Fayol in the age of algorithms: classical administrative principles and the digital transformation of public administration
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.51247/pdlc.v7iEspecial1.937Keywords:
Henri Fayol; principles of administration; digital transformation; algorithmic bureaucracy; e-government; public administrationAbstract
Objective: this reflection article examines whether Henri Fayol's fourteen classical principles of administration, formulated in 1916 for hierarchical, paper-based organizations, remain analytically useful for understanding public administration under digital transformation and algorithmic governance. Methodology: the study combines a critical synthesis of Fayol's original administrative doctrine with contemporary digital-government and algorithmic-bureaucracy scholarship, alongside official United Nations E-Government Development Index (EGDI) statistics for Algeria (2016-2024), treating both bodies of material as primary sources for conceptual analysis rather than for causal statistical testing. Main findings: several Fayol principles — unity of command, scalar chain, centralization, equity — are directly destabilized by algorithmic administration, in which automated systems, rather than named superiors, issue and enforce administrative decisions; other principles, notably division of work and order, are intensified rather than discarded by digitalization. Applications: the argument speaks to public administration, e-government studies, and administrative law, offering practitioners a structured vocabulary for diagnosing which classical administrative safeguards are eroded, preserved, or reinvented by digital transformation. Novelty: rather than treating digitalization as a generic, undifferentiated trend, the article proposes an explicit three-part classification — destabilized, intensified, reinvented — for reading Fayol's individual principles against digital-era administrative mechanisms, illustrated with documented evidence from Algeria's e-government trajectory
Downloads
References
Ahn, M. J., & Chen, Y. C. (2022). Digital transformation toward AI-augmented public administration: The perception of government employees and the willingness to use AI in government. Government Information Quarterly. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.giq.2021.101664
Borry, E. L., & Getha-Taylor, H. (2019). Automation in the public sector: Efficiency at the expense of equity? Public Integrity, 21(1), 6-21. https://doi.org/10.1080/10999922.2018.1455488
Bovens, M., & Zouridis, S. (2002). From street-level to system-level bureaucracies: How information and communication technology is transforming administrative discretion and constitutional control. Public Administration Review, 62(2), 174-184. https://doi.org/10.1111/0033-3352.00168
Buffat, A. (2015). Street-level bureaucracy and e-government. Public Management Review, 17(1), 149-161. https://doi.org/10.1080/14719037.2013.771699
Busch, P. A., & Henriksen, H. Z. (2018). Digital discretion: A systematic literature review of ICT and street-level discretion. Information Polity, 23(1), 3-28.
Chen, Y. C., Ahn, M. J., & Wang, Y. F. (2023). Artificial intelligence and public values: Value impacts and governance in the public sector. Sustainability, 15(6), 4796. https://doi.org/10.3390/su15064796
Espinoza-Freire, E. E. (2025). Estrategias de búsqueda de información en bases de datos científicas: Una guía práctica. Sociedad & Tecnología, 8(S2), 647-658.
Fayol, H. (1949). General and industrial management (C. Storrs, Trans.). Pitman. (Original work published 1916)
Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison (A. Sheridan, Trans.). Pantheon Books. (Original work published 1975)
Fountain, J. E. (2001). Building the virtual state: Information technology and institutional change. Brookings Institution Press.
Gulick, L. (1937). Notes on the theory of organization. In L. Gulick & L. Urwick (Eds.), Papers on the science of administration (pp. 3-45). Institute of Public Administration.
Karim, M. S., Ambrosetti, E., & Ouadah-Bedidi, Z. (2022). Demographic features in West Asian and North African countries: The impact of population policies. In J. F. May & J. A. Goldstone (Eds.), International handbook of population policies (pp. 229-254). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-02040-7_11
Meijer, A., & Bekkers, V. (2015). A metatheory of e-government: Creating some order in a fragmented research field. Government Information Quarterly, 32(3), 237-245. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.giq.2015.04.006
Mergel, I., Edelmann, N., & Haug, N. (2019). Defining digital transformation: Results from expert interviews. Government Information Quarterly, 36(4), 101385. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.giq.2019.06.002
Newlands, G. (2021). Algorithmic surveillance in the gig economy: The organization of work through Lefebvrian conceived space. Organization Studies, 42(5), 719-737. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840620937900
Services du Premier Ministre (Algérie). (2022). Le Premier Ministre procède au lancement officiel du portail gouvernemental des services publics. https://premier-ministre.gov.dz/fr/post/le-premier-ministre-procede-au-lancement-officiel-du-portail-gouvernemental-des-services-publics
United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. (2024). E-Government Development Index: Algeria country profile [Data set]. E-Government Knowledgebase. https://publicadministration.un.org/egovkb/en-us/Data/Country-Information/id/3-Algeria
Vial, G. (2019). Understanding digital transformation: A review and a research agenda. Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 28(2), 118-144. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsis.2019.01.003
Weber, M. (1978). Economy and society (G. Roth & C. Wittich, Eds.). University of California Press. (Original work published 1922)
Wren, D. A., Bedeian, A. G., & Breeze, J. D. (2002). The foundations of Henri Fayol's administrative theory. Management Decision, 40(9), 906-918. https://doi.org/10.1108/00251740210441108
Zuboff, S. (2019). The age of surveillance capitalism: The fight for a human future at the new frontier of power. PublicAffairs.
Zuiderwijk, A., Chen, Y.-C., & Salem, F. (2021). Implications of the use of artificial intelligence in public governance: A systematic literature review and a research agenda. Government Information Quarterly, 38(3), 101577. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.giq.2021.101577
Aman Alliance. (2024, December). 2024: le parachèvement du processus de transformation numérique, un enjeu majeur pour instaurer la transparence et améliorer les performances. Agence Presse Service, republished by Aman Alliance. https://www.aman-alliance.org/Home/ContentDetail/84577
Interfil Algérie. (2025, April 7). Rapport : un état des lieux du numérique en Algérie - 2025. https://www.interfilalgerie.com/etat-du-numerique-en-algerie-2025/
Njoya, S. (2025, October 17). Dzair Services : l'Algérie centralise ses services numériques dans un portail unique. We Are Tech Africa. https://www.wearetech.africa/fr/fils/actualites/tech/dzair-services-l-algerie-centralise-ses-services-numeriques-dans-un-portail-unique
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Mohamed Mammeri
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
