bureaucrat
noun
Did you know?
In French, a bureau is a desk, so bureaucracy means basically "government by people at desks". Despite the bad-mouthing they often get, partly because they usually have to stick so close to the rules, bureaucrats do almost all the day-to-day work that keeps a government running. The idea of a bureaucracy is to split up the complicated task of governing a large country into smaller jobs that can be handled by specialists. Bureaucratic government is nothing new; the Roman empire had an enormous and complex bureaucracy, with the bureaucrats at lower levels reporting to bureaucrats above them, and so on up to the emperor himself.
Synonyms of bureaucrat
Examples of bureaucrat in a Sentence
Stacy Davis Gates, Chicago Tribune, 19 Apr. 2026
This would reset the balance between the executive and legislative branches, demanding the House and Senate not cede excessive authority to unelected bureaucrats who are only too happy to usurp legislative powers.
—Editorial, Boston Herald, 18 Apr. 2026
Instead, the producers kept returning to another idea, about a small-town bureaucrat working hard to make the world a better place.
—Jennifer Armstrong, IndieWire, 15 Apr. 2026
The fiduciary standards are developed in part by government bureaucrats.
—Business Columnist, Los Angeles Times, 10 Apr. 2026
See All Example Sentences for bureaucrat
Cite this Entry
“Bureaucrat.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bureaucrat. Accessed 22 Apr. 2026.
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bureaucrat
noun
