result is often an uneasy tension. Weber was also much concerned by the trend toward increasing bureaucratization and rationalization. For him, the process of bureaucratization presented a very great threat to the freedom of the human spirit and the values of liberal democracy, because those in control have a means of subordinating the interests and welfare of the masses. Hence his view that bureaucracy could all too easily turn into an iron cage. He saw bureaucracy as a power instrument of the first order and believed that the bureaucratization of administration when completely carried through establishes a form of power relation that is "practically unshatterable." The strength of bureaucratic organization is, of course, being undermined by developments in information technology that erode hierarchy and introduce new organizational power bases. But the process of rationalization and control to which Weber speaks is as strong as ever.