Ethical Discourse in Public Administration

Abstract

From Weber to Ellul, the neglect of ethics and normative discourse in public organizational decision-making has been an enduring theme in bureaucratic theory. A number of contemporary public administration theorists have begun to search for a solution by turning to recent developments in ethics, political philosophy, jurisprudence, and the philosophy of science. An important theme in these efforts has been an attempt to present an alternative decision model capable of integrating both facts and values. As an extension of this line of investigation, the purpose of this article is to suggest a methodological framework for such a model developed from the informal logic of practical reason. Presented as a logic of questions that systematically integrate empirical and normative judgments, the framework is designed to serve as a rational-analytic guide for the evaluation of organizational decisions.