Discipline Of Public Administration Research Articles

The New Public Integrity Management and the Protection of the Impartiality of Bureaucratic Decision-Making

The article argues that government organizations and the discipline of public administration should embrace a New Public Integrity Management (NPIM) to bridge the gap between advocates of external and internal public integrity controls on the behavior of public employees and contract government employees. The article argues that external and internal controls are important in maintaining public trust in government. This includes the management of the acceptance of gifts and private hospitality by government and contract government employees. The article traces the evolution of federal executive branch public integrity management and argues that the discipline of public administration has demonstrated a long-standing hostility towards external ethics controls due to early 20th-century divorce between law and administration. Of particular importance, the NPIM requires the adoption of a much broader definition of public corruption, which includes the conduct of private sector partners of government agencies responsible for the delivery of public goods and services paid for with public funds. Finally, the article argues that government ethics programs need to integrate moral reasoning education into their public integrity training programs and discuss criminal and administrative rules of conduct directed at protecting public confidence in the impartiality of bureaucratic decision-making.

What Is The Public? A Pragmatic Analysis of a Core Concept in Public Administration

Abstract The discipline of public administration has grappled with concepts regarding the public for well over a century. Scholars from public opinion, public choice, and public value(s) have analyzed myriad elements of administration related to the public. Scholars also have applied numerous concepts from philosophical pragmatism to public administration. However, detailed explorations of the fundamental concept of the public remain surprisingly sparse. The public remains eclipsed by administration. In this essay, I analyze the concept of the public focusing on the works of John Dewey. Viewed through this lens, publics emerge when social interaction generates unreglated effects on communities that respond by organizing collective or state action, a process which I refer to as the realization of the pragmatic public. I juxtapose the theory with multiple extant literature on public administration, including public choice, transaction costs, and public value(s). I identify consistencies and inconsistencies to provide a pluralistic yet coherent framework in the hope of revealing points of departure for future theory development. Finally, I reframe and extend the pragmatic public by applying the insights of contemporary scholarship in networks and complexity theory.

Productive entities and citation patterns of highly cited papers in public administration domain: An informetric profile

This study aimed to analyze the characteristics of highly cited public administration articles in the Social Science Citation Index published from 1900 to 2022. Results show that classic works were revealed to frequently occur in the 1970s, and most of articles are on collaborative governance research. The output of countries, institutions, authors, and journals in the field of public administration also was revealed. In addition, the study discovers the life cycle of highly cited articles, including three types: “delayed growth,” “steady growth,” and “rapid growth.” This study describes the citation behavior characteristics of academic entities in the discipline of public administration and the common rules of highly cited papers, which provides insights for the future development direction of the discipline of public administration research.

Rethinking the boundaries of public administration: a conceptual exploration

This conceptual paper attempts to demonstrate its strength by first accepting that the (p)ublic (a)dministration's loci-foci is within the jurisdiction of the executive branch amongst the two remaining branches of government, namely, the Legislature and the Judiciary. In the executive, the administration of the state is observed. Secondly, this paper argues that while p. a. may be with the executive arm, there is however its place beyond just the said administration of the executive arm. This paper employs the use of public-private partnerships that emanated from the New Public Management Paradigm as well as monitoring and evaluation theory and practice in the public sector to argue its assertion that public administration is being practiced beyond the executive branch. The development programs and projects initiated by the government and handed to the service providers need to be monitored and evaluated to ensure value for money and meet public expectations. As a result, the expectation of quality service from the service provider should be the norm of the day. It is therefore, through the cooperative trajectory between the government and the private sector, that this paper proposes that public administration can be associated with the executive branch but not necessarily limited to the said branch of government. This paper employed desktop research and the existing relevant literature to support its argument and contribution to the discipline of public administration.

Public Administration Under Populist Rule: Standing Up Against Democratic Backsliding

ABSTRACT What happens to democratic administration when populists come to power? This article depicts the contours of the debate within the discipline of Public Administration (PA) about populist attempts to transform the state bureaucracy. It presents the results and limitations of recent empirical research about populist public administration policies and discusses the options for generating more systematic insights. The argument is that populist public administration research needs to improve on three fronts. First, more comparative research is needed in order to identify and explain similarities and differences across affected administrative systems. Second, the threat of democratic backsliding requires scholars to revisit questions about the ethical basis of public administration. Third, as populist backsliding endangers the survival of liberal democracy, PA needs to provide pragmatic and concrete answers as to how administrative systems can be made resilient against threats of illiberal state transformation.

Artificial intelligence, task complexity and uncertainty: analyzing the advantages and disadvantages of using algorithms in public service delivery under public administration theories

PurposeThis article revisits some theories and concepts of public administration, including those related to public value, transaction costs and social equity, to analyze the advantages and disadvantages of using artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms in public service delivery. The author seeks to mobilize theory to guide AI-era public management practitioners and researchers.Design/methodology/approachThe author uses an existing task classification model to mobilize and juxtapose public management theories against artificial intelligence potential impacts in public service delivery. Theories of social equity and transaction costs as well as some concepts such as red tape, efficiency and economy are used to argue that the discipline of public administration provides a foundation to ensure algorithms are used in a way that improves service delivery.FindingsAfter presenting literature on the challenges and promises of using AI in public service, the study shows that while the adoption of algorithms in public service has benefits, some serious challenges still exist when looked at under the lenses of theory. Additionally, the author mobilizes the public administration concepts of agenda setting and coproduction and finds that designing AI-enabled public services should be centered on citizens who are not mere customers. As an implication for public management practice, this study shows that bringing citizens to the forefront of designing and implementing AI-delivered services is key to reducing the reproduction of social biases.Research limitations/implicationsAs a fast-growing subject, artificial intelligence research in public management is yet to empirically test some of the theories that the study presented.Practical implicationsThe paper vulgarizes some theories of public administration which practitioners can consider in the design and implementation of AI-enabled public services. Additionally, the study shows practitioners that bringing citizens to the forefront of designing and implementing AI-delivered services is key to reducing the reproduction of social biases.Social implicationsThe paper informs a broad audience who might not be familiar with public administration theories and how those theories can be taken into consideration when adopting AI systems in service delivery.Originality/valueThis research is original, as, to the best of the author’s knowledge, no prior work has combined these concepts in analyzing AI in the public sector.

An examination of behavioral movement and its relevance in public administration: issues and prospects

The behavioral approach to public administration owes its genesis to the Human Relations Movement of the 1930s. The movement started off as a protest to the traditional approaches to public administration that focused on organizations, institutionalization, rules, and code of conducts etc. with absolutely no mention of people who are the center of all these activities. The pioneering work done by Taylor and the emergence of Scientific Management created quite a stir not just in the industrial sector but also in management and study of public administration. The proponents of the Behavioral Public Administration (BPA) movement call for a greater use of theories in psychology and experimental research designs to improve rigour of public administration (PA) research. Limitations inherent in traditional orientations of analyzing administrative phenomena are reasons behind the search for new paradigms aimed at increasing epistemic knowledge when analyzing administrative issues in the 21st Century. Against the existing institutionalists, pluralists and elitists’ approaches, contemporary thinkers have adopted the behaviouralist approach which has capacity to increase the empirical status of knowledge in contemporary administrative analysis. Using secondary sources like textbooks, scholarly journals, unpublished texts, the paper critically evaluates most of the criticisms levied against the behavioural approach with the view to identifying the edge which the behavioural approach offers contemporary analysts in public administration. The paper revealed that despite these criticisms, not all the examples of the approach are flawed. Behaviouralism has brought with it, new concepts, sophisticated tools of analysis and mathematical models which tend to make us all behaviouralists. It is our recommendation in this paper that behavioural principles in public administration should be upheld among researcher within the discipline of public administration.

A Different Approach to the Problem of Theory in the Discipline of Public Administration

A Different Approach to the Problem of Theory in the Discipline of Public Administration

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

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.

Beyond the Classics: Identifying Gaps and Setting Trajectory in Understanding Political Dynamics in Philippine Local Politics

Epistemological frames and theoretical underpinnings are developed precisely to give coherence and cognitive rendering to a rather chaotic appearance of the world and reality to man’s consciousness. These frames offer associations of nuances and concepts that in turn provide cogent systems of understanding, which contribute to man’s unending search for meanings combining as it were his experience of the world and his ability to mentally grasp such experience hence, the Ancient Greek word episteme. In the social sciences, theoretical frameworks are formulated to provide grounding venues for construing the complexities and specificities of social phenomena toward a better understanding of the social world. Concomitantly, these frameworks are assessed and evaluated based on their capacity to utter notions and tell stories of the slice of reality they wish to depict. 
 It is in this respect that this paper offers a critical examination of the most prevalent theoretical frames and epistemic perspectives, herein referred to as classics, deployed in understanding Philippine political local dynamics. In light of Philippine contemporary economic, social, cultural, and political developments, the article identifies some gaps and bumps in these ‘classics’ to offer a research trajectory that scholars in the field can rightly consider. Through a synthesis of existing political paradigms applied in local politics, the paper highlighted nuances that are ignored, realities that are not yet explored, and concepts rendered with over-simplistic meanings, suggesting imperatives for modifications, deconstructions, and even reconstructions.
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Studentification in South Africa: Possible Redirections and Political Implications for Local Government

This article challenges existing approaches to local government within the discipline of public administration through a case study of off-campus student communities in post-apartheid South Africa. These communities have become contemporary political spaces through the daily activism of students who occupy urban space both as off-campus students and as ‘new’ members of the community with a politicised outlook on their daily lives. The heightened political consciousness that derives from a long history of South African student activism brings different kinds of community engagement for local government to contend with, which are not easily captured by the spatially bounded understanding of local government that is assumed both by the law and by existing theory. Although early literature on studentification emphasised the agency of residents resisting the disruptive impact of students on community life, I argue that the South African case requires a view of students as political agents who demand basic services and improved livelihoods in the city on their own behalf both as students and as city residents. This intersectional pattern of citizenship that students bring to the South African university city gives them a substantial foothold to influence productively and direct the governance patterns of both local government and higher education. The article calls for the beginning of critical local government studies in two ways: a centring of students’ political agency in the theorisation of studentification and a contextual positioning of studentification in the literature of local government studies. This, I argue, could generate transdisciplinary possibilities for the revitalisation of the public administration discipline.

The Administrative Presidency and Federal Service

Through the 20th and early 21st century, the United States has seen the growth of the administrative presidency. As political polarization has made it much more difficult for a presidential administration to push public policy initiatives through Congress, presidential administrations have become much more dependent on executive orders, policy statements, federal rulemaking, and nonenforcement policies to implement their agenda. Presidential administrations have also attempted to exert much greater control over the actions of federal employees with policymaking and policy implementation responsibilities. The article argues that the modern administrative presidency has become a serious threat to the nation’s democratic values and institutions. The article also argues that in the wrong hands, the administrative state may do great harm. Finally, the article argues that the discipline of public administration must end its love affair with the administrative presidency. The danger of misuse of the administrative state has just become too serious to permit presidential administrations to coerce career civil servants to put the ideological interests of a President over the public interest. To help control this serious problem, the article argues that the discipline of public administration should help to empower federal employees to serve as guardians of constitutional values by providing them the tools necessary to uncover and make known instances of abuse of power by presidential administrations intent upon ignoring the constitutional foundations of the administrative state.

Austerity, staff inadequacy, and contracting‐out social services: How many government inquiries does it take to improve social policy outcomes in aged care?

AbstractThis study examines policy implementation as it unfolds from policy, to the contractors and then to its impact on employees delivering the social service. Multilevel statistical analysis is used to examine survey data from 36 contractors and 542 employees. The use of multilevel analysis provides a methodological tool and subsequent analysis new to the discipline of public administration. The results indicate a strong positive association between resource (in)adequacy decision‐making at the contractor level and employee outcomes. The contribution of the paper is new evidence to support the widening of existing quality care indicators to include organisational support metrics for contractors.

Popular Culture Informing Public Administration: Messages and Prospects for Social Equity

In the discipline of public administration, popular culture remains under-examined in scholarship and under-utilized in pedagogy. However, the field would benefit from greater integration of popular culture to expand understandings of governance, especially in that it provides important representations of and messaging about some of today’s most pressing social equity issues. To contextualize popular culture in public administration, we use critical discourse analysis as a frame to demonstrate how popular culture can inform public administration, especially regarding social equity. We argue that popular culture should be more extensively covered in public administration, because it offers a lens for better understanding intersections of power, equity, and ethics in government.

Clientelism and vote buying in low-cost housing provision: A case study of the Greater Giyani Local Municipality, Limpopo province of South Africa

Background: This article seeks to examine ethical dilemmas and clientelism in the allocation of low-cost houses using 10 selected villages under the jurisdiction of the Greater Giyani Local Municipality area as units of analysis. The hypothesis of the initial research was that political parties in control of government machinery employ low-cost houses as electioneering instruments. Aim: The aim of the article therefore is to investigate the extent to which clientelism and clientelistic strategies such as vote buying are pertinent to the housing provision. Setting: The research was guided by this question: what are the features of clientelism and their extent to the provision of low-cost houses at the Greater Giyani Local Municipality area? Methods: Mixed methods approach was used to solicit primary data in relation to clientelism and vote buying in the provision of low-cost houses. Results: The findings as presented in the article suggest that clientelism and vote buying are used in the allocation of low-cost houses but not to a larger extent as assumed. The findings therefore are not presenting a crystal clear picture regarding the manifestation of clientelism and vote buying specifically in relation to low-cost housing allocation. Conclusion: The article makes a significant contribution to the discourse on housing allocation in general and low-cost houses in particular, especially given the fact that it is located within clientelism and the strategies used in electioneering. The article further contributes to the discipline of Public Administration, Public Policy and to some extent politics. Studies in these areas fail to give attention to issues of public policy, ethics and clientelism. Municipalities and other housing provision authorities stand to benefit from the findings and the recommendations thereof. The article has the potential to shape legislative frameworks and procedures through which low-cost houses are allocated.

Publicness: The Basis of Constructing a Public Administration Discipline in China

The legitimacy crisis of public administration has a long history. From a historical perspective, an analysis of five Western pathways in the discipline of public administration shows that the roots of this crisis lie in the lack of a public nature. From a theoretical perspective, the “publicness” of public administration should be defined along the dimensions of public administration powers, actors, targets, methods and values. In terms of practice, the uniqueness of China’s public power framework, the influence of traditional political culture on the public nature of Chinese public administration and the provisions governing this public nature at different stages of China’s development constitute the unique public nature of the construction of Chinese public administration. The discipline construction of Chinese public administration should be rebuilt so that its public nature forms the basis of its legitimacy, in accord with historical logic, theoretical logic and practical logic. We should construct a publicness discourse system of Chinese public administration that adheres to the value guidance of publicness and should frame research topics on the basis of publicness. This will ultimately form a research paradigm for the public nature of public administration that will consolidate the foundation of the legitimacy of the discipline construction of public administration.

Bridging the Discipline and Practice of Public Administration in Philippine Governance: Concerns and Prospects of the National College of Public Administration and Governance

Bridging the Discipline and Practice of Public Administration in Philippine Governance: Concerns and Prospects of the National College of Public Administration and Governance

Adalet Yönetiminde Dönüşüm

Türkiye'de, 1980 darbesi ile başlayan, devletin yenisağ/ neo-liberal dönüşümünün adalet yönetimine yansıması 2002 yılı sonrasına denk gelmektedir. Adalet yönetiminde mevcut dönüşüm, adalet hizmetlerinde verimlilik, etkinlik ve etkililik sağlama gayeleri çerçevesinde olmuştur. Çalışma, uluslararası alanda 20. yüzyılın sonunda ortaya çıkmış olan yargıda verimlilik kavramı bağlamında Türkiye adalet yönetiminde 2002 sonrasında başlayan dönüşümü analiz etmektedir. Bu makale adalet yönetiminin kamu yönetimi disiplini içinde bir çalışma alanı olduğu varsayımından hareketle, adalet yönetimindeki dönüşümün yeni-sağ ile başlayan sürecin bir parçası olduğunu ileri sürmektedir. Bu politikaları teknikleştiren ve transfer eden aktörler ise uluslararası örgütlerdir. Bu çerçevede, Avrupa Birliği, Avrupa Konseyi ve Dünya Bankası gibi uluslararası örgütlerin, adalet sisteminin dönüşümü üzerindeki etkilerini sorgulamaktadır. Sorgulama, tüketici hakem heyetlerinin yargısal verimliliğe etkisi ve önemi çerçevesinde yapılmaktadır.

Impacts of the Thailand qualification framework–Public administration on public administration education in Thailand

ABSTRACT This paper explores the Thailand Qualification Framework (TQF), particularly, in the discipline of Public Administration in Thailand, its development, purposes, and feedback from academia. The investigation from previous research conducted before and after the enactment of TQF-PA on public administration teaching and learning in Thailand found an improvement in both number and quality of public administration programs at all levels of education from undergraduate to master’s and doctoral in terms of course requirements, qualifications of teachers, and teachers-students ratio, etc. The paper also attempts to answer the “Big Questions” raised by scholars in teaching public administration in the Thai culture during the new disruptive technology and dynamic of unpredictable situations like the coronavirus pandemic facing every government around the world today.

Is public administration struggling in higher education? Evidence from the united states scenario

This article aims to discuss the health of the public administration discipline in the US higher education system. In particular, it debates two possible alternatives: decline or reposition. The paper analyzes the academic offers of political science, public policy, and public administration programs at both undergraduate and graduate levels. The Results highlight that the public administration discipline is currently at a crucial point. The core attention within both governments and higher education is more focused on politics and policies than on management. Accordingly, this scenario has two main effects. First, it creates an imbalance between the political discourse, the formulation/execution of public policies, and the managing of effective public sector organizations. Second, it might lead the discipline of public administration into a decline. Nevertheless, public administration can find a reposition within social sciences by developing more openness and a process of cross-contamination with other humanistic disciplines.