Plural of directorate; the office, authority, or jurisdiction of a director or board of directors, especially in governmental or organizational structures.
From 'directorate' (director + '-ate,' suffix denoting office or position, from Latin). This term emerged in modern governmental administration to describe the agencies and departments headed by appointed or elected directors.
Directorates are where bureaucratic power actually lives—while ministers get attention, the directorates underneath do the work, and countries like France rely heavily on trained civil servants running directorates with remarkable continuity across political changes.
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