

• When it protects itself instead of those it was meant to serve
• When it punishes initiative and rewards conformity
• When it drowns clinical intuition under layers of permission
• When it turns thinking professionals into form-filling clerks

Bureaucracy is what happens when a system forgets why it exists.