American Public Administration Research Articles

Bureaucracy's Good News: A Quiet Gender Revolution

An unnoticed breakthrough has occurred over the past generation in American public administration. The top level of federal governance is no longer a man's world. It is a woman's world as well. Female leaders increasingly occupy top executive positions at the levels of presidency, cabinet and agency. This revolution, like other social upheavals of our time, has significant implications for shared power, deserved rights and effective governance.

Vincent Ostrom’da çok merkezlilik düşüncesi ve yönetişim ilişkisi

The end of the 1960s and the 1970s were the years when the social, political and administrative events experienced for the whole world were criticized in the name of democracy. These years were also a period in which the American public administration was not qualified to respond to the conditions of the period, social welfare was not distributed fairly, the ongoing poverty, violence, racism, and gender-based inequality in the society were discussed, and the decreasing trust in institutions and its traditionality were questioned. One of the important names of this period of interrogation is Vincent Ostrom. While Ostrom included his criticisms of traditional public administration in his work titled "Intellectual Crisis in American Public Administration" published in 1973, he advocates polycentrism against a single-centered hierarchical administration. Ostrom's idea of polycentricity and his search for democratic governance is the subject of this study. The study accepts that Ostrom's concept of polycentricity and democratic administration thought are compatible with the governance model and form the basis for the governance process. In addition, the study aims to clarify the relatively little discussed "Vincent Ostrom framework" in the Turkish literature.

The Flawed Foundations of Social Equity in Public Administration: A Racial Contract Theory Critique

AbstractThe social equity concept of American public administration traces its roots to the philosophies of John Rawls, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. We suggest such fixed positionalities limit what is knowable about social equity. This is due to their restricted considerations of America’s racialized origins. By introducing Charles Mills’ racial contract theory to the public administration discipline, we suggest that the assumed “social contract” at America’s origins was racialized, was disconnected from its historical actuality, and was born of exploitation. Racialized epistemological foundations alter how the social equity concept is understood. The implications matter for our disciplinary understanding of social equity and its origins.

Public Administration Studies and Management Discourse in the Post-Korean War Period Korea

This article focused on the management discourse after the Korean War and reviewed it focusing on the process of introducing public administration studies. In previous literature, the knowledge of public administration, which was introduced in earnest with US-Korea technical cooperation, was identified only by the influence of American public administration studies, but in this article, it was examined that it was related to studies in Japan as well as in the United States.BRSocial scientists who studied public administration during this period developed two major administrative theories, emphasizing the utility and significance of management in common. One was to understand that politics and administration are inseparable based on the expansion of the function of modern states and the existence of administration-led plans and policies, and to pay attention to the political functions through public administration. The other was to emphasize the uniqueness of public administration and the managerial aspect.BRFrom the postwar period to the early 1960s, knowledge of public administration as a management discourse grew its influence through public official education. American scholar Fred W. Riggs introduced administrative perception based on tradition-modernity dichotomy to Korea and influenced public administration research. The coup forces, who paid attention to the managerial function of public administration, tried to spread management-oriented administrative ideas and attitudes to all public officials, and incorporated management theory into both the subject and the system by establishing the Bureau of administrative management. This aspect was based on the intention of the coup forces to use management discourse as a technology of rule for economic growth and modernization.

The Fruits of Diversity and Globalization: Participation and Contributions of East-Asian Scholars in Public Administration

The growth of East-Asian scholars in the American public affairs and administration (PA) field is increasingly apparent in recent years. Their participation demonstrates the diversity of the academic community and the globalization of higher education. However, little attention has been paid in the literature to this minority. From the broader perspective, Asian minorities have been overlooked in the discourse on diversity, equity, and inclusion, although they certainly confront social challenges such as inequity, injustice, discrimination, xenophobia, and even hate crimes. Our research attempts to address this gap in the literature by objectively documenting the participation and contributions of East-Asian scholars (EASs) to the American PA field. We find that across the top 100 PA schools, approximately 5% of the total full-time faculty members are East-Asian scholars, and that almost 20% of the peer-reviewed articles published in the top 10 PA journals are contributed by that scholarly community. However, the representation of East-Asian scholars in journal and association leadership teams remains low, which does not rise to their level of their contributions via peer-reviewed journal articles.

Methodological Americanism: Disciplinary senility and intellectual hegemonies in (American) public administration

In this introduction, we introduce the concept of methodological Americanism to describe and explain the epistemological problem plaguing the public administration discipline. We argue that the discipline, dominated by US-focused analyses, is methodologically nationalist and White and represents a hegemonic intellectualism that limits what is “knowable.” To ensure continual disciplinary relevance of public administration studies, we propose that epistemological diversity—achievable by reshaping the disciplinary table—is the way forward. We conclude by summarizing how the articles in this first of two Special Issues contribute to paving the way toward epistemological diversity.

Expert opinion on the implementation of e-government efforts to improve village apparatus performance in Indonesia

This article was to understand the implementation of review techniques, which means understanding electronic applications from top to bottom, accompanied by efforts to carry out open administration by city authorities regarding the potential for open doors and doors in Indonesia. This study focuses on optional information as a distribution that has been distributed between 2010 and 2022, considering the development of gadgets, especially the web, lately has become an outstanding issue to examine efforts to build an understanding of American public administration, especially in the network—the country in a time that is currently full of innovation. After getting the development of information and writing related to the factors of this review, the authors scrutinized it with the framework of coding information, top-down assessment, and decoding information to get a high level of importance to note the problem; based on the presentation of the results and discussion. We can conclude that using applications to increase village operators in public services has helped provide practically dynamic and transparent services. Therefore village officials must improve their human resources so that technology-based services can be carried out better.

Darwin and American public administration Woodrow Wilson's Darwinian argument for administration.

This research note addresses a gap in the public administration literature by arguing that a political Darwinism was present in the intellectual origins of American administrative theory. By examining the arguments of Woodrow Wilson, this article demonstrates that Darwinism complemented the German political thought that contributed to the establishment of America's administrative state. The application of Darwinian evolutionary biology to politics was a vital element of Wilson's reconceptualization of the state as a living organism. Darwinism was a key rhetorical tool employed by Wilson in his argument against the Constitution's separation of powers. This note finds that Darwinism was present in the early stages of public administration theory in Wilson's argumentation and persists today in the public administration literature. It concludes by sketching out an agenda for further research on Darwinism's influence on public administration.

The Untapped Potential of Social Marketing: How a Sample of Florida Cities Engage in Its Practice

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is to investigate how cities are developing and implementing social marketing practices. Driven by a 2017 survey administered to a sample of Florida’s public officials, the research design of this study employs an exploratory data analysis including cluster analysis, univariate visualization, and bivariate visualization to information regarding public social marketing utilization. The findings of this study suggest possible confusion surrounding what social marketing actually is and how the practice can best be utilized within a strategic management context. This research adds value by contributing to a relatively nascent literature on social marketing within an American public administration context.

Actions for Queering American Public Administration

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) visibility has exponentially grown over the past half century. In one lifetime, America has borne witness to the Stonewall Riots, AIDS epidemic, legalization of same-sex marriage, and debates for transgender individuals to openly serve in the military. Yet, scholarship in top public administration journals has rarely examined how LGBTQ+ milestones relate to policy development, implementation, and service-delivery. This exposes a discrepancy between what scholars study, what practitioners face, and what queer communities need. Building on the Social Equity Manifesto, this manuscript offers recommendations for incorporating queer perspectives into research, teaching, and instruction, offering a more inclusive and intersectional agenda.

Policy improvisation: How frontline workers cope with public service gaps in developing countries—The case of Mexico's Prospera program

AbstractHow do frontline workers behave when they are, from one day to the other, left without clients because the policy that organized their street‐level interactions has been terminated? This is what happened in early 2019 to the staff of medical centers across Mexico after the sudden transformation of the long‐standing social program Prospera. Interviews with frontline workers show that they respond to this “policy void” by developing strategies of informal talks, community outreach, and the investment of personal resources to recover their clients. The findings presented here are relevant for understanding how frontline workers cope with public service gaps in developing countries. The notion of “policy improvisation” as a coping mechanism—frontline workers developing informal policy activities when being left without proper implementation instructions and capacity—is used here to signal the broader phenomenon of human resource neglect and implementation gaps in Latin American public administration.

Systematically Reviewing American Law and Public Administration: A Call for Dialogue and Theory Building

AbstractMany of the world’s most pressing issues lay at the intersection of law and public administration. However, many have long lamented the relatively weak and atomized state of law and public administration scholarship. In this article, we use bibliometric and content analyses to systematically assess the last 20 years of literature, exploring the extent to which law and public administration have developed as a coherent paradigm. In short, we provide a contemporary assessment of the past assertion that “public administration has largely abandoned or forgotten its roots in public law—in the Constitution, statutes, and case law.” While we conclude that little changed in the last two decades, we offer some insights on the theoretical integration of law and public administration identifying strengths, weaknesses, and future avenues to advance paradigm building. Many of these recommendations necessitate better cross- and inner-field integration of voices and ideas.

Separate and Unequal: A Sample of Disparities in Five American Unincorporated Territories

Recent natural disasters affecting the five populated unincorporated territories of the U.S. (Puerto Rico; Guam; American Samoa; U.S. Virgin Islands; and Northern Mariana Islands) have shed light on the inequities they encounter vis-à-vis the states of the union and Washington DC. In 2017, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands were devastated by two hurricanes (Irma and Maria). In 2018, American Samoa, Guam and Northern Mariana Islands were impacted by a cyclone (Gita), typhoon (Mangkhut), and a super typhoon (Yutu). These natural disasters have increased the interest of scholars in American overseas possessions in the Atlantic and Pacific. A review of journal publications and newspaper articles shows that the inequities faced by these locations are rarely studied comprehensively, as a group instead of individually. This article will focus on three specific areas in which the federal government discriminates against the group (with an emphasis on Puerto Rico): political representation, emergency management and welfare assistance. A subfield of study within American public administration is recommended: Unincorporation Studies. The development of this subfield would contribute to a better understanding of the discrimination based on location that these territories encounter as an integral part of America’s 21st Century Civil Rights Movement.

A Note From the Editor

This PPMG issue 3(3) opens with Alasdair Roberts’ article, “Bearing the White Man’s Burden.” https://academic.oup.com/ppmg/article/doi/10.1093/ppmgov/gvz018/5587059. Roberts observes that the field of American public administration has often been criticized for neglecting how experts and practitioners perpetuated racial prejudice and discrimination. His article shows that many “pioneers of public administration” were deeply involved in America’s experiment with imperialism, and designed systems of colonial administration that were built on theories about racial superiority. If experts thought this way about persons of color abroad, Roberts asks, why would they have thought differently about them at home? Roberts calls for more research about the influence of racialism on the evolution of public administration. The events of the last few months have shown the importance of this project. The remaining articles in this issue collectively present conceptual progress in research on collaborative management and governance offering a range of perspectives and applications from transboundary crises...

Racial Bias: A Buried Cornerstone of the Administrative State

Historians of American public administration have largely perpetuated its self-image of neutrality and scientific detachment. Yet public agencies are shaped by their political and cultural environments. Long-standing myths and historical narratives about the meaning of America reveal not neutrality but racial bias dating back centuries, a pattern sustained, in part, by failure to recognize its existence. This article explores how historical understandings of the administrative state have neglected the influence of racial bias on the development of administrative practices. We suggest that a reconstructed understanding may strengthen support for anti-racism efforts, such as diversity training, representative bureaucracy, and social equity.

POLITICAL ASPECTS OF IMPLEMENTATION OF INTERNATIONAL LAW IN NATIONAL LEGISLATION OF THE UNITED STATES: FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE

One of the big-league participants in major international processes, the US government defines the current agenda of the modern world order, steers the vector of international relations development and affects the distribution of power on the global political arena. A supporter of the Non-Institutionalized Global Governance concept and the idea of Rule of Law, American administration demonstrates its own, specific understanding of the goals and course of action of modern international legislation. It seems to have its own insight on the nature and order of international organizations in regards to formulation and adoption of international law, the US role in determining the key features of global law enforcement, as well as the standards and principles of implementation of international law in the US federal legislation. Despite the recent tendency of the US government to roll back from participation in IO projects and revision of a number of agreements within the framework of interstate cooperation, the United States not only succeeds, one way or another, in guiding the trends of global political development, but also continues to have an impact on the interpretation and application of international law. The given article looks at the status of international law in the American legal system, focuses on the participation of the United States in proposition, discussion and adoption of conventions, declarations, agreements and other documents within the framework of the UN, and determines the main directions, according to which American jurisdiction implements international legal doctrines. The current research also brings a focus on specific issues, problems, relations, and contacts regulated at the international level but not implemented by the US federal legislation. The article analyzes political aspects of formulation and adoption of legal rules by American public administration, which are meant to supplement and specify the dominant principles of international sources of law.

Industrial path analysis for CO2 transfers induced by final consumption: A comparison of the United States and China

Abstract The final consumption of the United States and China strongly affects global greenhouse gas emission. We analyzed the amount of CO2 transfers by the two countries caused by final consumption and its structural distribution from 1993 to 2013. We identified the key domestic and foreign sectors and transfer paths among the sectors that contributed most to final consumption. The total consumption-based transfer quantity increased to 1.2 and 3.6 times the 1993 value for the United States and China, respectively, whose domestic production and consumption were around 75 and 90% of the total, respectively. The key domestic sectors in both countries were the Electricity, Gas, and Water sector, the Transportation sector, and the Petroleum, Chemical, and Non-Metallic Mineral Products sector, which each accounted for 20–30% of the total. Among the domestic transfer paths, the American Electricity, Gas, and Water sector and Transportation sector, and China’s Construction sector, had the most connections to other sectors. We identified frequent contributions of foreign sectors to final consumption in both countries. Their dominant transfers were to the American Public Administration sector and Education, Health, and Other Services sector, and to China’s Construction sector. Understanding these key sectors and the paths among them can provide the scientific basis for improved national emission mitigation plans.

Bearing the White Man’s Burden: American Empire and the Origin of Public Administration

AbstractThere is an overlooked chapter in the history of American public administration: the experiment with colonial administration in the two decades following the Spanish-American War. Several scholars now identified as pioneers of American public administration were actively engaged in this project. They studied European empires closely to determine how the new American dependencies should be governed. This work was guided by beliefs about racial superiority and the duty of civilized nations to improve uncivilized peoples through colonization. This episode of administrative history provides insight into how American academics thought about race and public administration in the early decades of the twentieth century, both overseas and within the United States. It compels a reassessment of our understandings about their commitment to democracy, and about the supposed differences between American and European public administration at that time.

A Transformative Era: The Roberts Court, Constitutional Interpretation, and Public Administration

The Constitutional School of American Public Administration dictates that the rule of law serves as the intellectual and practical foundation of the field. One way to support the Constitutional School is to examine how the U.S. Supreme Court works to shape the administrative state in its own image. This article provides a thorough examination for how the Court under Chief Justice John Roberts constitutionally protected laws affecting gay marriage, affirmative action, abortion rights, gun ownership, and health care while simultaneously narrowed constitutional protections concerning voting rights, campaign finance laws, and employer mandated contraceptive coverage. These contrasting constitutional viewpoints not only represent a transformative era in the history of the nation’s highest Court but also in how public administrative agencies implement the Court’s decisions.

The Anti-Public Administration Presidency: The Damage Trump Has Wrought

President Trump and his Administration have gravely damaged the institutions and values of American public administration. Harm has been done to the federal workforce, the policymaking process, the integrity of missions, agencies and programs, and the government’s relation to science.