We can then decide whether bureaucrats have a political status or not. This is a definition which can be applied to politics world-wide and it is useful for the purpose here. As higher civil servants world-wide engage in policy making, they inevitably have a political status. A survey carried out by Richard Chapman found that policy formulation was the most frequently cited task of an administrative class civil servant in Britain. This is also common throughout other European countries.
Bureaucrats bring forth conflicting views in relation to policy making.
They analyse the different aspects of policy and present a picture of what they see to be the possible choices facing the minister. It is quite uncommon that a minister would ignore the advice of a senior civil servant. The biggest and most pervasive influence is in setting the framework within which the questions of policy are raised. I t is clear from this that bureaucrats, particularly higher civil servants, engage to a large extent in the formulation of policy, a previously political task. This is an example of the politicisation of the bureaucracy.