American Society For Public Administration Research Articles

The impact of COVID‐19 on American Society for Public Administration's scholar and practitioner membership

AbstractThe novel coronavirus, or SARS‐CoV‐2, which caused COVID‐19, emerged in China in December 2019 and by March 2020 had rapidly spread becoming a global pandemic. The pandemic tested nearly every aspect of the public sector including efforts to respond to, recover from, and mitigate its impacts. This Viewpoint explores COVID‐19 impact on US‐based public administration scholars and practitioners. The results of a survey conducted for members of the American Society for Public Administration showed that respondents grappled with issues involving institutional trust, organizational inequity and capacity, group‐based inequity, health measures, shifts in academic practice, and challenges arising from intergovernmentalism. We conclude with recommendations for future research.

The Journal of Social Equity and Public Administration: From Vision to Victory

This article details the genesis of the Journal of Society Equity and Public Administration (JSEPA), the official section journal of the Section of Democracy and Social Justice (SDSJ) of the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA). It is written to memorialize and celebrate the victory of JSEPA’s establishment for the generations of scholars and practitioners who will contribute to its success in the years to follow, as well as the readers—students, faculty, and practitioners alike—who will rely upon its findings to provide understanding and direction to solving some of the greatest inequities confronted by government.

The Managerial Apprenticeship of FDR’s Budget Director: Harold D. Smith and the Michigan Municipal League, 1928–1937

Public administration history often notes the seminal role of Harold D. Smith, FDR’s budget director (1939–1945), in the professionalization of the field and his principles for public budgeting. He was a cofounder of the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) and its second president (1940–1941). Smith came to Washington after a longer career in nonprofit management. This exploratory historical case study fills in a gap in the literature. Specifically, it examines his nonprofit management record at the Michigan Municipal League (1928–1937). He successfully grew the nonprofit in the teeth of the Great Depression. This success, among others, can be seen as providing two possible applications. First, his record suggests some commonalities between nonprofit management and public administration. Second, leading a nonprofit during the Great Depression may suggest applicable lessons for longer-term problems caused by COVID-19 regarding organizational management strategies during another severe economic contraction.

Diversity and Inclusion in Emergency Management and First Response: Accounting for Race and Gender in Codes of Ethics in the United States

Disparities in outcomes are evident in emergency management interactions, in acute circumstances, like hurricanes or natural disasters, or routine interactions involving first responders, such as traffic stops or patient transport. Women and people of color are disproportionately represented in experiencing adverse effects. In light of observed inequities, this analysis investigates whether codes of ethics articulate the value of equity as a guiding principle. After presenting background evidence on the manifestation of inequities, we reviewed literature on the general nature of codes of ethics and their context in Public Administration and Emergency Management, giving consideration to social vulnerability and cultural competence. The purpose of this inquiry was to examine codes of ethics in various professions comprising the broad field of emergency management and first response within the United States—including that of the American Society for Public Administration—to determine whether they take race and gender into account. As disparities in outcomes are broadly observed, we hypothesized that the terms would be underrepresented. We found that only a small minority of codes make explicit mention of race or gender, and the majority do not mention equity. We also discovered a stronger emphasis on professionalism than on outcomes within the populations served.

Social Equity in Professional Codes of Ethics

Social equity is a principle of public administration ethics and is reflected in numerous professional organizations’ codes of ethics. This piece examines social equity as an ethical imperative of public administration by examining the purposes of codes, surveying the meanings of social equity, and exploring how social equity is present in 10 codes, with particular focus on the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA). Reflections are offered on social equity as an ethical principle of the field.

Trapped in a Silicon Cage

Almost fifty years ago, in April 1970, there was a rebellion at the annual conference of the American Society for Public Administration in Philadelphia. A group of young professors boycotted the of...

Public service values in NASPAA programs: Identification, integration, and activation

ABSTRACTNASPAA expects accredited public affairs programs to stress public service values in their educational program. This article examines the values that are included the mission statements of 125 public affairs programs. There is wide dispersion in the number and content of the values identified in these mission statements. Content analysis of the five universal competencies was conducted to determine the match between the values in the mission statement and the description of competencies. The results indicate a common need for better integration of key values and the content of the curriculum. Finally, an approach to strengthen the activation of values by relating them to ethical standards in the Code of Ethics of the American Society for Public Administration or another comprehensive code is demonstrated. Despite clear connections between the values in NASPAA competencies and the principles and standards in the American Society for Public Administration Code, few programs incorporate codes in their curriculum.

PAR's (and ASPA's) Contribution to Public Administration Internationally

AbstractThe study and practice of public administration vary in each and every country, yet there are many lessons to be learned internationally. Public Administration Review (PAR) and the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) have contributed substantially to these lessons over the last 80 years, including for public administration in Australia. That contribution has been particularly in organizational theory and behavioral influence, policy studies, and teaching and research. Australia has tended to emphasize institutions and descriptions of practice. These differences help explain the more limited involvement of practitioners in ASPA and the Institute of Public Administration Australia's too little involvement of scholars. ASPA and PAR have played a leading role in recent years in expanding opportunities for international learning. Such learning requires an appreciation of differences in contexts, including of America's own unique context. Better understanding of Australia's context might lead to a more positive appreciation in the United States of Australia's reform experience. The balancing of scholarly and practitioner perspectives is also required.

The Truth About Honesty

This article examines the ethics of honesty and deception in public administration. Building on previous research showing that public administrators rank honesty as an essential public service value but also sometimes use deception while carrying out their duties, semi-structured interviews with public employees were conducted to explore this apparent tension. Specifically, this study asks: Why is honesty important for public administrators? What is honesty and dishonesty? Under what circumstances is the use of deception by public administrators legitimate? The American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) Code of Ethics is used as an analytical framework to assess the cases and examples provided by participants. The article concludes with a discussion of some important implications that this research has for public administration practice, teaching, and research.

Promoting Training and Professional Development in Government: The Origins and Early Contributions of Spod

This article describes the foundations of training and professional development in government and the beginnings of the American Society for Public Administration's (ASPA) Section on Professional and Organizational Development (SPOD). It summarizes the philosophical contributions of public sector political and economic reforms, human relations approaches to management, and socio-technical applications to organizational development and training. The article also highlights key changes in the decade between 1965 and 1975 that fostered the emergence of SPOD, such as the rapid growth of federal government and the demands for social and economic changes. It concludes with reflections on the founding of SPOD from an early member.

Public Administration at the Movies

This paper briefly summarizes evidence for the influence of popular films on public perception of government and on public policy. Two films examined through the lens of public administration, and the lessons they teach about public administration, are exposed. One film, Ghostbusters conveys a strongly negative image, and the other, A Thousand Heroes a strongly positive message. Only Ghostbusters was and remains popular and profitable. Public information efforts by government and the public administration community have been limited or reactive. The authors argue for the increased support for public information initiatives such as those of the Public Employees Roundtable (PER) and the American Society of Public Administration (ASPA).

Servant Leaders in Public Service: Christian Spirituality in Practice

Relying on a survey of members of the American Society for Public Administration, servant leadership is examined through the lens of Christian spirituality. Findings indicate that citizens can have confidence in the dedication and committment of public servants.

Colluding to Create the American Society for Public Administration and the Consequent Collateral Damage

The American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) was founded in December 1939. This did not occur ex nihilo. Rather, it was the desired end-result of an elaborate and detailed collusion by some early public administration professionals including Louis Brownlow, Luther Gulick, and William Mosher. With patience and careful planning beginning in 1937, they designed a scenario that would, as the events they were catalyzing unfolded, undermine the Governmental Research Association (GRA) and provide justification for the new organization. This pre-birth campaign is often skipped over lightly in histories of ASPA. In particular, their collusion caused some serious collateral damage, destroying the academic career of University of Chicago doctoral candidate Norman Gill. This revisionist history explores the detailed maneuverings of the leaders of the nascent ASPA against GRA and how they, seemingly obliviously, wrecked the intended professional path of an innocent researcher who worked for them.

On NASPAA Accreditation: Fred Was Right…But for the Wrong Reason

The debate over accreditation is far from over. Forty years ago, Fred Thayer feared that complying with the standards of the Network of Schools of Public Policy, Affairs, and Administration (NASPAA) would rigidify and stultify academic training. Today the opposite threatens. Under mission-based standards, Master of Public Administration (MPA) programs can teach whatever they can justify, even if the content has little or no connection with public administration. The MPA is in jeopardy of becoming little more than a Master of Arts that teaches students about public service–minded values. We argue that standards for MPA programs should be sufficiently content-based that the degree represents a common understanding of career preparation. One way to expedite the return to the MPA’s roots is for NASPAA to link arms with the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) to ensure that public administration education remains focused on advancing the enterprise of public administration.

Kenneth Kernaghan and Canadian Public Administration: Editor's Note and Remembrances

Kenneth Kernaghan and Canadian Public Administration: Editor's Note and Remembrances

Public Administration, Market Values, & the Public Interest: A Kohlbergian Perspective

This article argues that, from the perspective of Lawrence Kohlberg's theory of moral development, the imposition of market values onto public organizations creates situational factors in which it becomes difficult for public administrators to discern and advance the public interest. This is particularly true in those instances where administrators must subordinate their personal and organizational interests to the public interest, as the American Society for Public Administration's Code of Ethics calls for them to do. From a Kohlbergian perspective, the ability to reflect on the public interest – and especially to subordinate personal and organizational interests to the public interest – requires ‘Post-conventional moral reasoning,’ i.e., consideration of the conditions that make for a good society, respect for individual rights, and concern for universal principles of justice. However, the imposition of market values onto a public organization creates situational factors in which the administrator is likely to focus on the accumulation of rewards and the avoidance of sanctions; hallmarks of what Kohlberg terms ‘Pre-conventional’ moral reasoning. Therefore, this article concludes that if we expect public administrators to consistently pursue the public interest, we should not create situational factors that will compromise their ability to do so by imposing the values of the market onto our public organizations.

ASPA’s Section on Transportation Policy and Administration

The Section on Transportation Policy and Administration (STPA) of the American Society for Public Administration was chartered in 1992 as an organization dedicated to bringing together scholars, practitioners, and students interested in the role played by transportation in society. Although transportation policy and administration is somewhat specialized as a subject matter area in public administration, STPA grew rapidly in the 1990s due in large part to a stable group of founding members who provided both intellectual and organizational leadership. This article reviews the growth and development of STPA from its early years to the present. Attention is given to section activities, including publications, newsletters, awards, and conference presentations. Two themes are prevalent throughout the review: the importance of committed, diverse, and stable leadership and the high level of intellectual and professional discourse that has characterized the work of the section.

Seventy-Five Years of Transportation Administration Becoming Public Administration

Public sector investment in transportation accounts for about 4% of all governmental spending but may represent the public investment most frequently accessed by citizens. This means that transportation administration faces public administration (PA) type challenges, and a number of these are discussed in this special issue of Public Works Management & Policy. Transportation administration is a subfield of PA, but it has enjoyed its own distinct history and evolution, partially due to the dependence upon engineers to carry out this mission. This commentary argues that the field has evolved from a coterie of apolitical technicians to more closely mirror the practice and values of the general body of the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA). Recent changes in spending on transportation infrastructure and a shift to a more integrated operational focus have moved transportation to be more in alignment with PA.

Who Are the Keepers of the Code? Articulating and Upholding Ethical Standards in the Field of Public Administration

Establishing a code of ethics has been a challenge in public administration. Ethics is central to the practice of administration, but the broad field of public administration has had difficulty articulating clear and meaningful standards of behavior and developing a means of upholding a code of ethics. Although a number of specialized professional associations in public service adopted codes, starting with the International City/County Management Association in 1924 and others after 1960, the full range of public administrators did not have an association to represent them until the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) was founded in 1939. Despite early calls for a code of ethics in ASPA, the first code was adopted in 1984, with revisions in 1994, but neither code had a process for enforcement. A new code approved in 2013 builds on the earlier codes and increases the prospects for ASPA to work with other professional associations to broaden awareness of the ethical responsibilities to society of all public administrators.

Building Bridges? An Assessment of Academic and Practitioner Perceptions with Observations for the Public Administration Classroom

Beginning in the 1940s, academics recognized a gap between themselves and practitioners and contemplated methods of reducing this divide. Evidence for this gap includes recognition that academics and practitioners have different audiences, viewpoints, interests, intellectual approaches, research methods, and styles of discourse. Although much has been written about this topic and many solutions for closing this gap have been offered, there is growing concern among some scholars that this gap is increasing. Using a recent survey of current and lapsed members conducted for the American Society for Public Administration, we assess the current state of the gap between academics and practitioners on a range of ASPA services and priorities. Our findings suggest that demographic variables are more robust predictors of attitudinal differences among ASPA members as opposed to academic-practitioner views. Recognizing these differences may prove critical for ASPA as a professional forum of relevance as well as for promoting greater connectedness in public administration programs.