Public Administration (UPSC CIVIL SERVICE EXAM FOR OPTIONAL SUBJECT)

Evolution of Public Administration as a Discipline 

Paradigm 4: Public Administration as Management 

Partly because of their second - class citizenship status in a number of political science department of universities, some public administrationists began searching for an alternative. The management option - which sometimes is called " administrative science " or " generic management " - was a viable alternative for a significant number of scholars in public administration. Management is a field that covers organization theory and behavior, planning, decision making, various techniques of " management science " such as path analysis and queuing theory, human resources management, leadership, motivation , communication, management information systems, budgeting, auditing, productivity, and marketing. Management thinking many stemming from the business schools, fostered the alternative paradigm of management.

Scientific management and principles gave way to administrative management science. Such other works as James G. March and Herbert Simon's Organization  (1858), Organization  (1965), and James D. Thompson's Organization in Action  (1967) gave solid theoretical reasons for choosing management, with an emphasis on Organization Theory as the Paradigm of Public Administration. 

There were some other theoretical developments in this period that brought back some of the self esteem of the discipline :

• Comparative Administration - Fred Ringgs, Ferrel Heady etc 
• Development Administration - George Gant, Fred Riggs etc. 
• Critical Theory - Jurgen Habermas 


Paradigm 5: Public Administration as Public Administration, 1970-1990

In 1970, the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration  (NASPAA) was founded.  The formation of NASPAA represented not only an act of secession by public administrationists from political science or management science, but a raise of self confidence as well. Progress,  particularly in the area of organisation theory and information science , had been made in this direction. Additionally, considerable progress had been made in refining the applied techniques and methodologies of public administration. 

The New Public Administration 

An important development was that of the "new public administration ". In 1968, Dwight Waldo sponsored a conference of young public administrationists on the new public administration. The proceedings were published as a book in 1971, titled Toward a New Public Administration : The Minnowbrook perspective. The focus was disinclined to examine such traditional phenomena as efficiency , effectiveness, budgeting , and administrative techniques.  Conversely,  the new public administration was very much aware of normative theory, philosophy, and activism. The questions it raised dealt with values ,ethics, the development of the individual member in the organization,  the relationship of the client , with the bureaucracy, and the broad problems of urbanism, technology, and violence.

Reinventing Government 

Bureaucratic model developed in conditions very different from those that are existing today . It developed in a slower- paced society, when change proceeded at a leisurely gait. It developed in an age of hierarchy , when only those at the top of the pyramid had enough information to make informed decisions. It developed in a society of people who worked with their hands, not their minds . It developed in a time of mass markets , when most people had similar wants and needs. And it developed with strong geographic communities- tightly knit neighborhoods and towns.  Today's environment demands institutions that are extremely flexible and adaptable.It demands institutions that deliver high quality goods and services, it demands institutions that are responsive to their costumers ,offering choices of non- standardised services; that lead by persuasion and incentives rather than commands; that give their employees a sense of meaning and control , even ownership and it demands institutions that empower citizens rather than simply serving them. 

Most government institutions perform increasingly complex tasks, in competitive, rapidly changing environments, with customers who want quality and  choice. David Osborne and Ted Gabler in Reinventing Government  (1992) introduced the concept of Entrepreunial government. 


1. Catalystic government : Steering rather than rowing. 
2. Community owned government : Empowering rather than serving. 
3. Competitive government : Injecting competition into service delivery. 
4. Mission - driven government : Transforming rule-driven organizations. 
5. Results-driven government : Funding outcomes, not inputs. 
6. Customers -driven government : Meeting the needs of the customer, not the bureaucracy. 
7. Enterprising government : Earning rather than spending. 
8. Anticipatory government : Prevention rather than cure. 
9.Decentralised government : From hierarchy to participation and teamwork. 
10. Market-oriented government : Leveraging change through the market. 



The New Public Management  (NPM)

In the early 1990's, a new managerial approach to public administration began to take hold. Like the traditional managerial approach at its inception, the new approach is reform- oriented and seeks to improve public sector performance.  It starts from the premises that traditional, bureautically organised public administration is "broke" and " broke", and consequently the public has lost faith in government.  In the US, NPM approach was adopted by vice president AI Gore's national performance review  (NPR). Its 1993 report, From Red Tape to Results : Creating a Government that Works Better & Costs Less, Explicitly sought after new customer service contract with the people , a new guarantee of effective, efficient and sweeping the world and expressed in the form of Reaganism  in the US and Thatcherism in the UK that to calls for rollback  of state and reinventing government.


It called for among others : putting customers first, making service organizations compete,  creating market dynamics, using market mechanisms to solve problems,  empowering employees to get results,  decentralisation decision making power, streamlining the budget process, decentralised personnel policy, and streamlining procurement. Today , the NPM is becoming the dominant managerial approach.  Overall,   public administrative culture is changing to be more flexible,  innovative  , problem solving,  entrepreunial,  and enterprising as opposed to rule- bound, process oriented, and focused on inputs rather than results.   



Popular posts from this blog

Right to Information

Right to Information  Right to information legislation represents the fundamental right-to-known legal process by which requesters may ask for government held information and receive it freely or at minimal cost baring standardized exceptions. Also various referred to as open records or (especially in the United States  )sunshine laws governments are also typically bound by a duty to publish and promote openness.
Read more

Participatory Management (Chris Argyris)

Participatory Management(  Chris Argyris ) 1.Maturity -Immaturity theory People in an organization tend to move from immature state ●Infant Passivity- Adult activity ●Relative Dependence- Relative independence  ●Limited Behaviors - Many different behaviours ●Erratic, shallow, Brief Interests- Stable , deeper interests ●Short-term Perspective- Long term perspective ●Subordinate Social Position- Equal or superordinate position ●Lack of Awareness -Self awareness and self control There is a basic incongruence between needs of a mature personality and the requirements of a classical pyramidal bureaucratic organization. The application of classical organization priciples like hierarchy close supervision tight controls centralization make employees passive dependent subordinate and short term oriented. According to Argyris management assumptions are: 1. Employee are lazy 2. Uninterested and apathetic  3. Employee are money crazy 4. Employee create errors and waste Management bla...
Read more

Vroom and Yetton's Contingency Theory

Vroom and Ye tton's  Contingency Theory  This theory is also called the Leader Participation Model. Vroom and Yetton base their analysis on two aspects of a leader's decision : ● Decision Quality: The effect that the decision has on group performance  ●Decision Acceptance : It refers to the motivation and commitment of group members in implementing the decision  Vroom and Yetton identified five leadership styles based on the degree of employee participation and power in making organizational decisions : ● Autocratic  (A-1) : The leader solves the problem himself or makes the decision alone using information available to him at that time. ● Automatic  (A-2): The leader obtains information from his subordinates but the decision on solution is his alone. ●Consultative  (C-1): The leader shares the problem with his subordinates individually . He then makes the decision which mayor may not reflect the influence of his subordinates.  ● Consultative...
Read more