The State of Public Administration

The State of Public Administration
Author: Donald C Menzel
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 526
Release: 2015-01-28
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1317454464

The trends and practices of public administration are ever changing and it is essential that they be appraised from time to time. Designed as a capstone survey of the field, The State of Public Administration focuses on leading edge issues, challenges, and opportunities that confront PA study and practice in the 21st Century.

The Social Construction of Public Administration

The Social Construction of Public Administration
Author: Jong S. Jun
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Total Pages: 330
Release: 2012-02-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0791481891

In this conceptual guided tour of contemporary public administration, Jong S. Jun challenges the limitations of the discipline which, he argues, make it inadequate for understanding today's complex human phenomena. Drawing on examples and case studies from both Eastern and Western countries, he emphasizes critical and interpretive perspectives as a counterforce to the instrumental-technical rationality that reduces the field to structural and functionalist views of management. He also emphasizes the idea of democratic social construction to transcend the field's reliance on conventional pluralist politics. Jun stresses that public administrators and institutions must create opportunities for sharing and learning among organizational members and must facilitate interactive processes between public administrators and citizens so that the latter can voice their problems and opinions. The future role of public administrators will be to transcend the limitations of the management and governing of modern public administration and to explore ways of constructing socially meaningful alternatives through communicative action and the participation of citizens.

Public Administration and the State

Public Administration and the State
Author: Michael W. Spicer
Publisher: University Alabama Press
Total Pages: 178
Release: 2001-10-04
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN:

In this critical examination of public administration's pervasive vision of a powerful state, Spicer thoughtfully reconsiders the relationship between activities of governance and concepts of the state. Woodrow Wilson argued for a state led by a powerful government, guided by science and enlightened experts, for the accomplishment of a set of collective purposes—in other words, a purposive state. Michael Spicer contends that though Wilson and those who followed him have not typically explored questions of political and constitutional theory in their writing, a clear and strong vision of the state has emerged in their work nonetheless. Building upon the work of Dwight Waldo and others who have sought to explore and reveal the political theory behind the seemingly neutral language of administration, Spicer explores the roots—both historical and philosophical—of the purposive state. He considers the administrative experience of 18th-century Prussia and its relationship to the vision of the purposive state, and examines the ways this idea has been expressed in the 20th century. He then looks at the practical problems such a vision creates for public policy in a fragmented postmodern political culture. Finally, Spicer explores an alternative view of public administration—one based on a civil association model appropriate to our constitutional traditions and contemporary culture.

Swiss Public Administration

Swiss Public Administration
Author: Andreas Ladner
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 397
Release: 2018-08-07
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3319923811

Swiss citizens approve of their government and the way democracy is practiced; they trust the authorities and are satisfied with the range of services Swiss governments provide. This is quite unusual when compared to other countries. This open access book provides insight into the organization and the functioning of the Swiss state. It claims that, beyond politics, institutions and public administration, there are other factors which make a country successful. The authors argue that Switzerland is an interesting case, from a theoretical, scientific and a more practice-oriented perspective. While confronted with the same challenges as other countries, Switzerland offers different solutions, some of which work astonishingly well.

The Administrative State

The Administrative State
Author: Dwight Waldo
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 384
Release: 2017-09-04
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1351486330

This classic text, originally published in 1948, is a study of the public administration movement from the viewpoint of political theory and the history of ideas. It seeks to review and analyze the theoretical element in administrative writings and to present the development of the public administration movement as a chapter in the history of American political thought.The objectives of The Administrative State are to assist students of administration to view their subject in historical perspective and to appraise the theoretical content of their literature. It is also hoped that this book may assist students of American culture by illuminating an important development of the first half of the twentieth century. It thus should serve political scientists whose interests lie in the field of public administration or in the study of bureaucracy as a political issue; the public administrator interested in the philosophic background of his service; and the historian who seeks an understanding of major governmental developments.This study, now with a new introduction by public policy and administration scholar Hugh Miller, is based upon the various books, articles, pamphlets, reports, and records that make up the literature of public administration, and documents the political response to the modern world that Graham Wallas named the Great Society. It will be of lasting interest to students of political science, government, and American history.

State Management

State Management
Author: Jan-Erik Lane
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 192
Release: 2009-05-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1134007183

State Management offers a comprehensive yet concise introduction to the new field of state management, systematically examining the key approaches to the study of how government attempts to achieve successful delivery of public services, discussing the pros and cons of alternative frameworks of analysis.

The Machinery of Government

The Machinery of Government
Author: Joseph Heath
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 439
Release: 2020
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0197509614

In most liberal democracies for example, the central bank is as independent as the supreme court, yet deals with a wide range of economic, social, and political issues. How do these public servants make these policy decisions? What normative principles inform their judgments? In The Machinery of Government, Joseph Heath attempts to answer these questions. He looks to the actual practice of public administration to see how normative questions areaddressed. More broadly, he attempts to provide the outlines of a "philosophy of the executive" by taking seriously the claim to political authority of the most neglected of the three branches of the state.

American Public Administration

American Public Administration
Author: Maxwell Graduate School of Citizenship and Public Affairs
Publisher: University of Alabama Press
Total Pages: 316
Release: 1975
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780817348298

A seminal collection of essays, addressing such questions as the evolving roles of civil servants, the education and training of civil servants, and the ways to balance civil servants’ expertise with respect for democratic governance This collection of essays highlights the “peculiarly American” issues of public administration ranging from 1870 to 1974, when they were first published. Every contributor was assigned a period of American history and given the opportunity to write on what he or she deemed the most important or relevant concern of that period. This method, employed for this book and the connected National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration conference, resulted in a wide-reaching, if eclectic, collection. Supplanted by Mosher’s impressive summarization of the field throughout the years, the book still holds prominence as a source for scholars, workers, and students alike in public administration. The essays raise such issues as the education of civil servants, the changes necessitated by crises, the growth of social sciences in governmental concerns, and primarily, the role of public administrators in America. Each author is a distinguished expert in his own right, and each essay can stand alone as a remarkable insight into the changing world of public administration within American society. Frederick Mosher’s expertise and supervision shapes this work into a remarkable and holistic perspective on public administration over time.