Developments and Trends in the Study of Public
Administration
Jos C.N. Raadschelders,
Mark R. Rutgers
Preliminary statement:
This is an abridged version of a paper commissioned by RC32 as part of the IPSA
Study of the Discipline. Requests for full version should be sent to Jos
Raadschelders [raadschelders@ou.edu]
The object of the study of
Public Administration is government in its entirety, while this is only a
sub-field in other studies. As a consequence, public administration is the only
study where knowledge and insights about government - as generated in various
(more) monodisciplinary studies in the social and human sciences - can be
brought together. In our view, the major challenge of the study of public
administration is to provide a framework in which such ‘interconnecting’ of
various bodies of knowledge is made possible.
The development of the
academic study of public administration in the 20th century in the
U.S.A. and in Western Europe can be subdivided into four stages:
1.
A study for practitioners and academics alike, late 19th century -
1940s: both in Western Europe and in the U.S.A. the study of public
administration (re-)emerged as a response to increasing demands made upon
government;
2. Separation of
practitioners and academics, 1940s-1960s, into four groups:
a)
academic research oriented group: seeking to develop public administration as a
positivist and nomological study (e.g., Simon);
b)
academic education oriented group: seeking to develop public administration as a
liberal arts program for (e.g., Waldo in his earlier years);
c)
practitioner research oriented group: developing public administration as a
study of policy making (e.g., Lasswell, Lindblom), and as a study of
organization and management (inspired by, e.g., Mintzberg);
d)
practitioner education oriented group: seeking to develop public administration
as a professional study preparing individuals for generalist positions in
government (e.g., Waldo, since 1970s).
3.
Compartmentalization of public administration, 1970s-1980s: development of
public administration into sub-specializations, each with their own handbooks
and journals;
4.
Further specialization and new developments, 1990s: in mainstream public
administration (including: HRM, policy making, IGR, public finance, organization
theory, bureaucracy, etc.) new developments include increased attention for the
male-female gap (in hiring, compensation, etc.), NPM (especially the NPM
Research Conference in the U.S.), leadership studies (especially in the U.S.),
and political-administrative relations (both in U.S, and Europe no longer only a
political science topic).
There is, however, a range of new approaches to
the study emerging, which include:
-
neo-institutionalism (attention for state and welfare state, principal agent
theory, etc.: more in political science than in public administration);
- foundations of public
administration (i.e., government):
a) Minnowbrook I and II and
Blacksburg Manifesto (on nature of government; especially in U.S.A.; e.g.,
Marini, Frederickson, Wamsley, Wolf);
b) historical perspectives on
the state and welfare state (both in U.S. and Europe; e.g., Kickert & Stillman);
c) studies in ethics and on
values ((both in U.S. and Europe);
d) (organizational and
national) culture (e.g., Hofstede);
-
grass-roots or citizen perspective (related to the foundations literature):
focus on relation between citizen and government, and that public administration
should further democracy (e.g., Box, King; and renewed interest in Mary Parker
Follett);
-
meta-theoretical studies (e.g., the Renaissance Project at the University of
Leiden, Rutgers);
- gender-oriented approaches:
(e.g., Stivers, McSwite)
- process theory (searching
for roots in organic state theory, e.g., McSwite)
- post-modernism (a highly
divergent group of authors, e.g., PatNet);
- multi-disciplinarity
in public administration (as no longer limited to contributions from economics,
psychology, and organizational sociology, but also including philosophy,
history, theology, and so forth; e.g., Gawthrop, Raadschelders);
-
information and communication technology (e.g., Snellen).
These new approaches have
not replaced mainstream public administration, but have rather enriched the
traditional research agendas. Most if not all of the new approaches listed above
are relevant to the various components of mainstream public administration.
What is problematic about
the current state of affairs in the study is that authors/scholars in the
various sub-specializations do not often, if at all, communicate with one
another, and thus inhibits a comprehensive understanding of government. This is
not only a problem of the study of public administration, but is as much a
challenge that political science faces as was suggested by Holden in the APSR
(2000).
The study of public
administration should develop a meta-framework that facilitates the use of
different bodies of knowledge about government. It has to be a meta-framework as
it should not impose a specific methodology for the study (i.e., epistemology),
nor a specific conceptualization (i.e., ontology) of its subject matter. It
should provide us with ways to bring together, compare and confront the wide
variety of knowledge relevant to understanding Public Administration. It is an
interdisciplinary study (i.e., differentiated) that should not attempt to
establish jurisdiction over a particular domain of inquiry as Thompson
suggested. In fact, public administration by necessity must lack cohesion at
the epistemological and theoretical levels. Indeed, Dwight Waldo suggested such
half a century ago (heterodoxy instead of orthodoxy) and this was stated again
in Ferrel Heady’s Donald C. Stone lecture at the annual ASPA-conference in 2001
(see PAR, July/August 2001).
