Interrogating hegemonic embraces: Representative bureaucracy, methodological Whiteness, and non‐West exclusions

Abstract

AbstractThe United States' racial history infrequently defines the representativeness of bureaucracies outside of the United States. This article explores how selective historical memories and insufficiently critical concept importations limit disciplinary understandings. We articulate how policy transfer assumptions, narrow administrative histories, methodological Whiteness, and incomplete considerations of non‐West administration alter our understanding of what is or is not representative bureaucracy. We encourage scholars to recall how concepts like representative bureaucracy may lack exact comparability outside the West and to be open to its potential alteration by contextual circumstances. The implications for further exploration of the representative bureaucracy concept and the challenges for pedagogy are also discussed.Evidence for Practice West‐derived hegemonic understandings of the public administration discipline limit the development of public administration practice and scholarship outside the West. Insufficient historical and comparative circumspection is a frequent output of West‐based scholars seeking to implement their concepts in non‐West administrations. The discipline and practice of public administration may increase its global dialogues by conversing with non‐West actors and recognizing the limitations of Western data and theories. Like many administrative concepts, the representative bureaucracy concept as developed in the West may not operate similarly in other contexts.