Public Administration Theory in the Obama Era

Journal of Public …, 2011

This essay focuses on the potential of information communication technologies to move the Public Administration (PA) scholarly community into a new information paradigm. We begin with a review of conventional approaches PA scholars use to communicate with each other, students, and practitioners. After illustrating advances in Web applications, we call for an ''Open PA Scholarship'' in which research, teaching, and engagement are conducted in a more participatory, timely, and effective manner enabled by new technologies. We conclude with a proposal of Online PA Commons, an interactive Web platform that may facilitate the development of such scholarship. In 1988, the Minnowbrook II conference focused on ''public management in an interconnected world'' (Bailey and Mayer 1992). Discussions about this theme continue today and were reflected in debates at the Minnowbrook III meeting during fall 2008, albeit with a different flavor. Now this ''interconnected world'' is all around us, supported by a flow of information previously unimaginable. Many would agree the biggest change since 1988 is this new digital interconnectedness, enabled by advances in information technology hardware-our computers, cell phones, other types of hand-held devices-and platforms such as the Internet, Web-based databases, and search engines. As these new information communication technologies (ICTs) reshape the way society interacts, we observe parallel changes in the landscape of public affairs, which urge us to reconsider the role of Public Administration (PA) scholarship and how we share our research and enhance our teaching. Conventionally, governments use exclusive powers, such as tax authority or service monopolies, to provide specific public services within particular jurisdictions. Management and policy implementation are structured mainly hierarchically. Intergovernmental relations are assumed to be principle-agent problems of coordination; nonprofit and business, if involved, are mere vendors of public service provision (Knott 1993). This traditional view has changed. Today's governments function more like information nodes (Fountain 2001), working together with other governments, other sectors, and the public in an interactive network (Agranoff 2008b; Koontz et al. 2004). State and local governments interact with each other horizontally in policy competition, collaboration, or

Indian Institute of Public Administration, 2007

'If scholars live or die in terms of the images they create, students of public administration are clearly in trouble even if some hope still exists. …' Thus began Robert T. Golembiewski his monumental book: 'Public Administration As a Developing Discipline, Part I, Perspectives on Past and Present'. He devoted the book to provide content for Public Administration as a field. 'Content in his case included not only an orientation to analysis, but also the skills and technologies necessary for supporting cumulative traditions of research and application. To quote from the book ' Public administration's early history is studded with symbols testifying to its rich destiny and performance. Not only were all problems ultimately administrative problems, for example, but the very existence of our civilizations depended upon the success with which we learn of to cope with the administrative ultimates.' Woodrow Wilson's influential conclusion who noted, " it is getting harder to run a constitution, than to frame one " did generate its many an echo. Again to quote from the Foreword to the monumental 1937 publication 'Papers on the Science of Administration' by Luther Gulick and Lyndall Urwick, " if those who are concerned scientifically with the phenomena of getting things done through cooperative human effort will proceed along these lines we may expect in time to construct a valid and accepted theory of administration. " The confidence of the first half of the 20 th century, however, did not last long. " For a variety of reasons, " Frederick Mosher concluded, " public administration stands in danger of … senescence. " Frederick Mosher further emphasized the crisis of identity concern soon thereafter: 'More is now known about public administration than was the case twenty years ago. But there is a great deal more to know. There are more depths to probe than were then visualized, and more different perspectives from which to start the probing. This field need bow to no other in respect to its sophistication about its subject matter. But such sophistication can senesce into mere dilettantism unless it is grounded in premises and hypotheses that are in some degree ordered and tested and that are continuously refreshed with new data and experience.' Φ The author a senior member of the Indian Administrative Service-the premier Civil Service of India is presently working as Additional Financial Advisor and Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Defence in the Government of India. Earlier till recently he was working as Secretary Finance, Government of Uttar Pradesh and prior to that as Member (Finance & Accounts) UP State Electricity Board. He was the key person in the UP government's team assigned with the task of structuring and negotiations of first ever stand-alone programme loan to a sub national government by the World Bank. He has vast experience of serving in the various field level Public Administration positions, PSUs and at the policy formulation levels in the secretariat. The views expressed here, however, are entirely his own and in no way should be construed to represent the organization / the government he happen to be serving/have served. In this apparently visible two-part article, the first part is devoted to capture the discipline of public administration as seen by the masters of yore and is based largely on the works of Robert T. Golembiewski. The second part of course is what may be euphemistically called the recipe of the author.

Public administration: An interdisciplinary critical analysis (Ed. by Eran Vigoda), 2002

Crises and dilemmas in public administration? So what’s new? As this book has made clear, public administration has never had an easy ride, being a practice-oriented subject in an academy that gives more honor to theory, and also an inherently multidisciplinary subject in a world dominated by aggressive disciplinary purists. Consequently, this final chapter of the book does not seek to give a definitive answer to the question ‘‘What’s new?’’ but it does look at some key emerging areas within public administration, as evidenced by previous chapters in the book. Moreover, it goes on to explore what’s next. In doing this, it seeks to provide an interdisciplinary synthesis, marking out some boundaries and destinations for the new generation of public administration and suggesting some possible road maps to take us on the next stage of the journey. This chapter identifies different perspectives as well as common lines of thinking in the realm of public administration. It suggests that while public administration is enriched by a variety of social science disciplines, these disciplines have also maintained an artificial distance from each other, with serious impacts on their ability to explain the behaviors in which they are interested. Where disciplines such as economics and systems analysis have been dominant, hegemonic and narrowly managerialist approaches such as the New Public Management have emerged, often with significant adverse side effects to governance issues in the countries that have pursued this approach. Where narrow political science and legal approaches have held sway, outdated managerial systems have remained in place, often with significant adverse affects to the management of public services. Consequently, current interdisciplinary initiatives are highlighted in the chapter, and future research avenues are suggested as potentially useful for the evolution of public administration. If they are successful, they may provide more meaningful challenges to the public sector than the rather empty and abstract debates around the New Public Management, and may suggest more fruitful ways of designing public governance processes, implementing public policy, and managing public services. In sum, this chapter starts from Vigoda’s espousal in his introduction to this book of an interdisciplinary critical perspective on the state of contemporary public administration, based on a multilevel, multimethod, and multisystem analysis of current developments, and it goes on to propose a critical understanding of governance and government that highlights options for a new generation of public administration in the twenty-first century.