How Did The Bureaucracy Affect The United States

Governing a country with complete civil obedience and compliance has proven to be very difficult by numerous governments throughout history. To establish control, governments often become bureaucracies, believing this will allow for an easier domination of its people. Countries with lesser amounts of bureaucratic control that practice capitalism, for example, tend to have more civil cooperation than totalitarian and communist countries with enhanced bureaucratic control. During times of war, governments frequently implement extreme bureaucratic measures that affect the disempowered and minority populations the most. The U.S. government exhibited some of this extreme bureaucracy during World War II after the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Fueled by the attack and the fear that Japanese Americans were a threat to national security, Franklin D. Roosevelt released the Executive Order 9066, incarcerating 120,000
Japanese Americans.
This authoritative decision ultimately led to numerous negative short and long term effects on the Japanese Americans. Internment Camp conditions were harmful, as was life for these citizens after their incarceration. Generations later, Japanese American lives were still influenced by this Executive Order. Bureaucratic control, especially during times of war, is detrimental to the disempowered population. The Executive Order forced Japanese Americans to evacuate their homes and businesses and enter damaging concentration camps. These citizens were negatively affected both psychologically and physically. As the Issei (first generation of immigrants) and the american-born Nisei (second generation) were interned, their status was changed into that of enemy aliens. This caused them to experience a low sense of self worth, as they began to believe they were in fact as barbaric as the majority of Americans accused them of being. The american-born
Nisei, primarily in their early twenties, became more susceptible to these psychological effects. “The incarceration was a serious attack on their American identity development and had significant impact on Nisei self-image. Amy Iwasaki Mass noted that...the government's treatment was a ‘betrayal by a trusted source’ that led to ‘deep depression [and] a sense of shame’” (Nagata). Japanese Americans experienced verbal abuse and became convinced they were worthless to their own country. This low degree of self-esteem contributed to a diminished well-being for many Japanese Americans, along with high levels of stress and anxiety caused by their indefinite imprisonment. Further, internment camp conditions were less than adequate. Camp housing was mainly “military-style barracks with basic furnishings. In addition, authorities had hoped that the camps could become self-sufficient and grow their own food, but the location of these camps, mostly on arid land, prevented such cultivation and formed a harsh backdrop for these facilities” (Stock). Substandard housing and food impacted inmates’ health. These conditions added to the dehumanization of the Japanese Americans and worsened the psychological effects. The Executive Order authorized the Secretary of War to impose these conditions which damaged the minority population, the Japanese Americans. Not only were Japanese Americans negatively affected while imprisoned, they experienced additional harm resulting from the bureaucratic control of the U.S. after the war. Several health conditions began to afflict former concentration camp inmates. These life-altering ailments included “psychological anguish as well as increased cardiovascular disease. Traumatic stress was buffered by culturally constructed coping mechanisms that were less inculcated in the youngest detainees. They reported more post-traumatic stress symptoms of unexpected and disturbing flashback experiences than those who were older at the time of incarceration” (PBS). Without the original restrictions of Japanese American freedom, these illnesses would have never appeared. When Japanese Americans were allowed to leave the camps, they had to homes to return to.