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PAD 110: Introduction to Public

Administration

Dr. Tat Puthsodary


PhD in Social Work and Social Policy, University of
South Australia
Email: tputhsodary@auaf.edu.au

Introduction to the Syllabus (PAD


110)

Chapter 1: The Search for the Scope


and Purpose of Public Administration
The presentation is adopted from the text book
called Public Administration: Concepts and Cases
by Stillman Il 2010

1.1 Reading 1

The purpose of public


administration

1.1 Introduction

1.The field of public administration (PA)


2.Definition
3. Historic background of PA
4.The study of PA I, II, III

Discussion
Questions

1. According to Reading I, please identify various fields


associated with Public Administration.
2. There is no common definition of public administration.
Still, we can single out common themes emerging from
different definitions of several prominent authors. Please
identify these themes.
3. Please describe the historic background of public
administration since 1887.
4. What are the main events occurring in 19th century in
relation to public administration?
5. What is the main focus of Wilsons essay of public
administration?

1.1 Introduction
1.The field of public administration
(PA): key themes emerge in PA
Technical field
Budget
Employment
Evaluation
Performance measurement
Project management
Policy
Resource management
Governance

1.1 Introduction
2. Definition
- What are common fields emerge from
different definition? (e.g. production of
goods and services).
- What is are common themes defining public
administration?

Common themes of PA definitions


1. The executive branch of government (yet it is
related in important ways to legislative and
judicial branches)
2. The formulation and implementation of public
policies.
3. the involvement in a considerable range of
problems concerning human behavior and
cooperative efforts.
4. A field that can be differentiated in several ways
from private administration.
5. The production of public goods and services

1.3 Historic Background of Public


Administration
Referring to historic time of 1887 of Wilsos
essay The Study of Administration.

1.4 The Study of Administration


(Wilson 1887)

I suppose that no practical science is ever


studied where there is no need to know
(Wilson 1887, p. 197)
We can be the theory or we can be against theory,
but we can never be without theory (Mullaly 2007,
p. 204)

The Evolution of Theory

Dominant
truth
Events

Time

Reflec
Unearthed t
truth

Recognized
truth
Unrecognized
truth
Buried truth

Practical
science

Philosophical
theories
Concepts
No
practical
science

Practical
application

1.4 The Study of Administration


(Wilson 1887)

1. To take some account of what others have


done in the same line; that is to say, of the
history of the study.
2. To ascertain just what is its subject-matter.
3. To determine just what are the best
methods by which to develop it, and the
most clarifying political conception to carry
with us into it.

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (I)


(Wilson 1887)

1. To take some account of what others have


done in the same line; that is to say; of the
history of the study.
- PA is the latest fruit of science
- PA is government in action, it is executive,
operative
- PA is about constitution of government, the nature
of state, the essence and seat of sovereignty and
power.
- populate
PA is a systematic
knowledge (Who shall make
law and what shall that law be? How law should
be administered with enlightenment, with equity,
with speed and without friction?

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (I)


(Wilson 1887)

- Previously, there was no complex system of public


revenues, and public debts to puzzle financiers;
there were, consequently, no financiers to be
puzzled.
- Administration is everywhere putting its hands to
new undertakings between government, state
and citizens.
- Both government and state play a key role in
providing better services, utility and
infrastructure.

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (I)


(Wilson 1887)

- Such things must be studied in order to be well


done. And these, as I have said, are only a few of
the doors which are being opened to officers of
government. This is why there should be a science
of administration which shall seek to strengthen
the paths of government
- PA has found its doctors in Europeit is not of our
making; it is a foreign science, speaking very
little of the language of English or American
principles. It employs only foreign tongues

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (I)


(Wilson 1887)

- PA has been developed by French and German


professors.
- It refers to the Prussias history and Prussias
administrative system.
- Later PA has been adopted or employed in all
parts based the needs of a compact state.
- If we would employ it, we must Americanize it

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (II)


(Wilson 1887)

2. To ascertain just what is its subject-mater.


- The field of administration is a field of business.
- It is used as a machinery to manufacture products.
- The objective of administrative study is to rescue
executive methods from the confusion and
costliness.
- Administration lies outside the proper sphere of
politics.
- The distinction between politics and

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (II)


(Wilson 1887)

Between politics and administration


- Politics is state activity in things great and
universal while administration is the activity of
the state in individual and small thing.
- Politics is the special province of the statesman;
administration of the technical officer.
- Policy does nothing without the aid of
administration.

Administrative Wheel
Constituti
on
Politic
s

Administrati
on

Rules of Law

Policy
Liberty/Enli
ghtenment

Regulation
s

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (II)


(Wilson 1887)

Liberty is a subject matter of administration


- Apparently facility in the actual exercise of liberty
does depend more upon administrative
arrangement than upon constitutional guarantee;
although constitutional guarantee alone secure
the existing liberty.
- Liberty cannot live apart from constitutional
principle; or administration.

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (II)


(Wilson 1887)

The power/knowledge between constitution and


administration.
- The difference between the province of
constitutional law and the province of
administrative function ought to leave no room for
misconception; and it is possible to name some
roughly definite criteria upon which such a view
can be built.
- PA is detailed and systematic execution of public
laws (raising taxes, family laws)
- Constitution concerns itself with those

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (II)


(Wilson 1887)

The power/knowledge between constitution and


administration.
- The study of administration; philosophically
viewed, is closely connected with the study of the
proper distribution of constitutional authority.
- To discover the best principle for the distribution of
authority is of greater importance under a
democratic system, where officials serve many
matters, than under others where they serve but a
few.

Power/Knowledge
Sovereign

Administrati
on
Power/kno
wledge
Trust

Authority

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (III)


(Wilson 1887)

3. To determine just what are the best


methods by which to develop it, and the most
clarifying political conceptions to carry with us
into it.
- We do not study the art of governing: we govern.
- How to adopt foreign administration as our
methods?
- We devise or invent an adjusted weight for our
comparative method of study. We can thus
scrutinize the anatomy of foreign government
without fear of getting any of their diseases into
our veins; examine alien systems without
apprehension of blood-poisoning.

1.4.1 The Science of Administration (III)


(Wilson 1887)

Conclusion:
Wilsons essay intends to develop his arguments on
the evolution of PA from 1887 to late nineteenth
century and to sketch the academic study of PA in
America.

Reading 1.2: The Uniqueness of


American PA Thought

- After 1887, the rise of PA research and training in


1930s and 1940s
- Contextual forces in late 19th and early 20th
century forced Americans to build an
administrative enterprise due to:
- Massive migrants
- Rapid technological and urbanized
- Industrial change
- Clashes between management and labor
- International market

- The U.S PA becomes an established reality and


running the Constitution a necessity between
1877-1920s.
- American PA is bubbled up from grass-root
reforms, imbued with protestant moral uplift
and democratic idealism.
- It evolved in bits and pieces through the
experimentation by a variety of local reforms.
- Today, American PA still remains considerably
more experimental, fragmented,
inductive/principle, applied, and reformist in caste
of system and character compared with other

- American PA is created based on positive law


tradition through a basic methodology for
teaching and research.
- Therefore, PA becomes a part of solid scientific
legitimacy and managerial methodology.
- PA is growing after the dawn of 20th century
onwards.

POSDCORB Orthodoxy
(1926-1946)

- The emergence of POSDCORB orthodoxy (stands


for the field of management and PA in a classic
view).
- The orthodoxy addressed as well as any
alternative the twin crisis of the era, the Great
Depression and World War II (the worst economic
and military conflict).
- The orthodoxy provides a respectable intellectual
framework for the new academic field.
- It provides a cohesive and compressive academic
rational for setting up graduate programs
advancing research as well as its applications

Social Science Heterodoxy


(1947-1967)

- The engagement in the Cold War of the U.S.

- The Cold War shaped American society as a whole


as well as its PA and its administrative science.
- Not only a massive military-industrial complex
emerge, but also a host of domestic
administrative activities were justified by national
security needs (space program, scientific
research).

1.

The Reassertion of
Democratic Idealism (19681988)
Clashing moral absolute

2. The new tow Es and one L


3. A cry for relevancy
4. The fragmentation- or decline?
5. The proliferation of subfields and techniques
6. A field in intellectual crisis?
7. A widening gap between theory and practice

The Refounding Movement, (1989-to


the present day)
1. The re-inventor
2. The communitarian
3. The VPI re-founders
4. The interpretivists
5. The tool-makers
6. New bureaucratic analysts
7. From management to governance

Conclusion: PA as the
eminently practical science
What will the future hold for American
Administration Science? If the past is any guide to
the present and to the future- U.S PA unlike PA
elsewhere, will remain dominated by its own unique
brand of inductive, experimental, reformist
mindsets, closely interconnected to the practicalities
of coping with the immediate needs of democratic
governance.

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

1. Explain the purpose of the article.


2. Explain competing meanings of development and its
administration
3. Explain the ideology of development from optimistic and
ethnocentric perspective.
4. Narrate the meanings of development from Liberal and NeoMarxist interpretation.
5. What are key characteristics of development administration?
6. What are important differences between PA in poor countries
and in high-income countries?
7. From modernization theory, please criticize its application and
implication.
8. How do we characterize the contemporary practices of
development administration?

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

1. Explain the purpose of the article.


Explore the complex and diverse context of
development and public sector organization.
Analyze the ways in which public sector
organizations influence development policies
and programs, and the effects this has on
results achieved.
Identify and discuss appropriateness of
approaches
Contest dominant ideology of the last
decade

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

2. Describe the negative views of development and


its administration.
Management systems, administrative techniques and
organizational design are not neutral value-free
phenomena.
Complex web of relationships between organizations and
individuals and national culture that influence
operational norms and practices
Power and authority between politics and administrative
system.
Success and failure are based on organizational design,
administrative reform, and human resource
management.

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

3. Explain the ideology of development from


optimistic and ethnocentric perspective.
From optimistic perspective, development can be
seen as a problem-solving such as poverty,
inadequate social services and low levels of
industrial production by application of rational
management techniques.
From ethnocentric perspective, development is
defined as being Western and that Western
technology, institutions, modes of production and
values were both superior and desirable.

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

4. Narrate the meanings of development from Liberal and


Neo-Marxist interpretation.
From liberal reformulations, authentic development was
seen as progress towards a complex of welfare goals,
including poverty reduction, employment, the reduction
of inequality and the guarantee of human rights.
From Neo-Marxists, on one hand, the global economic
structures was exploitative systems which generated and
maintained the development of underdevelopment in
the poor nations. On the other hand, it is considered as
the concept of the world capitalist system.

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

5. What are key characteristics of development administration?


Development administration was synonymous with public
administration which itself was synonymous with bureaucracy.
Politicians and planners would be committed to transforming
their societies into replicas of the modern Western nation-state.
Development administration would tackle head on the lack of
administrative capacity for implementing plans and programs
through the transfer of administrative techniques to improve
the central machinery of national government.
Foreign aid was the mechanism by which missing tools of public
administration would be transferred from the West to
developing countries.
Culture was regarded as an obstacle to the smooth functioning
of Western tools and dominant Weberian models of
bureaucracy.

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

6. What are important differences between PA in


poor countries and in high-income countries?
In developing countries, there was that
inconvenient combination: extensive needs, low
capacities, severe obstacles.
In the West, there was an open systems and
contingency theories of management that
becomes the dominant paradigm.

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

7. From modernization theory, please criticize its


application and implication in the late 1960s and
1970s.
The blame for poor developmental performance
was in large part attributed to a failure of
development administration, and development
experts and institutions looked for new solutions.

Development and its Administration


(Turner & Hulme 1997)

8. How do we characterize the contemporary practices


of development administration?
It is both academic subfield in the social science and
a developmental practice. There is now a voluminous
literature offering practical advice, analytic insight
and descriptive account of administrative activities.
It is not a discipline in the sense of possessing a
distinct body of theory. There is no paradigmatic
consensus.
Development administration remains heavily but not
exclusively focused on public administration.
Consideration of power and politics is central to an
understanding of this mode of organizing.
It can defined based on culture and history.

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