Public Administration in Search of a Theory
- 1 November 1994
- journal article
- research article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Administration & Society
- Vol. 26 (3), 359-394
- https://doi.org/10.1177/009539979402600305
Abstract
Public administration has, during recent decades, been widely held to be a study in disarray, without an integrating theory, neither a discipline nor a component of a discipline. The orthodox solution is to affirm that it is an interdisciplinary study, requiring no central theory. 7The study should not and cannot be founded in a single discipline. This essay examines and challenges the case for public administration as an interdisciplinary study. It suggests politics as the discourse in which public administration most appropriately finds its place.This publication has 28 references indexed in Scilit:
- Enrollment Trends in Schools of Public Affairs and Administration: A Search for Winners and LosersPublic Administration Review, 1992
- What Do Public Administration Masters Programs Look like? Do They Do What Is Needed?Public Administration Review, 1990
- “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood:” Public administration, the management orthodoxy, and civic humanismInternational Journal of Public Administration, 1990
- Anomie, Resurgence, and Opportunity: Reflections on the Current State of the Public ServicePublic Administration Review, 1989
- [Introduction]Public Administration Review, 1989
- Comparison of Perceived Effectiveness of MPA Programs Administered under Different Institutional ArrangementsPublic Administration Review, 1988
- Theses of a New Reformation: The Social Fallout of Science 300 Years after NewtonPublic Administration Review, 1988
- The Get-It-All-Together ProfessionPublic Administration Review, 1979
- Paradigms of Public AdministrationPublic Administration Review, 1975
- The Lost World of Municipal GovernmentAmerican Political Science Review, 1957