Pragmatism, The New Republic, and American Public Administration at Its Founding

Abstract

We argue that philosophical pragmatism explicitly influenced the founding of American public administration. We analyze the case of The New Republic magazine to support our contention. The New Republic was founded in 1914 and edited by two pragmatists—Herbert Croly and Walter Lippmann—and put forth a pragmatic editorial stance that supported administrative innovations in American government that characterized the era. We illustrate the magazine’s pragmatic orientation toward public administration by analyzing the editorials of Croly and Lippmann and the writings of John Dewey, Frederick Cleveland, and Charles Beard—all written during the magazine’s first decade of publication.