VISION

The City College of El Salvador envisions herself as a public Higher Learning Institution in Northern
Mindanao that will empower the citizenry and provide social inclusion of the disadvantaged sector
through Education to cut the cycle of poverty by producing globally competitive professionals.

MISSION

It shall pursue a multi-sector agenda which include:

1. Training of competent and responsive human resource for community and industry
requirements;
2. Intellectual formation that generates knowledge for people empowerment and sustainable
development;
3. Bringing of boundaries across communities and other institutions; and
4. Being a laboratory for educational research and innovation.

GOALS

1. Strengthen instruction and training for skills in thrust areas of agriculture, fisheries, commerce,
industry, manufacturing and tourism;
2. Develop competent professionals to serve as a human resource pool for the growing number of
industries, government agencies and private enterprises;
3. Cater the uplift of the marginalized sector and cultural communities, indigenous people and
access to quality education for holistic development;
4. Promote sensible utilization and environmental protection within the context of sustainable
development; and
5. Promote peace and development

CORE VALUES

S – Service to God and Community

A – Accountability and Transparency

V – Victorious in all Undertakings

I – Inspiration/ Brother’s Keeper

O – Optimum use of Human Potentials

R – Resilient in Life’s Journey

PROGRAM OUTCOME:

1. Develop skills in managing a public sector or non-profit organization.

2. Apply the theories and practices in program and resource management.

3. Identify the theories and principles of accounting in controlling public finance, and create
budgets at the state, county, and municipal levels of government and non-profits..

4. Evaluate the role of community groups in local government.

5. Analyse ethical situations in the public sector.

6. Apply the techniques of planning in public administration.

7. Implement the principles of personnel management, including affirmative action, collective

bargaining and civil service.

8. Apply valid statistical analysis to public sector decision-making and evaluate the principal
approaches to research design to address a current problem in public administration.

9. Synthesize policy issues as they are framed by political and administrative perspectives.

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

This course is a basic introduction to public administration for graduate students. Topics to be covered
include the role of bureaucracy in the political process, theories of public organizations, bureaucratic
discretion and accountability, policy implementation, and the changing nature of public administration.
Our goal is to develop a solid understanding of public administration theory, research and concepts—
with an emphasis on important dimensions of policy formulation and implementation.

COURSE LEARNING OUTCOME:

 1. Cognitive
1.1 Evaluate alternative theoretical approaches to the examination of public administration
and of their respective strengths and limits.
1.2 Analyse the historical development of public administration and the major thinkers
underlying modern public organizational theory.
2. Affective
2.1 Analyse and critique the complexity of public administration in terms of mixes of
values, interests, competing orientations, and other factors, and of the ubiquity and
effect of the evaluation of policies.
2.2 Critique various organizational situations from various public administration
theoretical perspectives.
2.3 Analyse public administration issues and to present the results of those explorations
clearly, concisely, and in compelling form in written and oral communication.
3. Psychomotor
3.1 Learn how to write a policy brief.
3.2 Develop public presentation skills.
3.3 Ability to facilitate group discussion.
3.4 Ability to work with groups.
3.5 Ability to take on leadership roles.

TOPIC:

 Basic premises-meaning, scope and significance of Public Administration

DURATION:

 1 week/ 3hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:
 Analyse the nature of Public Administration.
 Evaluate the differences and similarities of Public and Private Administration.
 Incorporate functions of Public Administration to Private Administration using decision-
making model.
CONCEPT NOTES:

Public administration is a part of the wider term “Administration”. To understand the meaning
of public administration we must, therefore, firstly try to understand what administration means.

Administration

The word administer is derived from the Latin words administrate, which means to care for or
to look after people, to manage affairs. According to this wide definition almost every human activity
involves some kind of administration. Even in primitive societies, simple activities like hunting, food,
gathering, etc., could not be carried on without some form of organization. Somebody had to determine
as to who will do what. Certain norms of behaviour had to be laid down to decide the distribution of
work among the members of the primitive groups. Of course, the administration at that time was rather
simple because the tasks to be carried out were also simple. With the growing complexity of modern
life the administration of private as well as public affairs has become more and more complex. We
would now consider some of the definitions of administration given by prominent scholars.

Luther Gulick has said, “Administration has to do with getting things done; with the
accomplishment of defined objectives”.

James L. McCanny defined Administration in these words, “Administration is the

organization and use of men and materials to accomplish a purpose. It is the specialized vocation of
managers who have skills of organizing and directing men and materials just as definitely as the
engineer has the skill of building structure or a doctor has the skill of understanding human ailments”.

Pfiffner and Presthus have defined administration as “Organisation and direction of human
and material resources to achieve desired ends”.

From the above definitions, it becomes clear that administration is essentially a group activity
which involves co-operation and co-ordination to achieve desired goals or objectives. This also means
that administration has an element of rationality. Administration is thus a rational action, an endeavour
to maximize the achievement of goals or objectives, by a group of human beings. For example, for
rolling off a stone to a fix place, persons are put to the stone in such a relationship as to maximize their
efforts in a certain given direction. This arrangement of persons in relation to the stone i.e., the job is
called the “Management”. These two factors, namely, Organisation and Management are special
features of administrative activity. It must, however, be remembered that while administration is
basically a collective activity, every collective action is not administration.
The Integral and Managerial Views of Administration

There is a difference of opinion about the question as to what activity or activities are included
in “Administration.” According to integral view, `Administration’ is the sum total or the whole
complex of activities, manual, clerical, technical and managerial which are undertaken to realize the
objective in view, i.e., the implementation of the policy or policies in a given field.

According to the managerial view, `Administration’ is not the sum total of the activities
undertaken in pursuance of a purpose but pertains to only some of the activities concerned with
management which unite and control the rest of them as part of co-coordinated endeavour.

The distinction between the two views of `Administration’ is related to the difference between
the management and operation, or in ordinary words between getting things done and doing things.
According to the managerial view, only managerial or supervisory activities constitute administration.
The operational activities are not included. We may also say that according to the managerial view,
`Administration’ is not doing things, but getting them done. An administrator is a functionary who gets
things done by others by directing and supervising their work

Public Administration

In a broad sense, therefore, Administration is common to both public and private affairs. Public
Administration would then refer to that part of administration which pertains to the administrative
activities of the government. Here again, it would be worthwhile to turn to the definitions of public
administration given by some well-known scholars.

Percy McQueen “Public Administration is administration related to the operations of

government whether local or central”.

Luther Gulick defined public administration in these words, “Administration has to do with
getting things done … Public Administration is that part of science of administration which has to do
with the government and thus concerns itself primarily with the executive branch where the work of the
government is done, though there are obviously problems also in connecting with the legislative and
judicial branches”.
 L.D. White – According to him, public administration “consists of all those operations having
for their purpose the fulfillment of enforcement of public policies as declared by the competent
authority.”

Pfiffner – thought that public administration “consists of getting the work of government done
by coordinating the efforts of the people so that they can work together to accomplish their set tasks.
Administration embraces the activities which may be highly technical or specialized such as public
health and building of bridges… It also involves managing, directing and supervising the activities of
thousands, even millions of workers so that some order and efficiency may result from their
efforts…..”

Scope of Public Administration

The thrust of the various definitions of public administration is that it pertains to the
administrative activities of the government. As is well known, the activities of the government are
commonly divided into three major branches, namely, Legislative, Executive and Judicial.

The question naturally arises as to which of the activities of the government are included in the
study of public administration. There are two views on this subject. According to one point of view,
public administration is conceived in a comprehensive sense to include all the activities of the
government, whether falling in the sphere of legislative, executive or judicial branch of the
government. However, according to the other point of view, `public administration’ is concerned only
with such activities of the government which pertain to the executive branch. L.D. White takes the
former broad view, while Luther Gulick supports the latter narrow view.

There is a further narrowing down of the scope of public administration by restricting it to these
activities of the executive branch which are connected with the execution of the policies. It means that
the policy formulation has to be separated from the execution of the policy. It is only the execution
which is supposed to form part of public administration according to this narrow view.

Another complication in the scope of the study of public administration is introduced by the
two views of administration, namely, integral and managerial views. Public administration, being a part
of the more general term administration, is subject to these two views of administration also.

The differences of opinion about the scope of study of public administration thus centers around
the crucial points whether public administration is only the managerial part of the government work or
the entire complex of the activities or only the executive branch of the government or of all branches
and finally whether administration is mere execution or application of policy or is a factor in the
formulation of policy also.

Managerial View of Public Administration

The view that administration is made of managerial tasks only is mainly held by the writers on
business administration though most of the American writers on public administration also accept it
either as a matter of principle or for practical convenience.

The natural question then arises as to what is included in public administration according to this
view. Henri Fayol felt that principal categories of administration are five, namely, Planning (including
research and forecasting), Organisation, command, co-ordination and control. According to him, these
are the actual steps which successively occur in the administrative process. When any task is to be
accomplished the natural first step is enquiry or research leading to planning.

The Plan requires the necessary organization of men and material which have to be coordinated,
commanded and controlled to achieve the objectives. L. Urwick supported this analysis of Henri Fayol.
Their work was carried forward by Mooney and Reiley, P. McQueen and others who attempted to
deduce the fundamental principles of administration. Willoughby was the first to write about this
aspect. In this well-known work “Principles of Public Administration’, he divided the study of
principles into five parts, namely:

i) general or overhead administration (including allocation of functions, direction,

supervision and control);
ii) organization, i.e. building up of administrative structure;
iii) Personnel management:
iv) Materials and supply; and
v) Finance
Refining and elaborating these sub-divisions further, American administrative thought on the
scope of public administration appears to have crystallized around the functional elements indicated by
the letters of the word POSDCORB coined by Luther Gulick. This word stands for the following
activities:

P – stands for Planning

O – stands for Organisation S – stands

for Staffing
 D – stands for Directing

CO – stands for co-ordination R – stands

for Reporting

B – stands for Budgeting

The POSDCORB activities are said to represent the techniques, which are common to all the
fields of administration or management. These were, therefore, taken to be the essential core or
substance of administration.

Subject Matter View of Public Administration

For quite some time, the above-mentioned managerial view of public administration dominated
the scene. It was however, realized that the POSDCORB activities were not the whole of
administration. Some scholars of public administration went to the extent of suggesting that these were
only the common house-keeping activities or tools of administration, the real core of which consisted
of the various functions or services like law and order, education, public health, social security,
defence, etc. These programmes or services have important and specialized techniques of their own and
are not covered by POSDCORB activities. For example, Food & Agriculture administration has its
own techniques of production, distribution, extension, etc, which are not covered by POSDCORB.
It was also realized that the common techniques of management are very often influenced by
the subject matter of the services to be rendered by a particular department of the Government. For
example, the Organisation for maintenance of Law & Order is very much different from the
organization for education, public health or agriculture.
Reconciliation

The two views about the scope of public administration have been discussed above. It is,
however, not necessary to accept only one of them to the exclusion of the other. Just as the human
organ has both an anatomy and a physiology of its own, the public administration has the common
techniques of POSDCORB as its skeleton and the specialized methods of various programmes as its
muscles and sinews. Without either of them the public administration cannot function. Reconciling the
two views, the scope of public administration ought to include –

i) Administrative theory – which is general and abstract and largely consists of

POSDCORB techniques common to all administration.

ii) The study of the concrete application of the common administrative theory to the
various fields of administrative activity, such as agriculture, animal husbandry,
public health, social welfare, defence etc.

In addition, the scope of public administration should also include the administrative
organization and methods at different levels of the Government, such as, local administration, national
administration and international administration. It may also include the study of the administrative
system in different countries and under different forms of philosophies of Government.

Significance of Public Administration

The significance of the public administration can be studied from points of view, namely,

i) its significance as an instrument of governance;

ii) its significance as an instrument of development and change;

iii) its significance in modern domestic welfare state;

Significance of Public Administration as an Instrument of Governance

The most important function of the Government is to govern i.e. to maintain peace and public
order and to ensure the safety and security of the life and property of the citizens. It has to ensure that
the contracts are honoured by the citizens and their disputes settled. This most significant role of the
Government is to be fulfilled through the instrument of public administration. In the beginning of the
civilization this was probably the only function performed by the public administration. As the
civilization has advanced, many very important functions have been taken over by the Government,
but, the importance of this basic function should not be minimized. Worthwhile progress or
development is possible unless the citizens can live in peace. The continuing performance of this
function is like the presence of oxygen in the air we breathe. It is hardly noticed so long as it exists.
However, in its absence civilized life is impossible.
It is also a mistake to think that this regulatory function of the public administration has been
static. It has been growing with the growing complexity of modern civilization. For example, new
methods of investigation have had to be devised to take care of the better equipped criminals. New sets
of controls had to be devised to enable the citizens to share the scarcity of food and other essential
articles.

Significance of Public Administration as an Instrument of Development and Change

The public administration has to play a very significant role as an instrument of development
and change. The administration of the country reflects the genius of its people and embodies their
qualities, desires and aspirations. Whenever the people decide to proceed on the road to development,
their main instrument is the public administration. They need trained manpower to run this schools,
colleges and the technical institutions. They need technical manpower to build roads, bridges, buildings
and to run the machines in the industry. They need scientific manpower to undertake research and
development. It is the well-developed public administration which makes all this possible. It is true that
part of the effort comes in the private sector, but it alone cannot complete the task. A lot of basic
infrastructure has to be developed for which the private initiative is usually not forthcoming. For
example, nation wide rail transport, telecommunication network, fundamental research are all to be
organised by the Government. In several development areas initial thrust has to be provided by the
Government. All this is not possible without a well-developed public administration. This fact was also
highlighted by the American administrators and private aid giving agencies who took up the task of
assisting the developing countries. It was their experience that the recipient countries could not make
much use of their assistance because they did not have the well-equipped administrative machinery to
absorb it. The equipment provided by them could not be used for want of skilled manpower. Financial
assistance could not be channelized into productive schemes. The first task of developing countries is,
therefore, to develop adequate administrative machinery which can take up the diverse tasks required
for all round development.
The above discussion may create an impression that the public administration plays a
significant part only in economic development. Nothing could be farther from truth. In a developing
country, the public administration is also an instrument of social change and development. A number
of social welfare measures have to be taken up. New laws have to be enacted and enforced. The
obvious examples are anti-untouchables, anti-dowry laws and laws for the protection of weaker
sections like labour, children, women etc. While the impetus for social change may come from the
political process, somebody has to draft the laws and enforce them. This is the task of public
administration.
Significance of Public Administration as an Instrument of Welfare State

In a modern democratic welfare State, the Government has to provide many services for the
welfare of its citizens. It includes the provision of schooling, medical facilities and social security
measures. With the breakdown of joint families, the problem of looking after the old and infants,
orphans and widows comes up. With the slowing of economic activity, the problem of unemployed
youth crops up. The development process brings up many new problems like those of urban slums and
juvenile delinquents. The welfare State has to identify these problems and devise solutions for them.
The formulation of these schemes and their implementation is another significant function of public
administration.
The public administration is thus not only a protector of citizens from external dangers or
internal disorders, but has become the greatest provider of various services. The welfare of the people
depends very much on the way the public administration functions. No wonder today’s state has been
called an “Administrate State”. Prof. V.V. Donham has rightly said, “if our civilization fails, it will be
mainly because of administration”.

ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Note: Penalties on Plagiarism may include:

1) Deduction Marks
2) Failure on the course
3) Referral to SAS for disciplinary action.

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: Basic premises-meaning, scope and significance of Public Administration
Instructions: Essay minimum of 100 words.

1) Dicuss the Following:

a) Luther Gulick has said, “Administration has to do with getting things done; with the
accomplishment of defined objectives”.

b) James L. McCanny - “Administration is the organization and use of men and materials to
accomplish a purpose. It is the specialized vocation of managers who have skills of organizing
and directing men and materials just as definitely as the engineer has the skill of building
structure or a doctor has the skill of understanding human ailments”.

c) Pfiffner and Presthus - “Organisation and direction of human and material resources to
achieve desired ends”.

d) Percy McQueen “Public Administration is administration related to the operations of

government whether local or central

TOPIC:

 Public And Private administration

DURATION:

 1 week/ 3hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:
 Differentiate Public and Private Administration
 Develop ideas of incorporating POSDCoRB in Public and Private Administration

CONCEPT NOTES:

The term Public Administration appears to suggest that there must be non-public or private
administration also. Some thinkers believe that all administration is one and there is no difference
between public or private administration. Urwick, Mary Parkor Follet and Henri Fayol are of this view.
They belong to a school of thought which tried to find basic principles of administration which were
equally applicable to public and private administration.
Similarities
The public and private administration shows a number of similarities in practice. We usually
say that all those activities which are performed by the governmental agencies or public agencies from
part of public administration while those performed by the private agencies are called private
administration. There are, however, many activities which are performed both by private and public
agencies. For example, business activities were mainly performed by private organizations. But, the
Government has taken upon itself many economic and business activities were mainly performed by
private organizations. But, the Government has taken upon itself many economic and business
activities, which hitherto were the preserves of private administration.
This has given rise to a new form of organization, namely, a public corporation which is very
much different from the usual departmental form of organization prevalent in the Government. This
form of organization has become necessary to provide the public administration sufficient flexibility
necessary for running business enterprises in developing countries like India the public sector has come
to occupy a very important position in the economic organization of the country. The role of public
corporations has, therefore, gone up tremendously, giving rise to the phenomenon of adopting the
business practices of private organizations in the Government.
It has also been increasingly realized that there are many skills, techniques and procedures
which are common to both public and private administration. For example, accounting, statistics, office
management, office procedures, purchases, disposals and stocking and many other activities are
common to both public and private administration. In a number of countries several institutions have
come up which attempt to train administrators from public and private administration together. For
example, Administrative Staff College of UK and Hyderabad Staff college of India have been
established to bring about harmony and co-ordination between public and private administration.
Obviously this is due to the realization of the fact that there is a lot in common between the public and
private administration and both can benefit from each other’s experience.
In many countries, there has also been a cross movement of functionaries between public and
private administration. For example, in Japan a large number of public servants take up employment in
private industry after seeking premature retirement. Similarly, there is a great deal of exchange of
personnel between public and private sector in United States of America. Even in India recruitment to
public services has been made on an adhoc basis from open market.
This has been done twice since independence in addition to regular recruitment. A large number
of personnel in these special recruitments have been contributed by the private sector. This would not
have been possible if the public sector and the private sector did not have anything in common. There
appears to be a lot of force in the contention of scholars like Urwick and Fayol that both public and
private administration has common techniques. Having said that it must be admitted that there are some
significant differences between the public and private administration and they cannot be overlooked in
any objective study of administration.

Although these distinctions are not fully borne out by facts, the popular image of public
administration continues to be that characterized by these observations.
 Sir Josia Stamp pointed out four major points of difference between public and private
administration. We would briefly discuss them below:
1) The Principle of Uniformity

One of the most significant characteristics of public administration is that it is subject to the
principle of uniformity. It requires that administrative acts and decisions must be consistent, i.e., in
conformity with the rules and precedents. These rules and precedents must be applied uniformly to all
the citizens and classes of citizens. If any discrimination is shown without a reasonable cause, it may
give rise to a lot of criticism and discontent among the people. The private administration on the other
hand is not bound by any such rules of uniformity. In fact, a great deal of preferential treatment is
shown to certain clients in almost every business activity. This kind of favoured treatment is not
viewed unfavourably and is taken as a normal business practice.
2) External financial control

In public administration the executive does not control finance. The expenditure from public funds
can only be incurred when authorized by Legislature. Even after authorization, the expenditure is
subject to a great deal of control by Legislature through its agencies of audit etc. Such complete
divorce of finance and administration does not exist in private administration. The board of
management, which controls the business operations of the private undertakings, also controls financial
management.
3) Public accountability

Public administration is obviously subject to public accountability. This is very much more so in
case of parliamentary democracy like India. Every action of a minister or a public servant is subject to
close scrutiny by the representatives of the people sitting in Parliament. Even for trivial matters, a
Minister can be called upon to reply a question in Parliament. Any departure from the accepted norms
of behaviour or practice can cause a lot of embarrassment to the Government. On account of this
accountability, the public servants have to be very guarded and circumspect in all their actions. They
have to keep records of actions taken by them so that the responsibility of every action can be clearly
fixed. This explains much of the red-tape prevalent in the functioning of the Government. On the other
hand, private administration is generally not so accountable to the people or their representatives. The
private managers are free to take whatever action they deem fit in the interests of the organization in
which they are serving.
4) Profit motive

The private administration is largely governed by profit motive. This principle is not applicable to
public administration. It does not mean that the Government should necessarily indulge in extravagant
or wasteful expenditure. However, it does mean that a public administrator cannot be guided solely by
consideration of profit or economy in expenditure. He has to make sure that his actions are justified by
the results in terms of public welfare. For example, when it comes to controlling a law and order
situation, a District Magistrate or a Police Commissioner cannot think in terms of saving money on the
movement of troops to the place of disorder. On the other hand, the private administrator is mostly
governed by the profit motive. The sole criterion for decision in a private organization is the answer to
the question `will it pay’. Means to maximize their profits. Even the honest private administrators
cannot be expected to indulge in activities which do not bring profit to the organization.
 Apart from the above mentioned basic differences pointed out by Josia Stamp, there are a number
of other significant differences between public and private administration.

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION vs. PRIVATE ADMINISTRATION

Generally speaking, although the administration of public and private affairs differ at many points
and vary in form and purposes, there are underling similarities in their processes. Among a number of
distinguishing factors between public administration and private business administration, the following
could be considered as the major ones.

(a) The Political environment: public administration is concerned with the implementation of
decisions made within the political system. In a democratic system, the policies of the
government duly approved by the legislature should represent the political will of the
people, or at least the resultant of the activities of the various competing political interests
in the society. In consequence:

(i) The government creates individual rights and imposes constraints on individual and
group behavior

(ii) The administrator is in frequent contact with his clients and his major concern is
with equity and impartiality
(iii) Administrative procedures are built around strict compliance with the law. On the
other hand, private industry is essentially guided by the principles of profit
maximization and doesn't act as an arbiter between conflicting social interests.

(b) Social costs: public administration decision-making varies from that of private business in
that where private business is primarily concerned with questions of financial cost and
benefit, public administration is intimately concerned with the concepts of social costs and
benefits in addition to those of a mere financial nature.

(c) Public interest: Public administration is often evaluated by the ability to operate in a
manner so as to maximize and integrate the public interest, whereas private business is
evaluated on the basis of profit maximization. In other words, although efficiency is
axiom number one in the value scale of both public and private administration, in private
business it has to do with the minimization of cost and maximization of profits, while in
the context of public administrative system the aims are more complex to include other
 concepts like public service, public accountability, and social responsibility. Therefore,
the differing aims require efficiency to be redefined in connection to public administration.
In practice it is much more difficult quantify in financial terms the substantial investment
of resources undertaken by the public sector.
(d) Instability: As a result of operating in a political environment, public administrators are
faced with a much greater turnover of political leadership and consequent changes in
policy than is encountered in private business.
(e) Allocation of responsibilities: the method of allocation of functions in the public sector is
often based more on political considerations than pure test of efficiency, as it would be
done in the private sector.
(f) Functions: Public administration is faced with a much wider variety of functions than
those operating in private business, and also deals with matters, which are the exclusive
jurisdictions of central administration such as defense, and law and order.
(g) Decision criteria: Decision-making in public administration is unlike that of a private
organization whose customers are free to take or leave the organization's products or
services. Public administration decision-making is often not based on commercial forces.
Rather, the public, who are in a sense the "customers" of its services, indicate their interests
and views via their political representatives. All decisions of public administration take
place against the background of public criticism.

Besides to the above-mentioned differences, public and private administrations could also vary in
many respects. For example, as the nature of the basic administrative problems in public and private
sectors varies substantially, decision-making inevitably varies accordingly. Whilst the business
(private) sector is strongly oriented to market innovation, public administration can be said to be
concerned more with market compression.

The extent and magnitude of the vise versa influences of the two administrative systems are quite
different. Private administration is highly affected by the decisions, laws, and procedures of public
administration. From the outset, private sector is supposed to fulfill certain requirements imposed by
the government (public sector) before it starts to operate, and to respect and adhere to public laws. On
the contrary, public administration is less likely to be affected by private administration in the same
manner.
ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Prepare a case study provide solution to the problem with the application of POSDCoRB.
The study should incorporate the Pandemic problem and the involvement of private and
public agencies.

 Activity 2

Name: _________________
Course, Year and Section: ________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Visit any Government and Private agency, and observe their nature. Produce a VLOG
representing the differences of Private and Public Administration Roles in the economy.
TOPIC:

 New Public Administration

DURATION:

 1 week/ 3hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:

COPNCEPT NOTES:

Emergence of New Public Administration (NPA)

The emergence of New Public Administration (NPA) can be traced back

to the late 1960s. There were various reasons for the emergence of the NPA.
The world had witnessed two Great Wars by that time and after the wars a
number of agencies to alleviate the human sufferings had been formed e.g.
UNO, WHO, UNICEF, etc. However, these agencies found it difficult to
accomplish their tasks in the absence of effective and efficient administrative
systems in various countries. Unemployment, poverty, population, etc., were
increasing very rapidly and it was considered that these problems were due to
the inefficiency of the administrators and also due to the inadequacies in the
perception about the scope of Public Administration.
It was thought that the machinery of Public Administration was not
responding to the needs of the people as it was considered that policy
formulation was an area for the political leaders, while the administrators have
to only implement the policy so framed. Hence, there arose a need to rethink
about the objective and scope of Public Administration and the concept of NPA
emerged as a result thereof. There were also some other factors responsible for
the growth of NPA. It was felt that the objectives of Public Administration at its
core are still the same and it is still used chiefly as an instrument of law and
order and to maintain status-quo which benefits elite classes.
Therefore, scholars opined that the machinery of Public Administration
should act as an instrument of initiating and sustaining social change in order to
bring down the growing frustration among the people. They also felt that in the
eagerness to make Public Administration a science, the value-content of the
Public Administration has been missed i.e. the emphasis so far had been on a
value-free administration which meant that rules are applied equally and no
positive concession is given to the weakest of weaker sections in the society. In
the 1960s, there arose a crisis of governance in USA, where most of the scholars
of Public Administration were based at that time. The crisis reached its
culminating point with the failures at the Vietnam War, the rising youth unrest
in USA, the rising civil rights movements and the assassination of Robert F.
Kennedy, Martin Luther Kind Junior etc. This crisis had a natural impact on the
study of Public Administration at that time and the concept of NPA emerged
which suggested, in a nutshell, that Public Administration doesn’t function in
vacuum and the administration should be responsive towards the needs of the
society and address itself to problems and malaise that affected the society.

Features of NPA

NPA focuses chiefly on following things:

i) Change and Administrative Responsiveness i.e. operational flexibility

and organizational adaptability to meet the environmental changes
should be in-built in the administrative system.

ii) Relevance/Rationality of changes – i.e. people should see changes as

relevant meaning thereby that changes should be specific to the needs
of the area and the needs of the people. Earlier approaches to NPA
considered that rationality in decisions should be from the view point
of administrators only and hence rationality of the people was
neglected. NPA suggests the inclusion of rationality of the people too
in the process of policy formulation.

(iii)NPA advocates emphasis on Management-worker relations. There

should be equal emphasis both on efficiency and human
considerations. The new approach has to satisfy both the efficiency
and the human relations criterion in order to achieve success.

(iv) NPA suggests that small decentralized and flexible hierarchies in

organizational structures are more suitable in view of the increasing
role of administration.

(v) Since public affairs are highly varied and complex, no single approach
in the study of public administration out of various approaches,
namely management approach, human relations approach, political
approach, public-choice approach etc., would be adequate to guide the
actions of the administrator. Hence education in Public Administration
should be heterogeneous and wide based, as is advocated by NPA.

(vi) Three Anti-goals of NPA: NPA has advocated 3 anti-goals and hence
its literature is called “anti-positivist”. These are
a. Rejecting a definition of Public administration as
value-free i.e. Public Administration should be value-
oriented since not all the inclinations to the values are
bad and hence are desirable at some moments of time.
 b. Rejecting a rationalist and perhaps deterministic view
of human kind since human-behaviour is quite
unpredictable. Public Administration studies should
hence focus on what administration should “become”
instead of focusing on what administration should
“be”.

c. Rejecting “Politics – administration dichotomy” since

administrators today are involved in policy
formulation and policy implementation at all the
stages.

(vii)Four Goals of NPA: NPA advocates 4 goals to be achieved in future

namely – Relevance, Values, Equity and Change

a. Relevance

Contemporary Public Administration has been

adversely criticized as it had done nothing to solve the
problems and issues confronting the society. In view
of this the present concept of NPA suggests that
administrators should deal explicitly with political and
normative implications of all the administrative
actions. In this regard relevance of administrative
actions not only to the administration but also to the
public should be kept in mind.

b. Value

NPA rejects procedural neutrality and emphasizes that

public officials have to advocate the interests of the
disadvantaged people. However, emphasis on personal
values that benefit the elite sections of the societies
should be rejected

(g) Social Equity

A public administration system which fails to work for

the changes and fails to redress the grievances of the
minorities is likely to be eventually used to suppress
(jjj) Four Goals of NPA: NPA advocates 4 goals to be achieved
in future namely – Relevance, Values, Equity and Change

Relevance
 Contemporary Public Administration has been
adversely criticized as it had done nothing to solve the
problems and issues confronting the society. In view
of this the present concept of NPA suggests that
administrators should deal explicitly with political and
normative implications of all the administrative
actions. In this regard relevance of administrative
actions not only to the administration but also to the
public should be kept in mind.

b. Value

NPA rejects procedural neutrality and emphasizes that

public officials have to advocate the interests of the
disadvantaged people. However, emphasis on personal
values that benefit the elite sections of the societies
should be rejected

(h) Social Equity

(kkk) A public administration system which fails to work for the

changes and fails to redress the grievances of the minorities
is likely to be eventually used to suppress Four Goals of
NPA: NPA advocates 4 goals to be achieved in future
namely – Relevance, Values, Equity and Change

Relevance

Contemporary Public Administration has been

adversely criticized as it had done nothing to solve the
problems and issues confronting the society. In view
of this the present concept of NPA suggests that
administrators should deal explicitly with political and
normative implications of all the administrative
actions. In this regard relevance of administrative
actions not only to the administration but also to the
public should be kept in mind.

b. Value

NPA rejects procedural neutrality and emphasizes that

public officials have to advocate the interests of the
disadvantaged people. However, emphasis on personal
values that benefit the elite sections of the societies
should be rejected
 c. Social Equity

A public administration system which fails to work for

the changes and fails to redress the grievances of the
minorities is likely to be eventually used to suppress
those minorities. Hence the goal of administration
should be to bring about social equity and thereby
harmony and social integration in the society.
d. Change

Change is necessary to prevent Public Administration

from coming under the dominance of the powerful
interest groups. Now the question arises as to what
changes are desirable and what should be the direction
of these changes? In NPA, these changes should bring
about social equity and the changes brought about
should suit the future needs.
What is new in NPA?

It is true that ideas behind NPA concept had been there for quite some
time but what NPA did was to present those ideas nicely and in an integrated
manner. Hence, it can be said that although the concepts are not new but the
form provided to them is new. At the same time, credit should be given to NPA
scholars for pointing out the fact that “responsiveness” and “responsibleness” in
administration need to go together in the modern administrative set up. NPA
also provided some solutions for achieving these goals and anti-goals, popularly
called 4 D’s i.e. Decentralization, De-bureaucratization, Delegation and
Democratization. However, the solution in the form of 4 Ds has been criticized
by the scholars on following lines:

(i) The solutions for achieving the goals and anti-goals were not
provided by the NPA scholars explicitly.

(ii) Now there arises a million dollar question i.e. now much one
should decentralize or delegate or de-bureaucratize or
democratize in order to achieve the goals? On this front, NPA
is totally silent and it seems that they have left the answer to
the discretion of the administrators.

(iii) The overall focus in NPA movement seems to be to make

administration to be less “generic” and more “public, less
“descriptive” and more “prescriptive”, less “institution-
oriented” and more “client-oriented”, less “neutral” and more
normative” but should be no less scientific all the same.
ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Prepare a case study provide solution to the problem with the application of
POSDCoRB.
The study should incorporate the Pandemic problem and the involvement of
private and public agencies.

 Activity 2

Name: _________________
Course, Year and Section: ________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Visit any Government and Private agency, and observe their nature. Produce a
VLOG representing the differences of Private and Public Administration Roles in the
economy.
TOPIC:

 Ecology of Public Administration

DURATION:

 2 weeks/ 6hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:

COPNCEPT NOTES:

Public Administration cannot operate in vacuum. It has to interact with

the political executive, social political interest groups, commercial and
economic organizations etc, and above all with the people. Public
Administration can be taken as a sub-system of the overall social system and
has to interact with other sub-systems. A study of such interaction would
constitute what has come to be known as ecological approach to the study of
public administration. We propose to discuss in brief the ecological aspects of
Pubic Administration.

Meaning

The word “ecology” comes from the field of biology where it suggests
the interdependence between animal species and their natural environment. In
1947, John M. Gaus attempted to employ the concept of ecology in the study of
Public Administration. By this he meant the interdependence of Public
Bureaucracy and its environment. In the same year Robert Dahi stressed the
need for cross cultural studies that emphases environmental effects on
administrative structure and behaviour. He observed that Public Administration
cannot ignore the effect of national psychology and political, social and cultural
environment in which it works.
These developments in fact reflected the general interest in the study of
comparative Public Administration in the newly independent nations during
post World War II period. It was realized that the administration of these
countries could not be understood in terms of the then existing theories which
developed in a totally different setting, mainly in the USA. This interest in the
study of Comparative Public Administration (CPA) in the developing countries
was encouraged by the following factors:
 i) American occupational administration during and after
World War-II.
ii) The emergence of a large number of developing countries.
iii) The extension of technical assistance to these countries.
iv) Involvement of academicians in the administration of these
assistance programmes, and
v) Rapid growth of behavioral sciences in general and
comparative politics in particular.

In fact, a whole group of scholars in Comparative Administration Group

(CAG) emerged which engaged itself in the study of the administration in
developing countries of Africa, Latin America and Asia. They found that the
study of Comparative Administration requires new concepts which can take care
of the dynamic and developmental aspects of administration in cross cultural
perspectives. They have also found that such concepts have to take into account
the ecological aspects which can explain the impact of environment on the
administrative system and vice versa. In fact Riggs has observed that truly
comparative administrative studies have necessarily to be ecological in
character.
The basic premise of the ecological approach is that public administration
may be regarded as one of the several institutions of the society. Its structure
and functions can, therefore, be studied only in relation to these other
institutions. In a system approach, public administration is a sub-system of the
society and is constantly interacting i.e. affected by and affecting the economic,
political and socio-cultural sub-systems. Riggs, in his “The Ecology of Public
Administration” has explored the interaction between Public Administration and
the environment in which it develops. From the environment he chose, social,
Political, communication, and economic fields to study such interaction in the
USA, ancient Siam and modern Philippines and Thailand. A Brief discussion of
some of the relevant parameters is given below.
Economic Factors

In ideal type of diffracted societies to which America approximates

closely, the economic organization revolves round the market which is
characterized by the use of rational criteria for the allocation of scarce resources
for maximization of output. This rationality of the market mechanism is carried
over into the administrative bureau, where recruitment obviously takes place on
the basis of merit for the job to be performed. Similarly, the market oriented
practices of planning, communication, line and staff organizations etc, are taken
over to the Public Administration. On the same count, the performance
Budgeting has been introduced in the Government.
 On the other hand the market needs administrative services for
enforcement of contracts for regulating trade practices, for provision of
infrastructural facilities etc. The money to run these administrative services is,
in turn, provided by the economy. The inter-dependence between the economy
and public administration thus becomes obvious. The economy could not
survive without the administrative system which in turn was shaped by the
needs of the economy. Moreover the survival of the administration depends on
the support provided by the economy.
In a traditional society (termed by Riggs as “fused society”) there is no
market. The re-distributive functions of the economy are performed by the
administration which becomes co-terminus with it.
In traditional societies, the economy is governed by Bazaar-Canteen
model which is characterized by “Price-indeterminacy”, “pariah
entrepreneurship” and “subsidized” and “tributary” canteen for the favored and
the disfavored respectively. Business of entrepreneurship is not favored and not
taken up by “stronger” class. They have to buy protection from influential men,
mostly from those in administration. This, on the one hand, leaves little with the
entrepreneur for capital formation and on the other hand corrupts the
administration. Low capital formation makes for low productivity leading to
poor population and low tax collections. The administrators are less paid and
have all the incentives for corruption. Inter-twining relationship of the economy
and the administration is thus apparent.
Socio-Cultural Factors

American way of life is characterized by the existence of a large number

of functionally specific voluntary associations who recruit members
universalistically on contractual basis. Apart from its members, the association
may also have some staff which serves as its agent. The staff, when big,
becomes its bureaucracy. This pattern of associations has affected both
economic and administrative fields. The business field is dominated by big
corporations whose members are share holders. Similarly, the public
bureaucracy is the agent of the American people who form one big association.
This social organization gives to the public administration its very important
characteristics of universalistic recruitment and functional specificity. The inter-
dependence between associations and the administration is very significant.
Most of the important associations have their counterparts in the administration
which depends on them for interest aggregation and articulation. This facilitates
the task of administration in policy formulation and executing, which in turn,
helps the associations in furthering their objectives.
In fused societies there are no specific associations, but, only family and
kinship groups based on status. Higher the status, larger the family with kins
family at the apex. Since groups cannot aggregate or articulate the specific
functional interests, the administrative order is based on a particularistic group
structure which it also helps to sustain.
 In prismatic societies, characterized by a high degree of heterogeneity,
formalism and overlapping, the social structure is characterized by poly-
communalism. Due to improving communication system, the mobilization in
the society takes place faster than assimilation. Instead of nation-wide
functionally specific associations, we have such associations on community
basis. Such associations, called elects by Riggs, tend to further the interests of
their community and not the professional interest on national basis. The
emergence of elects has profound influence on public administration which
tends to carry many traits from the former.
The formal bureau chief while paying lip service to the formal laws and
rules feels compelled to help the members of his family and elects. This gives
rise to selectivism in recruitment to the positions in Government as well as
selection of beneficiaries of the Government programmes. This is some way
between universalism and particularities. This leads to nepotism and coupled
with the corruption induced by bazaar-canteen model of economic system may
lead to differentiated groups hostile to the ruling elite. The efficiency of the
administration goes down and so does the efficiency of economic organizations.
In this way, the socio-cultural institutions and administration interact in a
prismatic society.
Political Factors

Public Administration is most intimately connected with the political sub-

system of the society. In fact, it has grown out of the political system of which it
was earlier taken to be an integral part. Early theorists of Public administration
believed in politics-administration dichotomy. They believed that Public
Administration has to execute policies laid down by political masters. The
political system needs a lot of information to lay down policies and feedback to
readjust them. This information and feed back is provided by Administration.
This neat division of the policy making and policy execution functions
comparatively diffracted societies to a large extent, though not fully. This need
not be the case in the fused and prismatic societies.
In fused societies the two functions are not distinct. In political model,
termed “archalic” by Riggs both political and administrative functions are
performed but cannot be understood in terms of making and enforcing the
policies. The situation is much more complex in prismatic societies. The
prismatic characteristic of overlapping is very much in evidence among the
political and administrative sub-systems. The formal political structure may be
universalistic, but in practice laws and policies often discriminate selectively
against the excluded groups. The legislators attempt to secure positions for their
protégés and devote little time to important functions like legislation and policy
making. The strength of elects makes universalistic policies impossible.
Political system thus does not perform its functions but tends to enter the field
of administration. The administrative system is then called upon to interpret and
adopt the laws and policies to practical realities. In the absence of clear-cut
policy guidelines and effective control by the political system, the Public
Administration acquires considerable leeway in either enforcing policies
ritualistically or circumventing them according to the convenience of
administrators. Thus in a prismatic society, the administrative and political
system, not only show a good deal of interdependence, but also considerable
overlapping.

Legal Factors

The symbol system of a country has a bearing on its legal system. It

includes “myth”, “formula” and “code”. “Myth” means symbols to define
source of sovereignty; “Formula” determines the structure of the Government,
and “Code” includes laws and regulations. For example, the myth of popular
sovereignty determines the democratic form of government with its
universalistic laws. Whenever this myth is based on consensus among the
population, the formal political structure also becomes the substantive one.
The legislative, judicial and the executive wings of the government
perform their functions as laid down in the basic law i.e. constitution. Within the
executive wing, the political executive is able to exercise control over the
administrative wing as the guardian of the popular will. Laws enacted by the
legislative wing represent the popular will and are faithfully implemented. In
other words, there is a great degree of realism in the enactment and enforcement
of laws. Any difficulties in implementation by the administration can be brought
to the legislature for amendment in the laws. The legal system thus creates
interdependent legislatures and executives although they are assigned different
specific functions.
The discussions will not be complete without showing the effects of this
inter-dependence in the prismatic system. Here the myth of popular sovereignty
based on equality is superimposed on the traditional system with a different
myth based on divine origin of king or family and kingship loyalties. The result
is that the structure of the government and the laws enacted by the legislature
will not represent the consensus and may not be enforced. This gives rise to
constitutional and legal formalism with a great deal of difference between the
formal and substantive political and power structure. Some obvious symptoms
are:
i) The political executive may not be able to lay down realistic
policies due to lack of consensus and unrealistic laws may be
enacted. Obviously, they cannot be implemented. This places
great power in the hands of the administrators who may
chose to implement laws which serve their interests.
ii) Since the laws and rules and regulations do not lay down
realistic goals, the administrators may be very ritualistic in
implementing them. This may result in the red tape for
which the bureaucracy is so well known.
 iii) This fluid situation may prompt the political executives to
overlap into the administrative functions to further their
partisan interest.
iv) This also encourages the reverse process in which the
administrators by distorting the rules and laws acquire a lot
of political power.

The above discussion makes the interdependence of the political,

administrative and the legal systems amply clear to have a sound administrative
system; the laws and rules and regulations should be clear and policies should
lay down clear goals. On the other hand the enforcement of laws and regulations
and implementation of policies depends on a sound administrative system.

ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Prepare a case study provide solution to the problem with the application of
POSDCoRB.
The study should incorporate the Pandemic problem and the involvement of
private and public agencies.

 Activity 2

Name: _________________
Course, Year and Section: ________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Visit any Government and Private agency, and observe their nature. Produce a
VLOG representing the differences of Private and Public Administration Roles in the
economy.
TOPIC:

 Evolution of Public Administration as a Discipline

DURATION:

 3 week/ 9 hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:

COPNCEPT NOTES:

Public Administration has been defined in Chapter 1 as the administrative

activities of the Government. Obviously the definition takes or defines Public
Administration as an activity. In this Chapter the various phases through which
the discipline of Public Administration has passed to reach the present stage will
be discussed.
It is interesting to note that while Public Administration as an activity is
as old as social life itself; its study as an academic discipline is rather recent.
Not that Public Administration received no thought from earlier philosophers
and thinkers. Several Indian and Western thinkers have dealt with the subject in
the past. But, the administrative thought remained undifferentiated from
disciplines like political science, law and ethics for a long time. Several
examples can be given.
The great Hindu epics like Ramayana and the Mahabharat contained a
good deal of administrative thoughts along with the basic political setting. The
Smritis (The law books of ancient India) contained detailed exposition of
judicial organizations and administration. The Hindu books on politics often
delt with problems of administration rather than the theoretical basis of the
State. Kautilya’s Arthshastra, for example, contains details about the
administrative system of his times. Similarly, in ancient China the teachings of
Confucius contained many administrative details.
The same is true of Aristotle’s Politics. Machiavelli’s “Prince” written
towards the end of Middle Ages, is also a treatise on the art of government and
administration. There were thus many works in politics which contained details
about public administration. However, they did not even use the word “Public
Administration” up to the 18th century. Probably Hamilton was the first to
define meaning and scope of public administration in the “Federalist” complied
in the USA towards the end of the 18th century. Charles Jean Bounin was
probably the first author to write a separate book on public administration. It
was titled “Principles Administrations Publicque”.
The public administration was thus studied over a long period of time as a
part of other discipline, but, was not yet recognized as a separate discipline in its
own right. It was probably not sufficiently specialized as a subject to merit
separate and independent consideration.
On this reckoning the subject of Public Administration has completed a
little over hundred years as a discipline. During this century long journey the
discipline has seen many ups and downs. It has been the “hay day of Principles
of Administration” as well as the danger of merging into other disciplines like
political science or administrative science. It is proposed to study briefly this
fascinating history of the discipline of Public Administration.
A. Phase One (1887-1926) (Politics – Administration Dichotomy).

It is well known that public administration was included in

the subject/discipline of political science and Woodrow Wilson
first emphasized the need to study it as a separate discipline. In an
attempt to carve out an independent place for the subject it is not
unnatural that an extreme stand was taken by scholars like
Goodnow and L.D. White.
They emphasized that politics and administration were two
distinct activities and were to be studied separately. In his
monumental work “Politics and Administration (1900), Goodnow
contended that there were two distinct functions of the Government
“Politics” has to do with policies or the expression of the State will,
while “administration” has to do with the execution of these
policies. The legislative branch of the Government, with the help of
judicial interpretations, provided the policy frame work. The
executive branch had to administer these policies impartially,
politically and efficiently.
During the early part of the twentieth century a “Public
Services Movement”, was taking place in American Universities.
Public administration, therefore, received some serious attention
from the scholars. The “Committee on Instruction in Government”
of the American Political Science Association reported in 1914 the
Political Science was concerned with training for citizenship,
professional preparation such as law and journalism, training
experts and to prepare specialists for Government positions, and
educating for research work. This clearly made “Public
Administration” a clear and significant sub-field of Political
Science. Some other developments took place during this period
which, in time to come, contributed significantly to the recognition
of “Public Administration” as a separate discipline. In 1912, a
committee on Practical Training for Public Service was established
under the auspices of the American Political Science Association.
The Committee reported in 1914 that “Professional Schools” were
needed to train public administration. The Committee formed the
nucleus of the “Society” for the Promotion of Training for Public
 Service” founded in 1914 – a fore runner of the American Society
for Public Administration which was established in 1989.
Another significant development of this period was the publication
of the first text book on Public Administration by L.D White in
1926. The book was titled “introduction to the Study of Public
Administration”. The book took the politics – administration
dichotomy to its logical conclusions.
The period was thus characterized by politics – administration
dichotomy which was somehow related to value-fact dichotomy. It
was felt that the public administrator was supposed to deal with the
execution of policies and therefore, was concerned with things that
are “factual” and “scientific”. The political scientists, on the other
hand, were supposed to deal with the policy making and other
matters involving value questions. All this was supposed to have
been derived from Wilson’s essay of 1887, which in fact was at
best ambivalent on the subject and what it really emphasized, was
that “Public Administration is a field worth studying”. He did not
emphasize politics/administration dichotomy as he was aware that
public administration is innately political in nature and the two can
never really be separate. He, in fact, made this clear in his assay
itself. Be that as it may, Wilson’s assay did give rise to a phase of
politics/administration dichotomy in the study of Public
Administration. By hind sight it can be said that this dichotomy
was at best naive. But a long time had to pass before it was realized
by the scholars of Public Administration. For the time being the
emphasis on “fact” in public administration was to give rise to
some Fundamental Principles of Administration.

B. Phase Two (1927-1937) (The Principles of Administration)

As already mentioned earlier that the politics/administration

dichotomy gave rise to value/fact dichotomy. Everything about
Public Administration was thought to be “factual” or “Scientific”.
Search for scientific or universal principles of administration was,
therefore, only a step away. The process was hastened by the
Scientific Management Movement which proceeded the era of
Principles of Administration. The development of Scientific
Management in the Business schools focused mainly on the
Assembly Line, while the Principles of administration were
developed under the school of thought named “Administrative
Management”. The latter concerned itself with higher management.
The “Principles of Management” by F.W. Taylor (1911) and
writings of other authors like Frank and Lillian, Galibreth
developed principles of efficient physical movement for optimal
assembly line efficiency. These writings and the whole Scientific
Management Movement concentrated on finding “one best way” of
doing and organizing things. They emphasized that in terms of
technical efficiency there could be only ”One best way” of doing
things which had to be found in every work situation.
Since the Public Administration was also thought to be
“factual” and “Scientific” development of certain scientific
principles was to be natural consequences. In 1927, W.F
Willoughby’s book “Principles of Public Administration” was
published. It was the second full-fledged text book on Public
Administration. Its thrust was that certain scientific principles of
administration should be discovered. These principles should be
mastered by the practitioners of administration, other significant
contributions in this direction were Mary Parker Follett’s “Creative
Experience” (1924), Henri Fayol’s “industrial and General
Management” (1930) and James D Mooney and Alan C.Riley’s
“Principles of Organizations(1939). All these works enunciated
several principles of organization. These were supposed to be
principles applicable to every administrative organization and
situation. In other words the application of these principles would
not depend on nature and function of the organization;
environmental setting; historical and cultural background of the
country;work situation etc.

The Zenith of the era of the Principles was reached in 1937 with
the publication of Luther H. Gulick and Lyndall Urwick’s “Papers
on the Science of Administration”. The authors were the Chief
advisors of the President Roosevelt and their papers were a report
to the President’s Committee on Administrative Science.
According to Luther and Gulick, the Principles of Organization are
summed up by the acronym POSDCORB which stands for-
P - Planning
O - Organization
S - Staffing
D - Directing
CO - Coordination
R - Reporting
B - Budgeting
C. Phase Three (1938-1959) (Shadows of Doubt)

The age of certainty of principles did not last long. Voices of

dissent were heard from two directions. Firstly, serious objections
were raised against the politics – administration dichotomy. It was
contended that politics and administration can never be separated
as they were organically linked with each other. Secondly, the
principles of administration were seriously challenged on the
ground that they are not logically consistent.

Although the dissent to politics – administration dichotomy started

in the late thirties, F.M. Marx’s edited volume “Elements of Public
Administration (1946) made a major contribution to such dissent.
All the fourteen articles of the book, written by practitioners,
pointed towards an awareness of the fact that there was hardly any
issue which could be resolved by ‘value-free’ administration. It is
almost impossible to separate it from the value laden politics. For
example, there may be one scientific way to build a road. But,
could it be separated from such questions as whether the road
should be built at all? Where should it be built? From which
competing claims the money should be drawn for building the
road? Such a separation obviously appears impossible. The formal
answer to the question of politics – administration dichotomy was
provided by John Gans in his off-quoted dictum “a theory of Public
Administration means in our time a theory of politics also”,
published in Public Administration Review in 1950.

Almost simultaneously a serious challenge was being posed to the

so called Universal Principles of Administration. The earliest
challenge almost went unnoticed. In his book, ‘The Functions of
the Executive’ published in 1938, Chester Bernard challenged the
validity of the ‘Principles”, but the impact of his challenge was
probably delayed as, being the President of New Jersey Bell
Telephone Company, his academic credentials were not
immediately recognized. Simon, however, picked up the thread
when he wrote the article’ The Proverbs of Administration’ which
was published in Public Administration Review in 1946. Next year

Robert Dahl also published his article’ The Science of

Administration: Three Problems’ in the same journal. He gave
 three arguments to support his contention that there cannot be any
universal principles of administration. His arguments were –

i) There are values contending for pre-eminence in any

organization. It is therefore, not possible to have value free
scientific principles of administration having universal
applications.
ii) Administration is carried out in human organizations having
human beings who have differing personalities. It is,
therefore, difficult to find principles which can be applicable
to all administrative situations.
iii) The environment or social framework of administration
differs from country to country and in the same country from
organization to organization. It is, therefore, not possible to
devise universal principles of administration applicable to all
such situations.

Finally in 1947 Herbert Simon came forward with his book

‘Administrative Behaviour’, A study of decision-making processes in
Administrative Organizations’. Here he showed that for every principle of
administration there was a counter-principle which was equally true. Even the
different principles were not mutually consistent. For example, the principle of
having a small ‘span of control’ is directly contradictory to the principle of
maximized communication’. The principle of ‘Span of Control’ requires that an
administrator can supervise only a small number (about which the experts
differ) of subordinates; if organizations are designed on this ‘principle’ it may
have too many layers of hierarchy. This would make organizational
communication very cumbersome. For maximum communication the
organization should be flat and should not have too many layers. Obviously the
two principles contradict each other.
Another major work of the time was Dwight Waldo’s “The
Administrative State: A study of the Political Theory of American Public
Administration”. The book was published in 1948 and attacked the notion of
immutable principles of administration. It showed the inconsistencies of the
methodology of determining the Principles of Administration. The book
beautifully demonstrated that the values of ‘economy’ and ‘efficiency’
dominating the thinking of the field at that time were too narrow to give a
correct view of the Public Administration. This was the time of Human
Relations School of Public Administration. The dominant theme was that the
mechanical and scientific principles were too narrow and inadequate to explain
the working of organizations, since the organizations comprised human beings.
It was necessary to understand human behaviour as it is to be able to understand
the organizational behaviour. The attempt was to build a theory of human
behaviour in organizations. And it was too complicated to fit into the strait-
jacket of mechanical and scientific principles of administration.
By the middle of the century, the Public Administration had thus lost both
the pillars of strength; the ‘politics – administration dichotomy’ and ‘universal
principles of administration’. The Public Administrationists, therefore, found
the ground slipping from under their feet. The discipline came on the verge of
losing its identity. The morale of the discipline was therefore, very low. It was
looking to different directions to find its movings.

D. Phase Four (1950-1970) (Search for Identity)

While demolishing the Principles of Administration, Herbert

Simon thought of a new paradigm of two mutually reinforcing
components of Public Administration; viz., a pure science of
administration based on a thorough grounding in social psychology
and the other one concerned with ‘prescribing for public policy’.
And, the Public Administration did, in fact start searching for its
identity in these two streams.

In the Lap of Political Science

Some of the Public Administrationists opted for strengthening the
conceptual linkages of Public Administration with the mother
discipline of political science. They had two reasons for doing the
same-

i) There is a logical connection between the two in the public

policy making process. They considered Public
Administration as forming the internal stage of the process;
i.e. the formulation of public policies within public
bureaucracies and their delivery to the policy. Political
Science, on the other hand was thought to provide the
external stage of the process; i.e. considering the pressures in
the polity generating political and social change. The logic of
retaining linkage between the two is thus clear.
ii) They feared that treating Public Administration as a ‘pure
science’ will make it lose touch with political and social
realities. The focus would then be too narrow. They were
aware of the inadequacy of the Principles of Administration
and were afraid that pure science of public administration
would exclude from their purview the richest sources of
enquiry, viz., public interest, human values and normative
political theory.
 While this group of Public Administrations tried to strengthen the
bond of Public Administration with Political Science, the “mother
Discipline” was in no mood to welcome the prodigal son. Nor was
it ready to grant it any independent entity even within the field.
Political scientists started calling ‘intellectualized understanding’
of the executive branch as their aim of the discipline rather than
preparing public administrators for action as called earlier. During
this period even the position of Political Science was rather at low
ebb and it was considered a junior member of the social sciences
and within political science, Public Administration was treated with
scant respect. It would be clear from the fact that in 1962, Public
Administration was not included as a sub-field of Political Science
in the report of the Committee on Political Science. In 1967, Public
Administration was not included as an organizing category in the
programme of the annual meeting of the “American Political
Science Association”. Many Political Scientists were indifferent or
even hostile to Public Administration.

Case Studies
To cope with the situation some Public Administrationists developed the
case study method under the aegis of the Committee on Public Administration
of the Social Science Research Council of USA. According to Waldo the
emergence of case method in 40s and 50s reflects the response of ‘pubic
administration’ to ‘behavioral revolution’. It provided the Public
Administrationists to call their work as empirical and behavioral. It also
provided them an alternative to the Simon’s call for a rigorous pure science of
administration. This also provided them a way of re-establishing links with the
discipline of political science. However, the period is characterized by a group
of dispirited scholars trying to cope with the situation as best as they could. But,
the fields of comparative and development administration provided a contrast to
this depressing scenario.
Comparative and Development Administration
Although the beginning of comparative and development administration
could be traced to late 40s and early 50s, it really became strong during the 60s.
In 1962, the Comparative Administration Group (CAG) of the American
Society of Public Administration received financing from the Ford Foundation.
During the heydays of the Comparative Administration (1960-70), the
membership of CAG grew to more than 500 under the leadership of Fred W.
Riggs.
 The main features of the Comparative Administration were well
described by Riggs. He said that it tries to build administrative theory by being
empirical, and ecological. The most important of these was its ecological
character so much so that Comparative Public Administration is often called
cross-cultural public administration. Ford Foundation supported the programme
with a view to help the poor people in developing countries by improving their
administrative capabilities.
This concern of the Foundation was, however, not shared by the scholars
of the Comparative Administration Group. These scholars were from the
beginning interested in grand theory building rather than providing answers to
the practical problems being faced by the developing countries. This
incidentally was also the main difference between the main fields of Public
Administration and Comparative Public Administration.
The main field has developed out of the action in the real world. It has
come as an answer to the practical administrative problems, of course mainly in
the American context. In other words the main field has been ‘practitioner-
oriented”. In contrast, the Comparative Public Administration has had a purely
scholarly approach and has concentrated on theory building. As this approach
proved of little use in solving the practical administrative problems of the
developing countries, the Ford Foundation withdrew its financial support. The
CAG was disbanded in 1973 and merged with the international Committee of
the American Society for Public Administration.
The journal of Comparative Administration also closed down in 1974.
This was probably inevitable because the comparative sub-field set up a very
difficult goal of developing a comprehensive Theory of Public Administration.
A sub-field of Comparative Administration also developed viz. Development
Administration. But, the contributors to this sub-field have not been able to
build any viable theory. In fact, the writings on the subject have not really been
able to even bring it into proper focus. Although these sub-fields are not being
pursued with the same vigour as in sixties, interest in them continues to some
extent.
Another significant development during the period was effervescence of
some young Public Administrationists which has come to be known as New
Public Administration which will be very briefly discussed here.

New Public Administration

In 1968, Waldo Sponsored a conference of young Public
Administrationists, the proceedings of which were published in 1971 as a book
entitled ‘The New Public Administration: The Minnow book Perspective”. The
conference de-emphasized the traditional aspects of economy and efficiency in
Public Administration. Instead the moral aspects were emphasized. It mainly
discussed questions of values, ethics, development of individual member in the
organization, the relationship of the client with bureaucracy and several other
problems of technology, urbanization etc.
Of course, the effervescence of the New Public Administration was lost
almost as quickly as it occurred. But, many scholars feel that it was really an
attempt by Public Administrationists to break away from Political Science as
well as the Administrative Science, which was the other discipline in which the
Public Administration was trying to take refuge.
With Administrative Science
As already mentioned above when Pubic Administrationists sought to
return to the mother discipline of political science, they were not very welcome
there and were reduced to second class citizenship. Some of them, therefore,
looked elsewhere and tried to take refuge in Administrative Science. This meant
losing identity into the bigger discipline of Administrative Science which
includes Organization Theory and Management Science. Organization Theory,
using the disciplines of social psychology, sociology, etc., emphasizes the
importance of organization as a basis of all administration - be it private, public
or institutional. Some of the important contributors in the field were James G.
March and Herbert Simons “Organization” (1958); Richard Cyert and March’s
“A Behavioural Theory of the Firm” (1963); March’s “Handbook of
Organizations” (1965) and James D. Thompson’s “Organization in Action”
(1967).
In the early 60s Organization Development was making rapid progress. It
utilizes the concept of social psychology. It values democratization of
bureaucracy and self actualization of comprising the bureaucracy within
organizations. Organization Development therefore provided a very attractive
alternative to political science for the Public Administration.
Of course, there was no conceptual difficulty in using the management
techniques for improving the economy and efficiency of tasks performed by the
Public Administrators. Many of these tasks would lend themselves to
improvement by the Mathematical technique devised by the Management
sciences. It is a different matter that these techniques cannot encompass the
whole of Public Administration.
But, as already mentioned, the real dilemma was that the whole exercise
reduced Public Administration to at best a sub-field of Administrative science. It
was not much of an improvement to be so treated as a sub-field of
Administrative science instead of an “emphasis’ in political science. Both ways
Public Administration would lose its identity in either of the disciplines. It was
not a very pleasant situation for the discipline struggling for an independent
status. The Administration and New Administration were taking the discipline
in a new direction. These did not last long, but, they did create a climate where
the discipline started creating an identity of its own.
Phase Five (after 1970) (Pubic Administration as Pubic Administration)

During the last three decades or so, the discipline of Pubic Administration
has made considerable progress in establishing its identity. In this quest, it has
taken two directions. Firstly, it has been using the administrative science route
to study how and why the organizations work the way they do; how and why
people in organizations behave the way they do; how and why decisions etc are
made. More and more refined management techniques have also been taken
from the management sciences and used. Secondly, an attempt has been made to
define public in public administration, with the distinction between public and
private being blurred, public Administrationists are veering round the view that
the public in public administration means public interest. This new dimension is
being recognized as public affairs.
The concept of determining public interest and implementing it gives a
distinctive feature of pubic administration, without public interest in mind,
administrative science could be used for anything good or bad. However, the
progress in terms of defining ‘pubic interest’, ‘public affairs’, and ‘prescribing
for public policy’ has been rather slow. But Public Administration at last
appears to be coming into its own. In 1970 National Association of Schools of
Public Affairs Administration (NASPAA) was founded. It originated in
“Council in Graduate Education for Public Administration” founded in 1950 by
a small number of graduate programmes. The setting up of the national
associations in 1970 greatly strengthened it. In 1983 the National Association
(NASPAA) became a formal professional accrediting agency for Pubic
Administration programmes. By 1986, seventy universities had been granted
recognition by NASPAA. With this it appears that Public Administration is fast
becoming a separate self aware field of study.

ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Prepare a case study provide solution to the problem with the application of
POSDCoRB.
The study should incorporate the Pandemic problem and the involvement of
private and public agencies.
  Activity 2

Name: _________________
Course, Year and Section: ________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Visit any Government and Private agency, and observe their nature. Produce a
VLOG representing the differences of Private and Public Administration Roles in the
economy.
TOPIC:

 Public Administration as an Art and Science

DURATION:

 1 week/ 3hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:

COPNCEPT NOTES:

There has been a controversy over the status of Public Administration.

Some scholars consider it as a science while most of the practitioners of
management theory stress that it is an art. Let us now consider and then try to
establish whether Public Administration is a Science or an Art.
Considering Pubic Administration as Science has two implications i.e. it
could be a Science or it could be a Social Science.
Let us first examine as to how Public Administration can be considered as
a science. “Science” has 2 branches i.e. ‘Pure Science” and “Social Science”.
The ‘Pure Science’ has the following characteristics:
(i) Universality of laws
(ii) Exactness of the results based on these laws
(iii) Predictability of events.

In Public Administration there has been a quest to find out universal laws.
But such universal laws have so far not been established. Similarly the results
are in excess to some degree and the events, since they involve human
behaviour, are also not totally predictable. Hence Public Administration cannot
be considered to be a ‘Pure Science’ in its present status of understanding.
Now we may consider as to how Public Administration be considered as
a ‘Social Science’. Social Science is defined as - ‘a systematic body of
knowledge derived from day-to-day experience, observations and practice”. A
social science contains concepts, hypothesis, theories, experimentation,
principles, etc. and to develop these principles either inductive approach or
deductive approach is used. Hence based on above definition, Public
Administration can be considered to be Social Science because –
 1. It contains a body of exact knowledge derived from experiences
and observations which are applicable in practical situations. Hence
in this respect it is as much a general science as economics or
psychology or biology.
2. Through continued efforts, a body of principles which is applicable
in any administrative set up has been developed. These principles
are required to be applied in order to secure efficiency in
administration.
3. It employs scientific methods of investigations in its study e.g.
research and analysis is an indispensable part of any public policy.
4. It uses scientific process i.e. facts and data are collected and
analyzed and based on this analyze generalizations are arrived at.
Hence an administrator applies science in much the same manner
as an Engineer or a Doctor.
5. It has also developed its won body of subject matter as distinct
from other social science disciplines, though it is inter-disciplinary
and multi-disciplinary.

Therefore, it can be said that Public Administration is a corpus of

demonstrated truths and hence a social science. However, as a social science,
Pubic Administration has deficiencies, which present impediments in the path
of it being considered as a social science. These are:
1. Public Administration involves dealing with Human Behaviour in
organization which is not amendable to experimentation in
laboratory conditions. Besides, most part of the subject matter of
Public Administration is not amendable to experiments.
2. Simon in “Administrative Behaviour” has criticized that the
principles propounded in the discipline of Public Administration
are mutually contradictory and he has said that they are nothing but
homely proverbs.
3. The subject matter of Public Administration is not free from values
and hence its study can’t be completely objective, while objectivity
is the prime criterion for a discipline to be considered as a science.
4. Public Administration is also culture-bound i.e. Public
Administration in one country is quite different from Public
Administration in another country.

However, one can still regard Pubic Administration as a social science

with following characters:

a) It is a new undeveloped science where conscious theorizing has

gone on for only in the past 100 years.
 b) It is primarily a science of observation than experiment while other
social sciences are amendable to experiments. In case of public
administration every new policy which is implemented in itself
becomes a social experiment.
c) It is both a positive and a normative science i.e. it is concerned
with what “is” in the administration and also what “should be” in
the administration. In other words it takes account of existing facts
and tendencies and hence it is more than a mere wishful thinking.
d) It is a progressive science meaning thereby that its
“generalizations” and “principles” are bound to be constantly
revised and restated.

However, there exists a rival group of practitioners who claim that Public
Administration is an Art. The arguments behind their belief are as follows:
a) Administration, as has been established over the years, requires
specialized skills and specialized knowledge and it is not possible
for everyone to carry out administration just as it is not possible for
everyone to perform a drama or a dance.
b) Administration requires leadership and conviction, which cannot be
taught in a class.
c) It requires a body of special talents in the field of administration to
become a manager/administrator. For example, tactfulness, conflict
management etc are such special talents.
d) Success in administration is directly proportional to the extent of
skills applied. This is supported by the fact that in a group of 15-20
people only one person turns out to be a good manager who leads
the others.

In the light of the above discussions, the following two conclusions may be
arrive at:
1. There are strong reasons to believe that Pubic Administration is
both – a ‘Science” and an “Art” i.e. though it can make predictions,
the predictions are not absolutely correct. It also mean that a
contingency approach is required in the practice of administration
i.e. there is a need to modify the science of administration to suit
the situation and then apply it. The ability to modify it and to apply
it is an art.
2. The word “Science” could be used here in the connotation of a
‘social Science’. It has the traits of a science since predictability is
there though limited only up to some degree.
 Hence one can say that the methodology applied in Public Administration
is scientific while its application is an art.

ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: CASE STUDY

MID TERM EXAM

TOPIC:

 THE ENVIRONMENT OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

DURATION:

 1 week/ 3hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:

CONCEPT NOTES:
Environment in the context of this topic refers to actors and forces that affect or determine
public administration. The environment under which public administration operates, that would have
major implications on its success or failure as well as in shaping its basic features, can generally be
classified as internal and external.

Internal environment refers to those conditions, which are in most cases within the control of
the administration, yet having their own challenges and/or advantages. This may include the
organization

itself and groups and individuals within the organization, the material, financial, and other
resources available for the organization.

The organizational structure and the pattern of authority in the formal hierarchy, the purpose
and tradition of the organization, historical legacies or traditional practices of the administrative
systems, the internal network and working procedures, etc have influences on the administrative
efficiency and effectiveness of a given organization or country. The behavior and structure of
formal and informal groups like peer groups, labor unions, and advisory council have also strong
influence on the style of administration. The type and sufficiency of materials, skill, knowledge, and
finance are considered as environmental factors internal to the organization that highly determine the
administrative style and the accompanying success or failure of administration.

External environment on the other hand is that, which is outside the control of the administration
but having major impact in shaping the features and determining the success or failures of the overall
objectives that public administration wants to achieve. The external environment can be generalized as
political, economic/ecological, social, and technological (PEST) each of which reflected in many
ways. For example we can consider:
 a. Politically, the type of government and the resultant constitution, policies, laws and directives;
national and international political trends and changes; bilateral and multilateral agreements
and policies;

b. Economically, national economic trends and level of growth and development; the global
market and economic situation as well as the extent of mutual economic assistance and
cooperation;

c. Socially, population/demographic trends and changes; societal beliefs, values, attitudes,

cultures, and lifestyles; public expectations and demands;

d. Technologically, ability or access to use the type of technology being used elsewhere in the
world, such as in communication and production;

All these have their own effects on the administrative system of a given country or organization. Thus,
public administration has always to keep on with close scrutiny and be aware of what is going on or
what exists in both the internal and external environment.

As the internal and external environments do have influences on the features, structures and
goals of public administration, there are apparent differences in developed and developing countries in
these regards.

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION IN DEVELOPED (INDUSTRIAL) COUNTRIES

In the context of this note, the term "developed" or "industrial" societies refer to those countries
of Western Europe and USA where industrialization has brought about major changes in economic
structure and growth accompanied by political and administrative modernization.

Nevertheless, it should be noted that administrative modernization is not a typical or exclusive feature
of developed countries. Because some developed countries might not have modern administrative
system, while we could find a developing country that employs modern administration.

Despite individual differences, the following are some of the important features of administrative
systems of developed countries as a group that differentiate them from the developing ones:

1. Government organization is highly distinguished and functionally specific and the roles are
based on achievement criteria than on attribute or assumed power. The bureaucracy is marked
by a high degree of specialization. Recruitment of personnel is generally based on merits.
 2. Laws and political decisions are largely rational. Public policy making is effectively made by
professional public administrators.
3. Administration has become to take all-encompassing functions that affect major spheres of the
lives of citizens.
4. There is high correlation (association) between political power and legitimacy (legality) and
there is an extensive popular interest and involvement in public affairs.

5. Incumbents of political or governmental offices are generally considered as lawful or

reasonable holders of those positions, and transfer of power and positions tend to occur in
accordance with prescribed rules and procedures.

In summary, we can generally say that the nature of public administration of these industrialized
countries can be differentiated from those of the developing ones in structure and function.
Structurally and functionally they tend to resemble to the Weberian model of bureaucracy.

The fact that bureaucracy in these countries exhibits (demonstrate) high degree of professionalism
in turn is the result of various factors like educational background, career orientation and
standards of competence applied in recruitment to the public service. Due to a relative stability of
political systems in these societies, bureaucracy is fully developed with fairly clear roles and practical
acceptance as an autonomous institution. In terms of function, bureaucracy is primarily involved in
rule application, but performing secondary functions of rule making.

Public administration in these countries is more responsive and responsible to the public;
provides efficient and effective public services; performs both routine and welfare tasks. For such and
many other reasons, citizens of the industrial societies often view public administration as an impartial
and expert body of professionals intellectually equipped to cope with their administrative needs.

In theory, the tasks of public administration in industrial societies do not differ from the
developing ones where the primary task of public administration is to implement public laws and
policies. However, empirical studies proved that features of an administrative system highly relates to
the environment they exist. Therefore, the roles and challenges of public administration in developed
countries have to be viewed in their particular socio-economic and cultural context.

For example, public administration in developed societies is extremely affected by the development
of modern science and technology, and communication networks. Relative autonomy of institutions in
developed countries has also its own (special) administrative problems, reflected in terms of lack of
coherence among numerous service and regulatory organizations or agencies.
 Generally, according to Rumki Basu (1994:43), developed countries (especially in Europe) are
typical examples of what is known as the "administrative state"; and the bureaucracy in these states
mainly perform three types of functions:

1. Regulatory and preventive functions, enforcing laws, collecting revenue, and protecting the
state against external aggression.

2. Service functions, providing services like education, health, culture and recreation, social
insurance, unemployment relief, housing, transportation, and communication.

3. Entrepreneurial (commercial) functions, operating industrial enterprises, loaning funds and so

forth in order to maintain or increase economic growth and development of their respective
societies.

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

Many of the developing countries have got their independence from colonialists immediately
after the Second World War. Despite a wide range of differences in terms of the location, resources,
history, culture, political systems, and development patterns of these countries, they as a group can be
called (characterized) as "developing".

Most of these new self-governing states have been in the process of transitions, facing serious
problems of social turmoil and disturbances, economic depression (downturn) and administrative chaos
(confusions). Yet, a great degree of reliance has been made on the staggering state and bureaucracy for
achieving developmental goals and solving all sorts of social dilemmas and problems.

These realities have been seriously challenging public administration of developing countries.
The following points are indicative of general administrative patterns currently found in developing
(third world) countries.

The basic pattern of public administration is imitative (copied) rather than indigenous
(original). All developing (third world) counties, including those that were not colonized have
deliberately tried to introduce some version or style of the bureaucratic model of administration from
developed countries, most notably from colonial masters. Hence, it would be predictable for ex-
colonies to resemble in terms of their administrative pattern.

These realities have been seriously challenging public administration of developing countries. The
following points are indicative of general administrative patterns currently found in developing (third
world) countries.
1) The basic pattern of public administration is imitative (copied) rather than indigenous (original).
All developing (third world) counties, including those that were not colonized have deliberately
tried to introduce some version or style of the bureaucratic model of administration from
developed countries, most notably from colonial masters. Hence, it would be predictable for ex-
colonies to resemble in terms of their administrative pattern.
2) The bureaucracies are deficient (lacking) in the requisite skills necessary for development
programs. In spite of abundance (plenty) of labor (employable manpower) in relation to other
resources in most of the developing countries, trained administrators with management
capacity, developmental skills, and technical proficiency are extremely in shortfall.

3) Emphasis to non-productive orientations is another tendency (trend) of the bureaucracies of these

countries. Much bureaucratic activity is channeled towards the realization of non-developmental
goals. According to Riggs, bureaucrats prefer to personal expediency or convenience as against
principled public interest. This in turn may include practices like:

a) Non-merit considerations influence greatly assignments, promotions, dismissals, and other

personnel practices,

b) Widespread corruptions,

c) Using the public service as a substitute for a social security program, or to relieve the problem
of unemployment. Thus, there is always a surplus of employees in the public services,

4) Extensive (huge) discrepancy or disagreement between form and reality, which Riggs has called it
"formalism", is another distinguishing characteristic of administrative trends of developing
countries. In other words, bureaucrats pretend as if they make things they ought to be done while
the reality tells different from what they say. They try to fill partially the gap between expectation
and reality by:

i) Enacting laws that cannot be enforced,

ii) Adopting personnel regulations that are peacefully by-passed,

iii) Announcing programs for delegation of administrative authority while keeping tight
control over decision-making at the center,

iv) Reporting as if production targets are met, which in fact remain only partially fulfilled,
5) The bureaucracy in developing countries is likely to have high degree of operational
autonomy as a result of several operating forces in newly independent states. These operating
forces could be factions created by colonialists within a given country, national and international
organizations etc. Political role of the bureaucracy in these countries vary significantly.

Regardless of the aforementioned limitations of the current administrative patterns of developing

countries, the immensity of the developmental problems and the urgency to look for solutions have
thrust upon (or forced) the state to bear or shoulder the principal responsibility of achieving
developmental goals.

In other words, despite sever handicaps like shortage of capital, skilled manpower, and lack of
developmental infrastructure that they inherited from colonialists, the Third World governments are
confronted with rising expectations of the people they have to administer. Besides, Third World
governments have been expected to deal with curtailing social dislocations such as mass rural-urban
migration, sever unemployment, riots (social unrest) and community clashes.

With such challenges and confrontations, public administration still becomes the main agency
of socio-economic changes; changes not only in terms of formulating and implementing long-term
plans, but also in the context of establishing modern institutions or organizations equipped with the
necessary skills.

ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: CASE STUDY
TOPIC:

 EVOLUTION OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION: ADMINISTRATIVE THOUGHTS

AND APPROACHES

DURATION:

 3 week/ 9hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:
1. State the significant contribution of different management school of thoughts to the
development of Public Administration

CONCEPT NOTES:
Though Public Administration changed greatly in the 1950s and 1960s, the nature of such
changes and its significance can only be understood in terms of past doctrines. Up to the 19 th century,
the predominant concerns of the study of government affairs were political philosophy, constitutional
arrangement and law making. However, the complexity in economic and social life was forcing a
change of emphasis. European countries had begun taking very seriously the training of civil servants
and the scientific study of administration.

THE STUDY OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

As White (1955:13) puts it, no administrative system can be well understood without some
knowledge of what it has been, and how it came to be what it is. Once we said that the age of public
administration as an activity is traceable to human civilization itself while as an academic discipline is
relatively younger, we then need to see its phylogeny, how it evolved and passed through several
stages, how it became important to study public administration as an independent academic discipline.
Although the art of administration has been practiced for centuries, it has not been widely written about
until recent years. In other words, in spit of the fact that the system of administration continued to
expand and adapt itself to changing conditions, professional attention to the field was almost entirely
th
lacking until the end of the 19 century.

Professional publication on public administration dates from the famous essay of Woodrow
Wilson (1887) in title "the study of public administration". Consequently, the study of public
administration became systematic after 1900. The study of public administration began in the United
States and got acceptance as a complete discipline. Hence, the evolution of the subject has been largely
associated or seen in the context of the US.
 There have been many ways adopted to study public administration. The first systematic
approach notably used in America was through law and was devoted to the legal organization of public
authorities, their legal forms of action, and the limits of their power. Subsequently came systematic
writing primarily concerned with the nature of administrative institutions, an approach related to the
scientific management movement.

More recently, attention has been given to historical and biographical materials that reveal the
evolution of administrative systems and trends in thinking about administration. Sociologists have also
explored the nature of public administration as one among many significant social structures. All of
these approaches were relevant to establish wisdom and understanding about the subject. Hence, the
study of public administration has advanced to an extraordinary degree particularly since 1920.

Modern public administration was first taught as part of a training course of public officials.
The subject was largely compiled and taught by generalists, or known as "cameralists", in a descriptive
manner. Initially, civil service recruits had to study law, and gradually public service training schools
started offering courses on administrative law in America and all over Europe. The study of public
administration has now become a staple curriculum in many colleges and universities.

However, in English-speaking countries emphasis was on generalist administrators and

circumstances were unfavorable for the emergence of a discipline of public administration at the initial
stage. In these countries, administration was considered more of an experimental art rather than a
subject to be taught theoretically. Later on, with the expansion of governmental functions, training of
practitioners in the art of public administration was deemed paramount.

The expansion of governmental functions gave raise for public administration as an activity to
become highly diversified, complex and specialized. Therefore, there was a growing need for better
management of public affairs through scientific investigations, for specialized training of public
servants in the USA.

Many factors have contributed towards the growth of the study of public administration in the USA
and gradually all over the world as a separate discipline. To mention the major ones;

A. The development of modern science and technology made an impact on the lives of the
people and the functioning of the government. This is to mean that rapid technological
development created large-scale social dislocations that made state intervention imperative
and desirable. Hence, scholars came to pay increasing time and attention to the problems.
B. The scientific management movement founded by F.W. Taylor, which began in the USA
th
towards the end of the 19 century, gave great impetus to the study of public administration
throughout the world. The message of his thesis was that all work processes are separable into
 units; the efficiency of each unit can be tested and improved; the techniques can be extended
upwards in every organization, making efficient and rational.

B. The gradual evolution of the concept of welfare state, which decisively shifted the
philosophy of state functions everywhere from the traditional laissez-faire to that of social
welfare. The welfare movement has tremendously enlarged the scope of governmental
functions and administration since public administration has become the chief instrument of
social welfare.
C. The movement of government and administrative reform which took place in the early
th
years of the 19 century in USA to look for remedies of the then problems envisaged or
encountering the civil service. The impact of the reform movement in the Us government
permeated American Universities to popularize the study of public administration.

ADMINISTRATIVE THOUGHTS (ORGANIZATIONAL THEORIES)

Organization theory has developed rapidly since 1920s, which have much relevance to public
administration. The primary purpose of organization theory as an academic study is to understand and
explain:

A. Organizational problems as they relate to the structure of public departments, their

interrelationships, coordination, and internal functioning.
B. How people in organizations behave and how organizations function.

The relevance is particularly apparent to those public sector organizations that are concerned
with the provision of goods and services. However, two important points should be noted in
considering these theories:

1. Organization theory doesn't exist as a coherent and universally accepted set

of concepts.

2. Organization theory is not traditionally concerned with public

administration. It is thus necessary when applying such theory for public
administration to bear in mind that whilst organizational features may be
similar, public administration operates in a much different institutional
setting.
Three broad schools of thoughts to organization or administrative theory may be discerned
namely, "classical" or equally known as "scientific administration", "human relations" or
"behavioral", and "systems" theories. Each of these broad thoughts, which will be discussed as
follows also consist different sub-theories.
THE CLASSICAL THEORY
The classical theory of organization is also known as the structural theory or the scientific
administration theory and its foremost proponents were Frederick W. Taylor, Henry Fayol, Luther
Gulick, James Mooney, to mention a few. The most important concern of the classical theory is the
formation of certain universal principles of organization. It deals with formal organizational structure,
the study of activities that have to be undertaken to achieve objectives, and the grouping of such
activities to achieve efficient specialization and coordination.

In some books, we may find scientific management (administration) theory as an independent school
of thought or theory treated separately from the classical theory. However, in the most acceptable
presentation, scientific management theory could be fairly seen under the general category of the
classical approach or school. The study of scientific administration began with the advent of scientific
management founded by Frederick W. Taylor, who lived from 1856-1915 and has been called the
“father of scientific management”.

The following are brief statements of the main features of the classical school or approach to
organization.

Determining objectives: the basic purpose of determining organizational objectives is seen as being

to:

1. Establish management priorities

2. Indicate key departments and activities

3. Provide consistency of human and materials organization with the objectives

Specialization and groupings: the classical theory treats specialization as the basis of efficiency, and
consequently places emphasis on the most effective management groupings of specialist functions.

Grouping: the approach identifies four relevant factors in grouping:

1. Span of control: the classicists consider that one manager is only capable of controlling a
limited number of subordinates.

2. Economies of scale: grouping should be made to produce or achieve economies of scale both
from the technical and resources aspects, and from the management aspects.
 3. Coordination: grouping may be justified and should be operated to achieve coordination or
integration of individual effort

4. Unity: key activities that have long-term nature may be grouped under higher management for
direct supervision, to place highly interdependent units under a unified head.

Delegation: the approach believes that delegation defined as "the institutionalized right to make
decisions or give orders on behalf of an organization" should be to the point closest to that of operation
or job to be done and identifies factors relevant to delegation:

(iv) It makes possible the achievement of economies of scale and specialization

(v)It diffuses the authority to make decisions to lower levels of the organization thus enhancing
initiatives and job satisfaction as well as identification with the goals of the organization

Divisionalisation and decentralization: divisionalisation refers to dividing the organization into units
based on such factors as product type, geographical operation, etc while decentralization is the
systematic delegation of authority to all organizational units.

Specifying responsibility: responsibility is a corollary of authority, the natural consequence of

exercising power. The classical approach thus emphasized the need for clear specification of
responsibility for the following reasons:

1. To avoid vague assignments that would result in confusion and jurisdictional conflict

2. To make accountable those who are assigned with certain jobs and given responsibility

3. To limit interference by supervisors

Line and staff relations: the classical theory emphasized the need for the establishment of line and
staff relationships, as well as relationships between superiors and subordinates for the following
reasons:

1. It establishes official lines of communication throughout the organization

2. It establishes to who each subordinate is accountable

3. It establishes responsibility for coordination of the functions of subordinates.

Line functions are conceived of as vertical relationships and staff services as horizontal supporting
activities, the former being direct contributors and the later indirect contributors to the fulfillment of
the overall organizational objectives. .

All these being the major assumptions of the school towards organization, it tries to apply the scientific
method to obtain desired results in the workplace. Briefly, the scientific method uses the following
steps to achieve an objective:

a) Identify the proposition (objective)

b) Acquire information about the proposition through observation

c) Formulate a hypothesis about the proposition

d) Investigate the proposition thoroughly by controlled experiments

e) Set priorities and clarify the data obtained

f) State tentative answer to the proposition

g) Adjust and implement the answer to the proposition

The school, most notably Frederick W. Taylor, also believed that management, not labor, was the
causes of and potential solution to problems in industry. Taylor called for a mental revolution to
combine the interest of labor and management into a mutually rewarding whole. He emphasized the
importance of mutual understanding and building better management and labor relations.

Henry Fayol is a French contemporary of Taylor who came up with a concept or theory under
the general category of the classical school or approach known as "Administrative Management
theory". He made valuable contributions to administrative thoughts and development. Fayol focused on
the enterprise as a whole, not as a single segment of it, and he emphasized rationalism and logical
consistency.

Fayol's Administrative Management theory was often considered as the first complete theory of
management, the focus of which was on the job of the chief executive and on the principle of unity of
command. He divided all activities in an organization under six groups; technical, commercial,
financial, security, accounting and administrative.
 He further propounded (advocated) the following fourteen principles of organization; namely,
(1) Division of work, (2) Authority, (3) Discipline, (4) Unity of command, (5) Unity of direction, (6)
Subordination of individual interest to general interest, (7) Remuneration of personnel, (8)
Centralization, (9) Scalar chain, (10) order, (11) Equity, (12) Stability of tenure of personnel, (13)
Initiative, and (14) Esprit de corps. The last one, Esprit de corps, is a French term that denotes feelings
of pride, care and support for each other etc, that are shared by members of a group.

Mooney and Reiley, in their famous work known as "the principles of organization", have also
argued that all organization structures are based on a system of superior-subordinate relationships
arranged in a hierarchical order termed as "scalar principle". According to this principle, in every
organization there is a grading of duties in varying degrees of authority and corresponding
responsibility. The "scalar principle" has its own principle, process and effect termed as leadership,
delegation and functional definition.

Luther Gulick who has been considered as another notable thinker of the classical school, defined
major managerial techniques by an acronym known as "BOSDCORB", each letter standing for
planning, organizing, staffing, directing, coordinating, reporting, and budgeting.

In general, the classical or scientific management school has contributed tremendous

administrative knowledge to us. Its essence is the development of an inquiring mind, searching for
more knowledge, more facts, and more relationships. Historically, it is associated with economic
considerations such as cost, time use, and efficiency supported by research methods of other
disciplines.

Advocates of this school firmly believe that better management is possible by using scientific
method, and best management is never permanently attained because continuous new knowledge paves
the way for constant improvement. Moreover, the school tried to replace rule-of-thumb methods by
scientific methods. It sought to analyze existing practices; study works for standardization and
improvement. On the human side, the school suggested the highest degree of individual development
and reward through fatigue reduction, scientific selection to match individual’s abilities to their jobs,
and wage incentives.

In general, the major theme of scientific management was that work could be studied
scientifically, work processes are separable into units, the efficiency of each work unit could be tested
and improved through careful scientific analysis, and the techniques could be applied universally.
There are, however, certain criticisms made by different commentators as the classical theory has its
own defects. These include:

1. Underlying assumptions: the basic classical assumptions have been challenged in that they
oversimplify, and fail to take account of the development of small informal groups and sub-
groups, which may be at odds with the overall organizational goals.

2. Problem definition: the classical approach presumes both the importance and the ease of
defining objectives and fails to recognize that in public administration the definition of such
objectives is interwoven with broad political process. In other words, there are problems in
defining and quantifying objectives in public administration particularly where social criteria
are involved.

3. Means, not ends: the approach concentrates on the means whereby objectives may be
achieved, but gives little or no guide to the relevant elements of establishing ends.
Consequently, the approach is unrelated to the social and political problems faced by public
administration.

THE HUMAN RELATIONS (BEHAVIORAL) THEORY

This theory involves the study of motives and behavior and the development of criteria to help
design an organization that st imulates members to cooperate in achieving organizational aims. The
behavioral approach generally belongs to the neo-classical school of thought, focusing on the
behavioral, humanistic or human relation aspects of administration for which Elton Mayo is known as
the major contributor of the thought.

It is primarily concerned with the analysis of the behavior of groups and individuals within the
organizational context. Much of their work is experimentally based and concludes that social
classification must be taken into account when explaining behavior.

According to behavioral thinking, it is important that organizations should devise objectives taking
into account the needs of their staff as well as those of the organization as a whole. For example,
positive measures to stimulate cooperation and to avoid conflict should be made. In practice, the neo-
classical (behavioral) approach is concerned with the following:

A. Needs and wants: the approach involves the study of an individual's wants and needs,
stimulating factors that help to satisfy needs and achieve organizational goals. Needs have to be
classified as physical, safety, social, egoistic, and self-actualization. Thus, an organization
should offer incentives to satisfy such needs as well as effectively subjugate (suppress) personal
values of individuals to those of the organization.
 Incentives may be defined as "the appeals an organization makes to the personal values of
employees to induce them to accept organizational values". Incentives can generally be classified as:

1. Material inducement,

1. Opportunities for distinction, honor and recognition,

2. Good physical working conditions,

3. Personal confidence and satisfaction in social relationships within the organization,

4. Conformity with habitual practices, and

5. Feeling of participation and belongingness,

B. Work groups: the approach recognizes the influence of a group on the individual's attitude and
behavior. It points out that an individual doesn't operate in isolation, and in particular:

a. He/she tends to conform to group pressure.

b. His/her attitudes and morale are influenced by group associations.

c.Problem solving and leadership are often group functions.

C. Supervisory behavior: this is treated as a vital factor in influencing work group behaviour, as
the supervisor represents the link between the group and the formal organization.

Writers like Barber (1983:37-41), underscore the importance of behavioral studies in organization and
expose the failures of public administration to consider behavior as an influential factor. According to
this author, public administration studies tend to concentrate on the machinery of administration, to the
exclusion of those factors influencing behavior in organizations and consequently that of organizational
effectiveness. However, any public administration system depends for its effectiveness on both
organizational factors and behavior within the structure of that organization.

Generally, the approach is concerned with inter-group behavior and study of relations between
groups rather than between individuals and emphasizes the power of groups in decision-making.
However, group participation in this regard is criticized for the following reasons:

(a) It increases group domination of its members

(b) Responsibilities become blurred

(c) Group and expert judgments may conflict

 (d) The cost of reorienting supervisory functions may exceed the benefits of group participation

(e) The process is not automatically effective and depends greatly on supervisory and management
attitudes

The behavioral (neo-classical) criticism of the classical school shows that scientific
administration is ignores the impact of staff satisfaction and psychology on the performance of the
organization as a whole. The classical concentration on specialization, span of control, etc, is rejected
as being inconsistent with needs and wants.

In conclusion, the classical (scientific administration) and neo-classical (human relations or

behavioral) approaches vary in the following important aspects:
(a) Whereas the human relations school is concerned with the organization evolving effectively
from inter-personal behavior, the classical school predetermines the organization within
which individuals are required to function

(b) The human relations approach results in a comparatively flat organizational structure,
whereas the classical approach results in a pyramidal structure

(c) Authority is regarded by the human relations approach as a social factor, but as
organizational factor by the classical approach
(d) Interdependence is a key factor in the human relations approach, which considers that the
classical definition of responsibility creates competition.

THE SYSTEMS THEORY

In some literatures, we may find systems theory as being one of the theories that are within the
category of the "Modernization School of Thought" along the Contingency Theory and Management
Process Theory, while in some others systems theory is recognized as an independent school of
thought. This approach concentrates on decisions that need to be made to achieve objectives, and the
organization is thus designed to facilitate decision-making.

The systems approach treats organization as an example of a "system", i.e. a set of interdependent parts
forming a whole with the objective of fulfilling some definable function. An organization is essentially
regarded as a decision-making system and treated as being built up from the analysis of information
requirements and communications networks. It, thus, treats the process of decision-making as basic to
the determination of objectives and policies. The methodology of the systems approach consists of the
following steps:

(a) Specifying objectives

 (b) Establishing subsystems (main decision areas)

(c) Analyzing these decision areas and their information needs

(d) Designing the communication channels to facilitate information flow within the
organization

(e) Grouping decision areas to minimize communication problems. In practice, the approach
illustrates the importance of organization of information, the advantages of projects rather
than functional divisions and the need to concentrate centrally the information network

Within the systems theory, the contemporary approach to the theory of organization is to abandon
the idea of treating organizations as the mere passive instruments operating in response to external
pressures. Rather, organizations are regarded as semiautonomous systems, which develop their own
internal goals; having their own performance and conservation (survival) objectives.

All schools of thoughts on organization have developed mainly to explain aspects of performance
and behavior that can be observed. From the point of view of the practicing administrators, each school
is likely to offer useful perspectives and be helpful in revealing past weaknesses and enabling the
establishment of better structure.

THE BUREAUCRACY THEORY

The term "bureaucracy" is a combination of two words; i.e. "bureau" and "cracy". "Bureau"
means an office or organization established to perform certain activities, or it may mean a government
department, while "cracy" denotes a form of governmental rule. In this consideration, bureaucracy
simply means a form of rule or activity exercised/practiced by governmental offices.

In its literal meaning, "bureaucracy is a system of official rules and ways of doing things that a
government or an organization has, which are complex in nature; or a system of government in which
there are a large number of state officials who are not elected".

Bureaucracy was first used in France as "bureaucratic" in the eighteenth century to refer to "the
government in operation". Classical writings on bureaucracy can be traced to several sources, notable
contributors of which were Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Robert Michels.

Prior to the tremendous contribution of Max Weber, Karl Marx attempted to explain
bureaucracy in a scientific manner. He tried to conceptualize the role of bureaucracy in his works on
state organizations, while developing a critique of the political economy of capitalism that existed in
th
Europe in the 19 century.

Different from Weber's understanding of bureaucracy as an ideal type that can exist only in
abstraction, Marx examined it as a set of relationships that arise in a specific socioeconomic context.
Marx said, "Bureaucracy considers itself the ultimate finite purpose of the state".

Marx also mentioned about the spirit (typical feature) of bureaucracy. According to him, the
universal spirit of bureaucracy is the secretiveness, the mystery (strangeness) sustained within it by
hierarchy and maintained as a closed corporation. He further believed that authority is the principle
(source) of knowledge, and the desiccation (preservation) of authority is its sentiment by maintaining
obedience to fixed normal activity, fixed principles and loyalty.

For individual bureaucrats, the state's purpose becomes their private purpose of hunting for higher
position and making a career for themselves. According to Marx, the bureaucrat cannot be a rational
actor in terms of competence. Its hierarchy of structure means a hierarchy of knowledge, thus
comprehensive knowledge is impossible in a situation where knowledge is deliberately split up into
practical reality and bureaucratic reality. Generally, Marx as quoted in Rumki Basu (1994:79),
described bureaucracy as follows:

The bureaucracy is a circle from which no one can escape. Its hierarchy is a hierarchy of
knowledge. The top entrusts the understanding of detail to the lower levels, whilst lower
levels credit the top with understanding of the general and so all are mutually deceived".

From his explanations, we can understand that he has overemphasized the malicious (evil) side of
bureaucracy, and his view is in clear contrast to the conception of his countryman, to the Weberian
conception of bureaucracy as "rationalization of organization". Nevertheless, whatever arguments he
has made and explanations he provided about bureaucracy, public administration as a discipline didn't
care much for his views since it was not his purpose to develop a theory of public administration. He
simply wrote a critique on bureaucracy alongside his famous critique of the political economy of
capitalism.

Robert Michels, who is equally known in the theory of bureaucracy, on the other hand
concentrated his analysis on the internal politics of large organizations and to the phenomenon of elite
domination in organizations. His observation was based on the internal structure of the German
Socialist Party, which was supposed to be organized along democratic principles yet the reality was
quite different, and he discovered that the system was oligarchic. He concluded that all big
organizations tended (had a propensity) to develop a bureaucratic structure that ruled out the possibility
of internal democracy.
The various meanings, which have been given to the term, include the following:

(a) Institutional meaning: the term "bureaucracy" may refer to government by appointed or
recruited officials as opposed to government by elected representatives. Alternatively, it may
be used to indicate that, although representative government exists, the dominant role is held
by officials. These definitions, however, tend to be inadequate in that they fail to distinguish
those common situations where government consists of a combination of elected and non-
elected members and officials.
(b) Activity of officials: in contrast, a definition may be attempted from the aspect of what
officials do or how they behave. In this regard the following interpretations exist;
(i) Derogatory: the synonymous use of "bureaucracy" and "red tape", resulting from the
real and supposed difficulties of dealing with the official environment. This is
however an extremely offensive yet subjective meaning of bureaucracy.

(ii) Regulated system: a regulated administrative system operating through complex

interrelated organs,
(iii) Methodological: a study of methods based on either the first (i) or the second (ii)
points above,

The definition based on the activity of officials, as a regulated system (item b-ii above), is used in most
instances due to its objective and analytical nature. The other definitions are associated with subjective
or disparaging connotations. Bureaucracy is thus conceived as a form of organization. Etzioni, as
quoted in Michael P. Barber (1983:87), considered that organizations are characterized by the
following:

 Division of labor, power, and communication responsibility deliberately planned to achieve

certain goals,

 The presence of power centers, which control the concentrated effort of the organization and
continuously review its performance and re-pattern its structure to increase efficiency,

 The classification of personnel,

Etzioni's view is based on Weber's classical view of bureaucracy, which will be discussed
subsequently.
THE WEBERIAN MODEL OF BUREAUCRACY

Bureaucracy as an organizational model was first developed systematically by Max Weber, a

Th
distinguished German sociologist in the 19 century. According to him, every organization can be
defined as "a structure of activities (means) directed towards the achievement of certain objectives
(ends)". Every organization develops a system of specialization (division of tasks) and a set of
systematic rules and procedures to maximize efficiency.

Weber stressed that the bureaucratic form of organization is capable of attaining the highest
degree of efficiency since the means used to achieve goals are rationally and objectively chosen
towards the desired ends. In this sense, it is the most rational means of carrying out functions
effectively in any organization, superior to every other form in precision, stability, discipline, and
reliability. Weber tried to identified the various factors and conditions that have contributed to the
growth of bureaucracy in modern times. Namely:

(a) The development of modern large-scale organizations and corporations has led to the
development and considerable spread of bureaucracy. Whatever may be the evils of
bureaucracy, it is indispensable for the running of complex administrative structures.

(b) The role of expanding technical knowledge, and the development of modern technology is
another important factor responsible for the superiority of bureaucratic organizations. A
considerable degree of bureaucratic specialization is required to attain high level of efficiency
regardless of the economic system to be either capitalistic or socialistic.

Max Weber principally developed the organizational definition of bureaucracy and conceived of the
concept in two aspects, namely:

(a) The social mechanism that maximizes efficiency in administration

(b) A form of social organization with specific characteristics. Social organization is

described as "institutionalized strategies for the achievement of administrative objectives by
the concrete efforts of many officials".

Weber specified the following structural and behavioral characteristics or conditions that an
organization must possess before properly being called or distinguished as a bureaucracy:
 (1) Division of labor: This involves a specified sphere of competence, which has been marked
off as part of a systematic division of labor in the organization, and job placement is based
qualifications and/or special training. The regular activities required for the purpose of the
structure are distributed in fixed ways as official duties,

(2) Hierarchy: It is the feature of any bureaucratic form of organization. The organization of
offices follows the principles of hierarchy, with a clear separation between superior and
subordinate offices; i.e. each lower office is under the control and supervision of a higher
one. Being a bureaucratic official constitutes a career, and there is a system of promotion
and career advancement on the basis of seniority or merit, or both,

(3) Rules: Bureaucracy operates in accordance with a consistent system of abstract rules laid
down regarding the performance of official jobs. There is consistency in the application of
the rules to specific cases to avoid personal favoritism, arbitrariness, or nepotism that would
otherwise hinder the function of an organization,

(4) Rationality: Weber's ideas on efficiency and rationality are closely related to his ideal
(typical) model of bureaucracy. For Weber, bureaucracy is the most rational known means of achieving
imperative control over human beings. For example, candidates are selected on the basis of technical
qualifications, which will be tested, in the most rational cases, by examinations, or guaranteed by
diplomas certifying technical competence, etc.
Personal whims of the leaders are no longer effective in such a system; there is a clear
demarcation between personal and official affairs. Rationality is also reflected by the
relatively easier means of calculability of results in the organization,

(5) Impersonality: the bureaucratic form has no place for personal whims, fancies, or irrational
sentiments. Officials are subject to authority only with respect to their impersonal official
obligations,
(6) Rule orientation: rationality and impersonality are mainly achieved through the formulation
of rules and procedures that clearly define official spheres of authority and conduct, which
the employees are supposed to maintain in discharging their duties. This is to mean that the
official is subject to strict and systematic discipline and control in the conduct of his/her
office,

(7) Neutrality: Bureaucracy is supposed to be apolitical and neutral in its orientation. It is also
value-neutral committed only to the work it is meant to perform.
 While the first three points are structural characteristics of bureaucracy, the rest four points are
behavioral characteristics. Further elaborations of those points mentioned above as structural and
behavioral characteristics of bureaucracy would help to understand their basic essences in the views of
Weber.

Weber concluded that a fully developed bureaucracy has those advantages of speed, precision,
non-ambiguity, continuity, discretion, unity, strict subordination, and reduction of friction and of
material and personal costs. He considered that its specific nature develops more perfectly the more it
is dehumanized, i.e. "the more completely it succeeds in eliminating from official business all purely
personal, irrational, and emotional elements that escape calculation". The organization conceived by
Weber is therefore designed to achieve rational orientation towards tasks, which are conducive to
effective administration.

Max Weber has also talked about bureaucratic procedures as having the nature of dictating the
course of action governed by a prescribed set of rules, in order to achieve uniformity. Such rules are
abstract in order to guide the different courses of action necessary for the accomplishment of
organizational objectives in diverse conditions. The rules become more detailed at the lower points in
the organization's hierarchy.

Weber stated that bureaucratic officials would approach the public "in a sprit of formalistic
impersonality without hatred or passion, and hence without affection or enthusiasm". He considered
this requirement as intended to assure equitable treatment of clients, and rational rather than
emotionally dominated administration.

In spit of the seemingly, or apparently for that matter, logical presentations of Weber about the
advantages of bureaucracy, there are critics along several lines or cases against it that stem from its
supposed mechanistic nature, i.e. its regimentation (strict discipline and formalism) and predictability.
The following are among the critics that turned against the advantages of bureaucracy:

(a) People in bureaucracy fulfill merely segmental roles over which they have no control

(b) In consequence, they have little or no opportunity to exercise individual judgment, with the
result that employees feel separated from their work

(c) In order to be effective, bureaucratic personnel must behave consistently and follow
regulations strictly. This automatically limits a bureaucrat's capacity to adapt to changing
circumstances not envisaged by those who drew up the rules

(d) The general rules, which may make for overall efficiency could produce inefficiency and
injustice in individual cases
 (e) The impersonal treatment of clients envisaged by Weber is not always operable in practice as
many researches disprove such principles of impartiality.

(f) Weber's view that bureaucrats should not become closely involved in personal relations with
colleagues has undesirable practical effects

(g) The key limit on the efficiency of bureaucratic administration lies on the difficulty of coping
with uncertainty and change, thus bureaucracy rests upon tasks being convertible into routine.

Chester Barnand has also criticized Weber for not recognizing the role of informal
organizations and better human relations in increasing efficiency. Weber is also criticized for not
paying adequate attention in his theory to human behavior, relations, morale and motivational factors.
His theory has been called a "machine-theory" and a closed system model overemphasizing the formal
rational aspects of bureaucracy while ignoring the whole range of socio-cultural environment and
behavioral characteristics of large formal organizations.

Weber has failed also to analyze and compare the correspondence of behavior in organizations
with organizational blueprints. In particular he failed to account for the fact that in the course of
operations new elements arise in the structure that would effectively influence subsequent operations.

More other critics indicate that since bureaucracy is characterized by passion for routine in
administration, the sacrifice of flexibility to rule or overemphasis on rules and regulations rather than
on goals and objectives, delay in making decisions, lack of public relations and class consciousness on
the part of bureaucrats, and refusal to embark upon experiments, it cannot be considered as the best
means of achieving efficiency or as having no limitations.

The Weberian model of bureaucracy is a product of an alien or unfamiliar culture, which is

fairly inadequate for imposition in the developing societies where rapid change is required to bring
about socioeconomic transformation. Hence, the Weberian model of bureaucracy can best function in a
stable environment with routine and repetitive tasks since its capacity in adaptation to change is
limited.

The concept of bureaucracy has been also criticized by writers of the modern time like Riggs as
being "the product of a specific historical and political milieu (setting)". To overcome these
shortcomings of the bureaucratic model, Riggs developed his ecological model of public
administration relevant to developing societies.

There are however many commentators who do not fully agree with such critics. Rather, the
critics and the realities with regard to the relationship between bureaucracy and public administration,
in particular that of the civil service made to draw the attention of scholars and practitioners. As many
commentators in the field would agree, bureaucracy is condemned both for what it is and it is not.
Bureaucracy, like any other system, has weaknesses and strengths as well as advantages and
disadvantages.

First of all, it is important not to confuse defects in bureaucracy with defects in public
administration (public administration considered as "large-scale organization"). Defects in coordination
and organization inherent in large-scale organization may apply whether the organization is
bureaucratic or not. In addition, criticism of complexity of organization, the subordination of
individual, and the stifling (suppression) of initiatives must be accepted as applicable to most large-
scale organizations and not merely as characteristic of bureaucracy.

Different arguments have been made also with regard to the application of the theory of
bureaucracy to the civil service. As Barber (1983:90-91) pointed out, "the civil service has been
accused of containing a bureaucratic, hierarchically organized, tightly knit elite. On the other hand, it
has been stated that bureaucracy is a means of institutionalizing clear, universal and impartial
procedures for administration, infinitely preferable to most of its historical alternatives". In practice,
civil service systems of many countries accord with many of Weber's characteristics and principles of
bureaucracy mentioned above.

In conclusion, the bureaucracy theory of organization has made useful contributions to the study of
public administration in general in terms of developing the concept professionalism in administration
by incorporating rationalist ethics and standards of conduct and business. Ideally, it is a major
breakthrough from the earlier corrupt, closed, authoritarian, and unresponsive administrative systems.
It is therefore a progressive and useful model of organization.

It is also necessary to bear in mind that Weber wanted to construct an "ideal type" model of
bureaucracy, which obviously cannot be approximated to reality. Weber was rather sufficiently aware
of the evils of "bureaucratization". He merely compared the prevailing administrative systems of his
time and the earlier ones with the ideal model of bureaucracy he constructed. It is a reality that
bureaucracy is still the best one in the history of administrative system and has no substitute until this
time.

APPROACHES TO THE STUDY OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

There have been different approaches to the study of public administration since 1887, since the
subject was born as a separate academic discipline. A concise review of the different approaches are
presented as follows:
1. HISTORICAL APPROCH

The historical approach is essentially based on the belief that knowledge of history is
absolutely important for an in-depth study of the subject. For a proper understanding of the subject,
the study of public administration of the past particular periods is necessary to link-up with the
present administrative system.

2. LEGAL APPROCH

Exponents of this approach would like to study public administration as part of law and
concentrate on the formal legal structure and organization of public bodies. Its chief concern has
been with power-its structure and functions. Its main sources are constitutions, codes of laws, office
manuals of rules and regulations, and judicial decisions.

3. ISTITUTIONAL APPROACH

This approach tried to establish linkages between the study of public administration and
government institutions. It approached the study of administration through the study of structure,
and functioning of separate institutions of the state such as the executive, legislature, departments,
boards and commissions.

4. BEHAVIORAL APPROACH
This approach is mainly concerned with the scientific study of human behavior in diverse
social environments. It started as a protest against the traditional, historical, normative and largely
descriptive approaches in the social sciences. In public administration, behavioral study started in
the 1930s with the "Human Relations Movement". For this approach "administrative behavior" is
part of the behavioral sciences and the study of public administration should involve the study of
individual and collective human behavior in administrative situations or settings.

5. SYSTEMS APPROACH

One of the most significant landmarks in the evolution of organization theory is the
development of general systems concept for organizational analysis. The term "system" has been
defined as a complex whole, a set of connected things or parts. According to this approach in
organizational analysis, an organization can be considered as a social system to be studied in its
totality. In other words, a system is a collection of interrelated parts, which receives inputs and
produces certain results.

6. STRUCTURAL/FUNCTIONAL APPROACH
 The two basic concepts to this approach are structure and function. All social structures
exist to perform certain functions. While functions concern the consequences of patterns of action,
structure refers to the patterns of actions and the resultant institutions of the systems themselves.

7. ECOLOGICAL APPROACH
Various scholars and administrators have often referred to the need to relate public
administration to the environment in which it functions. The ecological perspective in the study of
PA included such factors as people, institution, scientific technology, social technology, wishes and
ideas, catastrophe and personality.

STAGES IN THE STUDY OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

The evolution of public administration as an academic discipline falls mainly into the following six
crucial stages.

Stage One

The first stage, which began with the publication of Woodrow Wilson's work, "The Study of
Administration" in 1887, can be called "the era of politics-administration dichotomy". Wilson is
considered as the founder of the academic discipline of public administration. Making a distinction
between politics and administration, he argued that administration is concerned with the
implementation of political policy decisions.

Another notable event of the period (first stage) was the publication of Goodnow's in title "politics and
administration" in 1900, which supported the Wilsonian idea further by conceptually distinguishing

the two functions. According to him, "politics has to do with policies or expressions of the state will"
whereas "administration has to do with the execution of these policies".

Apart from this, the institutional locations of these two functions were differentiated; the location of
politics were identified with the legislature and higher levels of the government where major policy
decisions were taken, while the location of administration was identified with the executive branch of
the government and the bureaucracy.
With an increasing recognition of the study of public administration in American universities, Leonard
D White (1926) wrote a book known as "Introduction to the Study of Public Administration", which
was recognized as the first textbook on the subject. This book, while advocating a politics-
administration dichotomy, stressed the human side of administration, dealing comprehensively with
administration in government.

Stage Two
The second stage of evolution is marked by the tendency to reinforce the idea of politics-administration
dichotomy and to evolve a value-free "science of management". The central belief of this period was
that there are certain "principles" of administration, which were the task of scholars to discover and
advocate. Important works of this period sharing the same approach were:

 "Principles of Public Administration" by Willoughby (1927),

 "Principles of Organization" by Mooney and Reiley,

 "Creative Experience" by Mary P Follett,

 "Industrial and General Management" by Fayol,

 "Papers on the Science of Public Administration" by Gulick and Urwick, eds (1937),

The main reason for the upsurge of interest of administration in this period was absence of enough
skilled personnel to perform the rapid multiplication of government functions following the 1930s
Great depression. Therefore, schools of public administration were established to quickly train as many
people as possible in the techniques of administration.

The main difference between the protagonists of the politics-administration dichotomy of the first and
second stages in the evolution of the discipline is that, while the former ones emphasized the legal and
constitutional aspects, the new school of scientific management of the second period emphasized a
purely scientific approach to the study of public administration, but retaining ideas of the first period.

With the help of scientific management methods, the leaders of public administration tried to discover
certain principles of public administration, which could be of universal applicability. Gulick and
Urwick (1937) coined the word POSDCORB to promote some of these principles of administration.
POSDCORB stands for Planning, Organizing, Staffing, Directing, Coordinating, Reporting, and
Budgeting. These maxims (principles of administration were said to be of universal applicability in all
organizations.
 Stage Three

The third stage began with a creation against the mechanical approach. The so-called "principles" of
administration were challenged and dubbed as "naturalistic fallacies" and "proverbs". The third stage
approach was based on experiments and organizational analysis. The experiments, which focused upon
work groups, have brought a major shook on the foundations of the scientific management school of
thought by clearly demonstrating the influence of social and psychological factors on the worker's
output.

This approach also drew attention to the effect of informal organization in the formal setup, the
phenomenon of leadership and influence, and impact of conflict and cooperation among groups in the
organizational environment. Thus, the approach revealed the vital importance of human relations in
organizations. Lastly, this approach criticizes the politics-administration dichotomous analogy of the
first and second period thinkers. Politics and administration couldn't be separated; one couldn't be taken
out of the other.

Stage Four
The fourth stage was usher by two significant publications in the 1940s; i.e. Simon's "Administrative
Behavior" that associates itself to the behavioral field and Robert Dahl's "The Science of
Administration: Three Problems". Simon's approach widened the scope of the subject by relating it to
psychology, sociology, economics, and political science. He rejected both the classical "principles" of
administration and the "politics-administration dichotomy" in administrative thought and practice. He
argued that all administration revolves around rationality and decision-making. Simon identified two
mutually supportive streams of thought;

 One was engaged in the development of a pure science of administration, which required a
solid base in social psychology, and the other was concerned with the normative aspects of
administration and prescription for public policy.

 The second approach would require a broad understanding of political science, economics, and
sociology as well.
He favored the coexistence of both approaches, empirical and normative, for the development of the
discipline of public administration. Likewise, Dahl's essay identified three important problems in the
evolution of the science of public administration:

(i) The impossibility of excluding normative considerations from the problems of public
administration. Values inevitably (permeate) filter through administration while science is
value-free.

(ii) The inescapability of the fact that the study of administration must include a study of human
behavior, which is open to all possible variables and uncertainties making it impossible to
subject it to the rigors of scientific enquiry.

(iii) The tendency to pronounce universal principles based on few examples drawn from limited
national and historical settings.

Thus, the principles of public administration were attacked. They were not scientific but normative,
not universal but culture-bound. They were not grounded in evidence but based on misplaced
corporate analogies and autocratic assumptions.

Stage Five

The fifth stage is concerned with the nature of post-war developments and transformations, taking
place in both the theory and practice of public administration. The older approaches have not been
totally abandoned in this period but modified considerably in the light of new developments.

Firstly, administration came to be viewed increasingly as a unit in the process of continuous

interactions between the people inside and outside the organization at any given period of time.

Secondly, separate studies of public and private business administrations tended to merge into a single
science of organization, whose theories and concepts were to be equally applicable to both private and
public administration

Thirdly, the increasing use of the systems and the behavioral approaches encouraged the comparative
study of administrative systems in diverse social settings and environments. New perspectives were
seriously needed and the impetus for the study of comparative public administration and development
administration (a relatively unknown field before WW II) became apparent.
In the transfer of administrative know-how to the developing countries, western administrative
concepts were found to be inadequate. The result was questioning of the traditional framework of
public administration and its universal applicability.

Stage Six

The final (six) stage of the evolution of public administration coincides with a general concern in the
social sciences for public policy analysis. This approach was a post WW II war phenomenon, and was
built upon two basic themes:

(i) The interpenetration of politics and administration at any levels; and

(ii) The programmatic character of all administration.

The interdisciplinary policy process and planning approach has become the most useful and relevant
guide to practical administrators in developing and developed societies alike. The adoption of the

policy approach has revealed that public administration, which faced the disturbance of crisis of
identity since the 1940s is an interdisciplinary and applied field.

It came to be known as an integrating discipline- the meeting ground for all branches of knowledge.
According to Rumki Basu (1994:17), the problem of crisis of identity has been resolved with the
recognition and acceptance of the field as interdisciplinary and an applied subject. In the words of
James Fesler public administration, is policy formulation and policy execution, public administration is
bureaucracy, and public administration is public.

These premises directed attention in public administration towards political or policy-making processes
and specific public programs. Since 1968, the evolving discipline of public administration has come to
be enriched by the emergence of what has come to be known as the "New Public Administration".

ASSESMENT
TOPIC:

 THE MANAGEMENT PROCESS IN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION (FUNCTIONS OF

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION)

DURATION:

 1 week/ 3hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:
 Analyse the nature of Public Administration.
 Evaluate the differences and similarities of Public and Private Administration.
 Incorporate functions of Public Administration to Private Administration using decision-
making model.

CONCEPT NOTES:

Planning is a management or administrative process or function that involves setting goals and
deciding how best to achieve them. This function also includes considering what must be done to
encourage necessary levels of change and innovation. Barber defines planning as "an activity that
concerns with proposals for the future, with the evaluation of alternatives and with the methods by
which these proposals may be achieved".

Planning is the primary (first) administrative or managerial function that sets the stage for other
functions. It is a process of deciding exactly what one wants to accomplish and how to best go about it
before action is required. When planning is done well, it creates a solid platform for further managerial
efforts of other functions.

Planning is the dynamic process of making decisions today about future actions; and it is a selection or
choice among alternatives as to: What missions or objectives be achieved, what actions should be
taken, what organizational positions be assigned, how the end can be achieved, when to achieve it, who
is to do it, Where to do it. It bridges the gap between where are we now and where we want to be.

Planning is a continuous process so far as the organization is in operation. The more continuous the
planning is, the higher its efficiency of the organization.
Planning is a means to an end. Planning is not an end by itself. It is a means to an end (meeting
objectives). Planning is an instrument that pushes people towards the achievement of objectives.

Planning is preparing today for tomorrow; it is the activity that allows managers to determine what
they want and how to get it: They set goals and decide how to reach them. Planning focuses on the
future: what is to be accomplished and how. Answers six basic questions in regard to any intended
activity:

 What (the goal or goals).

 When (the time frame in which it will be accomplished)

 Where (the place or places where the plans or planning will reach its conclusion).

 Who (which people will perform the tasks).

 How (the specific steps or methods to reach the goals).

 How much (resources necessary to reach the goals).

Planning is an essential activity for any organization that wants to survive by achieving its objectives.
Otherwise the old management dictum (saying), "failing to plan is planning to fail" still holds true.
Planning is indispensable to the administrative process as any decision and consequent activities
carried out to achieve objectives of that decision will limit the range of choices available for the
administrator in the future owing to the limited nature of resources. The basic requirement in planning
is that of coordination in order that contradiction of goals between various groups involved in the plan
is avoided, which in turn is possible if there is an overriding goal to which all groups are working.

In order to be effective, planning must be concerned not only with materialistic ends but also
with human behavior, which may inhibit the achievement of the goals. Therefore, any planning process
must attempt to rationalize and take into account possible resistance from implementers and dynamics
and unforeseen circumstances (uncertainties).

In general terms, planning may be carried out through specialized planning units (staff) or
through units of government, which at the same time perform other functions. Planning staff is a small
group of individuals who assist top-level managers in developing the various components of the
planning process. However, whichever type of unit is utilized, it is necessary that planning should take
place at a level where there is responsibility for the achievement of some overriding social policy, and
thus there is a natural tendency for the level of integration of planning to exist in the administrative
structure.

Planning is of different nature in terms of scope, time, and objective and by whom it is prepared. For
example, indicative planning is prepared by central authorities that lay down the expected performance
of the economy in the immediate and medium-term. The target gives all the other decision-making
units a framework within which to make their own plan.

Planning involves selecting missions and objectives and the actions to achieve to them; it requires
decision-making, that is, choosing from among alternative future courses of actions. Managers who
develop plans but do not commit themselves to action are simply wasting time. The outcome of the
planning function is a plan, a written document that specifies the courses of action a firm will take.

THE NATURE OF PLANNING

Discussing the following points can highlight the nature of planning; its contribution to purpose and its
primacy.

(A) The contribution of planning to purpose and objectives

Every organization is established (exists) for the accomplishment of a purpose or objective. So,
the purpose of any plan and its derivatives or supporting plans is to facilitate the accomplishment of
organizational objectives.

(B) The primacy of planning

All the five managerial functions - planning, organizing, staffing, directing and controlling- are
designed to support the accomplishment of organizational objectives. However, planning precedes the
execution of all other managerial functions, because all other managerial functions must be planned if
they are to be effective. This does not mean that planning is the most important of all other managerial
functions, because to be important or useful all other functions have to accompany it.

Although in practice all the functions mesh (interlock) as a system of action, planning is unique
in that it involves establishing the objectives necessary for all group effort. The entire gist (idea) of
initiating, exercising, and activating the managerial functions of organizing, staffing, directing and
controlling is to bring the objectives formulated during planning in to fruition.

In fact, the concept of especially control would be unthinkable without planning because any
attempt to control without plans is meaningless, since there is no way for people to tell whether they
are going where they want to go (the result of the task of control) unless they first know whether where
they want to go (part of task of planning). Plans thus furnish the standards of control. Since planning
and controlling are so much inseparable, they are treated as the Siamese twins of management.

The pervasiveness /Universality/ of planning function

Planning is a function of all managers, although the character and breadth of planning varies
with each manager’s authority and with the nature of policies and plans outlined by superiors. That is,
all managers-from presidents to first-level supervisors- do plan. Even for personal life we plan. " It is
difficult to call a person a manager if he or she doesn't plan " Koontz

The efficiency of plans

We measure the efficiency of a plan by its contribution to our purpose and objectives, offset by
the costs and other factors required to formulate and operate it. A plan may enhance the attainment of
objectives, but with unnecessarily high cost. Plans are efficient if they achieve their purpose at a
reasonable cost, when cost is measured not only in terms of time or money or production but also in
the degree of individual and group satisfaction. Plans can even make it impossible to achieve
objectives if they make enough people in an organization dissatisfied or unhappy.

THE IMPORTANCE OF PLANNING

Planning, if properly worked out, offers a number of important advantages for the performance
of organizations and for those who work in them.

(a) It provides purposeful and orderly activities: It is through planning we can establish our
objectives. Moreover, the sequence of activities is determined by planning. Once organizations known
what they can do and can't do over the future, they began to set objectives based on their capacity and
the order of activities needed to accomplish their objectives. It provides direction and a common sense
of purpose. Otherwise, the proverb "if you don't know where you are going you will reach to
anywhere" works real.

(b) It points out the need for future change/ preparing for change: It is while planning that the
manager should consider the potential areas, changes in the future; rather than merely reacting to it as
it appears. When managers plan, they predict the future environment using different techniques of
forecasting. When doing this if they get something wrong, they change their actions.

(c) It answers “what-if” questions: In planning managers develop several "what if" questions in
order to reduce the risk of unpredictable future, so far as they plan for the future. By asking what if
questions managers develop alternatives.

(d) It provides basis for controlling: Standards /controlling mechanisms/ are developed during
planning. It specifies what is to be accomplished and provides a standard for measuring progress
(performance).

(e) If forces managers see the organization as a system: While planning managers have to
consider parts because the plan of one part (department) affects the operation of the whole organization
so far as parts of an organization are interdependent.

(f) It provides the opportunity for obtaining the required resources as well as for a greater
utilization of the available organizational resources: In planning we determine how much resource
is necessary to reach the goals, where and how to get, and how to use these resources.

(g) It provides the base for teamwork/ coordinating efforts: Management exists because the
work of individuals and groups in organizations must be coordinated, and planning is one important
technique for achieving a coordinated effort. Since planning is the best way to coordinate actions
among a variety of actors, all managers should develop plans that support the accomplishment of other
managers' plans.

(h) Developing managers: The act of planning involves high level of intellectual activity. Those
who plan must be able to deal with abstract and uncertain ideas and information. Planners must think
systematically about the present and the future. Through planning, the future state of the organization
can be improved if its managers take an active role in moving the organization toward that future.
 Planning then implies that managers should be proactive and make things happen rather than
reactive and let things happen.

Through act of planning, managers not only develop their ability to think futuristically but, to
the extent that their plans are effective, their motivation to plan is reinforced. Also, the act of planning
sharpens manager's ability to think as they consider abstract ideas and possibilities for the future. Thus,
both the result and the act of planning benefit both the organization and its managers.

THE PLANNING PROCESS

Like other managerial activities planning involves processes or series of steps. In other words,
planning is a statement of action steps to be taken in order to accomplish objectives. These steps in the
systematic process are interrelated, and there is no rigid boundary between or among these steps, and
one is the base for the other. These may include the following:

(i) Establishing objectives

Strictly speaking planning starts when objectives are laid down. However, though it is not a
part of planning proper, it is true that management (planners) are expected to have a rough idea about
their organization potential and the environment which they or their company is in. it is only after the
managers have at least the rudimentary knowledge about their capabilities and available opportunities
that objective setting does make sense.

Here we have to bear in mind that the preliminary knowledge that planners are expected to
have is not considered as one element of planning because every reasonable person is expected to have
it. This involves establishing long range as well as the short-range objectives for the entire organization
and for each subordinate work unit.

Objectives specify the expected results and indicate the end points of what is to be done, where
the primary emphasis is to be placed and what is to be accomplished by the network of strategies,
policies, procedures, rules, budgets and programs. In developing objectives, the manager should
consider two characteristics: (1) objectives should be realistic and specific, and (2) objectives should
be compatible with other organizational objectives.
 The more specific the objectives are, the easier it will be to monitor progress and to note
successful completions. Developing objectives that cannot be accomplished because of lack of time,
talent, or other resources will not be useful to the organization. Objectives developed by organizational
levels and peer managers should be compatible with one another. Top-level management should set the
stage for goal setting by lower level management, thereby ensuring maximum use of resources.
Enterprise objectives give direction to the major plans that define the objective of every major
department. Major department objectives, in turn, control the objectives of subordinate departments
and so down the line.

Developing premises
Planning premises are assumptions about the environment with in which the plan is to be carried out.
Once objectives are established managers have to investigate the company's environment to know
factors that facilitate or block the attainment of these objectives. This involves examining the external
and internal factors which affect the performance of the organization: the external environment (for
treats and opportunities) through PEST analysis and internal environment (for strengths and
weaknesses) through self-audit.

Strengths: are internal competencies possessed by the organization in comparison with the
competitors. These include structure and policies of the organization, location, financial soundness,
knowledge of personnel, qualities of facilities, and so on.

Weaknesses: are attributes of the organization, which tend to decrease its competence in comparison
to its competitors.

Threats: are reasonably probable events, which if it were to occur, would produce significant damage
to the organization.

Opportunity: is a combination of circumstances, which if accompanied by a certain course of action

on the part of the organization, is likely to produce significant benefits.

The key element of planning at this stage is forecasting. It is based on the forecasts made in
different areas that premises are made. Because the future is so complex, it would not be profitable or
realistic to make assumptions about every detail of the future environment of a plan. Therefore,
premises are, as a practical matter, limited to assumptions that are critical or strategic to a plan, that is,
those that most influence its operation.

Determining alternative courses of actions

Alternatives are courses of actions that are available to a manager to reach a goal. In developing
alternatives, a manager should try to create as many roads to meet objectives as possible. This refers to
developing alternatives on the basis of different scenarios. Usually the most common problem is not
finding alternatives, but reducing number of alternatives so that the most promising may be analyzed.

Evaluating (analyzing) alternative courses of action

Having sought out alternative courses, managers evaluate or analyze the benefits, costs and
effects of alternative courses in light of their weight to goals and premises. Because there are so many
alternative courses of action in most situations and there are numerous variables and limitations to be
considered, evaluation can be exceedingly difficult. This is a step in planning process that operations
research and mathematical as well as computing techniques have their primary application to the field
of management.

Selecting a course of action

This is the point at which the plan to be adopted is chosen or selected. It is the real point of
decision-making. The analysis of each alternative’s advantages and disadvantages (costs and benefits)
should result in determining one course of action that appears better than the others. If no one
alternative

emerges as clearly the best, consideration should be given to combining parts or the entire content of
two or more alternatives.

Formulating derivative plans

At step five planning is ended. Formulating derivative plans means formulating other plans
based on one major plan.

Numberizing plans by budgeting

Plans will have meaning when they are changed in to numbers. Budgeting is the means of
adding various plans together and set important standards against which planning process can be
measured. If we numberize our plans, we can know our objective or plan specifically.

Implementing the plan

After the optimum alternative has been selected, the manager needs to develop an action plan to
implement it. This is a step where by the entire organization will be in motion or real operation. All the
planning in the world will not help an organization to realize objectives if plans cannot be
implemented. Authority, persuasion and policy are the manager's means of implementing.
Controlling and evaluating the results

Once the plan is implemented, the manager must monitor the progress that is being made, evaluate the
reported results, and make any modifications necessary. The environment in which a plan is
constructed in is constantly changing, so the plans may have to be modified. Or modification may be
needed because a plan was not quite “perfect” when it was implemented.

Types of Plans
Managers face different planning challenges. In some cases planning environment is stable and
quite predictable; in others more dynamic and uncertain. In all cases managers must understand the
different types of plans and be able to use them effectively, since they all engage in planning their
activities and the activities of others. They all plan in basically the same way, but the kinds of plans
they develop and the amount of time they spend on planning are different for many reasons. Based on
this variation, we can divide plans based on three dimensions; namely scope/breadth, time, and use.

Scope/Breadth Dimension
Scope refers to the comprehensiveness of the plan, or it refers to the level of management
where (at which) plans are formulated. This dimension creates hierarchy of plans. Based on
scope/Breadth we can classify plans in to strategic, tactical and operational.

Strategic Plan

Is organization wide plan that is formulated or developed by top-level management in

consultation with the middle level management. It addresses long-term needs and set comprehensive
action directions. In other words, it is best described simply as how to get where you want to go with
what you have or can get. It applies to the entire organization, and:
  Looks ahead over the next two, three, fire or more years.

 Develops the direction for the entire organization.

 Is primarily concerned with solving long-term problems associated with external, environmental
influences.

 Establishes overall objectives and positions an organization in terms of its environment.

The following are distinguishing characteristics of strategic plan.

 It requires looking outside the organization for threats and opportunities.

 It requires looking inside the organization for strengths and weaknesses

 It takes a longer view, i.e. it covers a relatively long time horizon > 5 years.

 It tends to be top management responsibility, but it reflects a mentality useful at all levels.

Strategic plans address such questions as:

 What business are we in?

 What business should we be in?

 Where will we be in after some years (for example, after ten years) if we continue doing what
we are now doing?

The difference between that a firm would like to be (where we want to be) and where it will be if it
does nothing is called the Planning gap. Strategic planning is primarily concerned with closing that
gap. The success or failure of an organization depends up on the success or failure of strategic plans. It
makes premises for tactical plans.

Tactical Plan: Is a midway plan that helps to reduce long range planning in to intermediate one by
increasing the amount of specificity and making the actions goal oriented. Tactical plans are specific
and more goal-oriented than strategic plans. Middle level management in consultation with lower level
management develops them. Especially tactical plans:
  Are the means charted to support the implementation of the strategic plans and achievement of
tactical goals. They are concerned with shorter time frames and cover a narrower scope.

 Structures a firm’s resources to achieve maximum performance.

 Make premises for operational plans.

 Are narrower in scope than strategic plan and wider than operation plan; but more detailed than
strategic plan and less detailed than operational plan

Operational Plan: Is concerned with the day today activities of the organization and is made at the
lower level management in consultation with middle level management. Operational plans spell out
specifically what must be accomplished to achieve specific /operational goals. It is concerned with the
efficient, day-to-day use of resources allocated to a department manager’s area of responsibility. A
typical operational plan, for example, in a business firm could be production plan, financial plan,
facilities plan, marketing plan, and human resource plan.

Operational plans have relatively short time frame (< 1 year). It is the most detailed and
narrowest plan compared to the above two, because it is to be implemented on day-to-day basis. Unless
operational plans are not achieved in organizations, tactical and strategic plans will not be successful
and goals at those levels will not be achieved.

Summary

Level of
Type of plan Scope management Time Specificity

Strategic plan Wide TLM Long:  5 years Less

Tactical plan Medium MLM Medium: 1-5 years Medium

Operational plan Narrow LLM Short: < 1 year Detailed

Time Dimension

Refers to how long a plan is in use or it covers. Based on the length of the time a plan covers, we do
have three types of plans: Long-range, medium-range and short-range plans. Time dimension and
scope dimension are the same except the former is about the length of time that the plan covers, while
the later is mainly about the level of management where the plan is formulated, but still having an
indication of time.

All strategic plans are long-range plans.

All tactical plans are medium-range plans.

All operational plans are short-range plans.

Use Dimension
Refers to the extent to which plans will be used on a recurring basis, i.e., based on how
repeatedly/frequently a given plan is used. Based on this dimension, we do have mainly two types of
plans: standing plans and single use plans.

(a) Standing Plans: are plans that provide an ongoing guidance for performing recurring activities.
They are plans, which are formulated to be used again and again for the day-to-day operation of the
organization. That is, repetitive situations or actions require the development of such plans. They
become necessary when the same kinds of actions are to be taken again and again. Standing plans
become valuable under relatively stable situations.
Once established, standing plans allow managers to conserve time used for planning and
decision-making because similar situations are handled in a predetermined, consistent manner. For
example, a bank can more easily approve or reject loan requests if criteria are established in advance to
evaluate credit ratings, collateral assets, and related applicant information. The major types of standing
plans are policies, rules and procedures.

Policies: is a general guide that specifies the broad parameters with in which organization members are
expected to operate in pursuit of organizational goals. Policies are general statements or
understandings which guide or channel for thinking and actions in decision-making to achieve
organizational objectives.
 Not all policies are “written statements”; they are often merely implied from the actions of
managers. The president of a company, for example, may strictly follow perhaps for convenience
rather than as policy a certain practice. The practice may then be interpreted as a policy and carefully
followed by subordinates.

Top managers of the organization usually establish policies formally and deliberately. They can
also emerge informally and at lower levels in the organization from a seemingly consistent set of
decisions on the same subject made over a period of time.

Rules: spell out specific required action or non-actions, i.e., actions that must be or must not be taken,
allowing no discretion in a given situation; for example "No smoking", "cheating is prohibited". Rules
are unlike procedures in that they guide action without specifying a time sequence.

The difference between rule and policy is that the purpose of policies is to guide decision-
making by marking off areas in which managers can use their discretion, while rule doesn't allow
discretion in its application, although rule also serve as guides. Rules are the most explicit of standing
plans and are not guides for thinking or decision-making. Rather, they are substitutes for them. The
only choice a rule leaves is whether or not to apply it to a particular set of circumstances.

Procedures: are statements that detail the exact manner in which certain activities must be
accomplished. They put the precise order of activities to be carried out to do a task and thus,
procedures are chronological sequences of required actions. They provide detailed step-by-step
instructions as to what should be done.

When we compare the above three, policies, procedures and rules, we can understand that all
are alike in the sense that they are directives to guide people’s behavior to the desired ends and they are
plans, which are to be followed in the future. Conversely, procedures and rules are different from
policies in that the former are guides to actions while the latter are guides to thinking. So, procedures
and rules render no freedom and hence should be used when we want to discourage initiative or repress
thinking. But, policies must permit freedom with in limits and hence are used when people’s
involvement, participation or initiative is desired.

Though both rules and procedures repress (inhibit) thinking, they are different. Unlike
procedures, rules (1) guide actions with out specifying a time sequence (2) spell out that a certain
action must or must not be taken. Procedures, however, specify a time sequence.” In fact a procedure
may be looked upon as a sequence of rules. A rule, however, may or may not be part of a procedure”
(b) Single use plans: are plans aimed at achieving a specific goal that, once reached, will most likely
not recur in the future and dissolved when these have been accomplished. They are designed to
accomplish a specific objective usually in a relatively shorter period of time and it is non-repetitive.
They are detailed courses of action that probably will not be repeated in the same form in the future.
The major types of single use plans are programs, projects, and budgets.

Programs: are a complex of goals, policies, procedures, rules, task assignments, steps to be taken,
resources to be employed and other elements necessary to carryout a given course of action. A program
is a comprehensive plan that coordinates a complex set of activities related to a major non-recurring
goal. A program may be as large in scope as placing a person on the moon or as comparatively small as
improving the reading level of fourth grade students in a school district. Whatever its scope, it will
specify many activities and allocations of resources with in an overall scheme that may include such

other single use plans as projects and budgets. A program may be repeated with modification but not as
it is.

Projects: are plans that coordinate a set of limited scope activities that do not need to be divided in to
several major projects in order to reach a major non-recurring goal. Projects are the smaller and
separate portions of programs. Each project has limited scope and distinct directives concerning
assignments and time. Each project will become the responsibility of designated personnel who will be
given specific resources and deadlines.

Budgets: is a statement of financial resources set a side for specific activities in a given period of time.
It a statement of expected results expressed in numerical terms. Budget is a single use plan that
commits resources to an activity over a given period of time. It may be expressed in Birr, worker
hours, units of product, machine hours, or any other numerically measurable term. It may be referred to
as a “numberized” program. Budget is also a control device. However, making a budget is clearly
planning.

Contingency planning can be added up to those major types of plans (standing and single use plans)
within the "use dimension of plans". Contingency planning is the development of alternative plans for
use in the event that environmental conditions evolve differently than anticipated, rendering original
plans unwise or unfeasible.
Although planning by definition involves "thinking ahead", organizational assumptions, predictions
and intentions may prove to be in error due to uncertainties in the planning environment. Unexpected
problems and events frequently occur. When they do occur, then plans may have to be changed.
Therefore, it is important to anticipate during the planning process that things might not go as
expected, and to develop alternative plans ready for use under such circumstances.

THE ORGANIZING FUNCTION

The Meaning of Organizing
Once a manger develops a workable plan, the next step is bringing resources together in the most
effective manner to accomplish the plan. The manager should strive to match labor force to the right
place (job), which is an important part of management functions of an organization.

Planning, consequently, requires organizing the efforts of many people. It forces us to address several
basic questions:

 What specific tasks are required to implement our plans?

 How many organizational positions are needed to perform all the required tasks?

 How should these positions be grouped?

 How many layers of management (Organizational levels) are needed to coordinate them?

 How many people should a manager supervise directly?

The answers to these and other questions enable us to create an organizational arrangement, a structure,
for putting plans in to action.

Organizing: is the management process or function that focuses on allocating and arranging human
and nonhuman (physical) resources so that plans can be carried out successfully and attained
organizational objectives. It is the management function that establishes relationship between activity
and authority. It is through the organizing function that administrators/managers determine which tasks
to be done, how tasks can be best combined into specific jobs, and how jobs can be grouped into
various units that make up the structure of the organization.
Organizing - refers to the coordination of resources; i.e. labor, managerial talent, material, machinery
and money. It is an activity of establishing the total system of social and cultural relationship among
peoples who are joined together to achieve some specific common objectives.

Organizing - is also the process of determining authority dispersion, determining the extent of power
centralization or decentralization, or power sharing among organizational units, which in turn
determines the span of management or control. In an organization, we have a number of levels,
managerial positions.

Organizing: is essentially the division of functions among people. it is establishing the internal
organizational structure. The division of functions and allocation of responsibilities could be both
vertical and horizontal. The nature and style of the organizational structure; i.e. vertical and
horizontal structure reveals the extent of the concentration of power in the organization, the former
inclines to centralization of power while the later is more likely to share power and to make decisions
together.

The philosophy of hierarchy depends upon the nature of the organization. For instance, the military
and business management might not follow the same line of organizational hierarchy. The military
structure is very much centralized because of the seriousness of the decision matter, while in business
organizations the hierarchy is not that much stiff and provides managerial autonomy.

The manager while organizing must identify those areas of management that needs high degree of
autonomy and determine the span of control. Span of control refers to how many people should
report to each manager. Determining the span of control in turn has to do with the supervisory
effectiveness of managers.

THE ORGANIZING PROCESS

The organizing process has the following steps.

(j) Identification of objectives

This is to understand clearly the objectives of the organization, i.e., to reconsider the objectives
established during planning and identify the specific objectives to be pursued.

(ii) Identification of the specific activities needed which help the organization achieve its
objectives. Knowing the objectives clearly makes the identification of activities needed clear and
simple. Here we ask what work activities are necessary to accomplish the identified organizational
objectives. Creating a list of tasks to be accomplished begins if we identify clearly what objective in
to be accomplished or met. This identification of specific activities needed is called division of labor.
(iii) Grouping of activities necessary to attain objectives

The series number of activities listed and/or identified must be grouped together. That is, this involves
grouping together of activities in accordance with similarities (homogeneity) of the activities,
interdependence, job characteristics or any other grouping criteria, and this result in departments and
the process is called departmention. Grouping of similar activities is based on the concept of division
of labor and specialization.

(iv) Assigning group of activities (work) and delegate the appropriate authority.
Management has identified activities necessary to achieve objectives has classified and grouped
these activities in to major operational areas. The activities now must be assigned to individuals who
are simultaneously given the appropriate authority to accomplish task.

(v) Provision for coordination/Design a hierarchy of relationships.

This step requires the determination of both vertical and horizontal operating relationships of the
organization as a whole. The vertical structuring of the organization results in a decision-making
hierarchy showing who is in charge of each task, of each specialty area, and the organization as a
whole. Levels of management are established from bottom to top in the organization. These levels
create the chain of command, or hierarchy of decision-making levels, in the company.

The horizontal structuring has two important effects.

1. It defines the working relationships between operating departments

2. It makes the final decision on the span of control (the number of subordinates under the
direction of each manager).

The result of this step is a complete organization structure. An organization chart shows this
structure visually. While developing organizational structure, managers make a variety of decisions;
especially they decide division of labor, delegation of authority, departmentation, span of control, and
coordination.
(A) Division of labor
When joint accomplishment of a grand task is the goal of many people, this overall task must
be split in to its component jobs and apportioned among the people involved. It is only after these jobs
are correctly done that the grand task can be achieved.

The degree to which the grand task of the organization is broken down and divided in to smaller
component parts is referred to as division of labor. Division of labor is performed in light of
organizational objectives. It begins by determining (sub tasks) called jobs that are necessary to
accomplish the identified objectives. These sub tasks could include ongoing tasks which are part of the
regular routine for running any business such as hiring and record keeping or tasks unique to the nature
of the business; such as assembling, machining, storing, inspecting, selling, advertising, computer
programming.

After determining the sub tasks, sub tasks will be defined by enumerating the activities that
each individual sub tasks would entail in terms of what the incipient sub task performer is expected to
do. This is called job description. Job description is an account of activities what the sub task performer
is expected to perform and the associated authority and responsibility relationships among jobs.

The sub task assigned to the sub task performer is called job. Thus by doing so individuals specialize in
doing part of the task rather than the entire task, i.e., division of labor in effect is the assignment of
various portion of a particular task among organizational members. In short, division of labor involves:

 Breaking down a task in to its most basic elements

 Training workers in performing specific duties

 Sequencing activities so that one person's efforts build on another's.

(B) Delegation of Authority

Authority - is the right to commit resources (that is, to make decisions that commit an organization’s
resources), or the legal (legitimate) right to give orders (to tell someone to do or not to do something).
It is the right to make decisions, carry out actions, and direct others in matters related to the duties and
goals of a position. It is the formal right of a superior to command and compel his subordinates to
perform a certain act. All managers in an organization have authority. It provides the means of
command.
Generally level of authority varies with levels of management. Higher-level managers have greater
authority, with ultimate power resting at the top. Authority decreases all the way to the bottom of the
chart, where positions have little or none. Authority is vested in a manager because of the position
he/she occupies in the organization, that is why we say, “authority comes with the territory.”

The person who occupies the position has its formal authority as long as he/she remains in the position.
As the job changes in scope and complexity, so should the amount and kind of formal authority
possessed. Even though a manager has formal or legitimate authority, it is wise to remember that the
willingness of employees to accept the legitimate authority is a key to effective management. Chester
Bernard called this Acceptance Theory of Authority.

Delegation of Authority - is the down ward pushing of authority from superiors to subordinates to
make decision with in their area of responsibilities. It is the process of allocating tasks to subordinates,
giving them adequate authority to carry out those assignments, and making them obligated to complete
the tasks satisfactory. Delegation is a concept describing the passing of formal authority to another
person. It is the assignment of part of a manager’s work to others, along with both the responsibility
and authority necessary to achieve expected results.

Delegation is necessary for an organization to exist. Just no one person in an enterprise can do all the
tasks necessary for accomplishing a group purpose, so is it impossible, as an enterprise grows, for one
person exercise all the authority for making decisions.

The Process of Delegation

Delegation of authority has the following steps.

Assignment of tasks

Specific tasks or duties that are to be undertaken are identified by the manager for assignment to the
subordinate. The subordinate is ten approached with the assignment.

Delegation of authority

In order for the subordinate to complete the duties or tasks, the authority necessary to do them should
be delegated by the manager to the subordinate. A guideline for authority is that it be adequate to
complete the task - no more and no less.
Acceptance of responsibility

Dispensability is the obligation to carryout one’s assigned duties to the best of one’s ability. It is the
obligation created when some one accepts task assignments together with the appropriate authority.
Responsibility is not delegated by a manager to an employee, but the employee becomes obligated
when the assignment is accepted. The employee is the receiver of the assigned duties and the delegated
authority; these confer responsibility as well.

Creation of accountability

Accountability is having to answer to some one for your results or actions. It means taking the
consequences - either credit or blame. It is the requirement to provide satisfactory reasons for
significant deviations from duties or expected results. When the subordinate accepts the assignment
and the authority, he or she will be held accountable or answerable for actions taken.

A manager is accountable for the use of his/her authority and performance. The manager is also
accountable for the performance and actions of subordinates. The manager should take the time to
think through what is being assigned and to confer the authority necessary to achieve results. The
subordinate, in accepting the assignment becomes obligated (responsible) to perform, knowing that
he/she is accountable (answerable) for the results.
DIRECTING (LEADING)

Directing or leading is the management or administrative function that involves influencing others to
engage in the work behaviors necessary to reach organizational goals. It simply means guiding the
efforts of human resources to ensure high level of task accomplishment. Leading or directing includes
communicating with others, helping to outline a vision of what can be accomplished, providing
direction, and motivating organization's members to put forth the substantial effort required from them.

Leading involves motivating or activating people towards achieving a harmonized common

(organizational goal). It is a process of getting or winning the cooperation and willingness of people
fulfill organizational objectives. Leading includes, among others, the following:

 Motivation: involves inspiring or stimulating employees by giving an opportunity to ensure

high-level individual performance and thereby attain organizational objectives. There are
different motivational factors, which could be implemented on the basis of identifying the real
demands and interests of employees, such as material and financial rewards, providing
training, introducing safety measures, creating conducive working atmosphere and
relationships, recognition etc.

 Dealing with People: managers need to spear their time to handle the effect of group behavior
as well as to capitalize the advantages of using the different talents of people they lead.
Leading has also to do with maintaining teamwork.

 Communication: is an important, perhaps the determinant, factor for effective leadership.

This refers to the level of consultation and interaction of managers with their subordinates,
and the use of communication channels or networks that facilitate effective transmission of
information and idea. For example, policies, orders, and regulations that are usually
formulated by the top management should be properly addressed to organizational members.

Leadership function is essentially influenced by the type of leaders an organization might have. There
are three basic types of leaders who exercise leadership roles differently:

 Authoritarian Leaders: they lead by using power, followers are alienated, performance is
proportional to power

 Transactional Leaders: they lead by using rewards, followers are willing but calculative, use
linkages between performance and goals as well as between performance and rewards
  Transformational Leaders: they lead by articulating and communicating realistic vision,
intellectually paying attention to individual differences, make followers committed and loyal.

CONTROLLING

Controlling is the management function that is aimed at regulating organizational activities so

that actual performance conforms to expected organizational standards and goals. Controlling simply
means monitoring of task accomplishments and taking necessary measures. To do the necessary
regulatory functions, administrators need to monitor ongoing activities, compare results with expected
standards or progress toward goals, and take corrective action as needed.

Controlling involves follow up of employees' activities to get feedbacks about results by

comparing performances with plans. Controlling shouldn't be associated only with its negative sense;
i.e. subjugating or subduing subordinates by giving no or little discretionary power in their operation. It
should rather be considered mainly in positive terms as having a purpose of helping people to be in
conformance with plans, making an appropriate adjustment when performances deviate from
expectations. Administration therefore involves:

 Looking ahead,

 Making good plans, and then

 Helping people to take actions needed today in order to best meet the challenges of the future. In
this regard, " administrators are responsible to monitor the goals, look for problems, and help
people who fall behind before they lose control of or cause organizational damage". In
controlling, managers need to:

 Have standards or yardsticks, which are the measuring instruments through which performances
and plans could be compared,

 Get outputs compared with inputs with reference to approved plans and identify the gaps and
the causes of deviations,

 Correct deviations, if there is any, by properly addressing the identified problems,

In fact having standards and comparing outputs with plans might be a short-lived exercise or business.
What is most difficult rather is identifying the problem to correct the prevailing deviation. As a matter
of principle managers may use the following three types of control:

(a) Preliminary control: it is a pre-action control that takes place before the actual managerial
activity started. It is an attempt to have a very realistic objective. To apply preliminary control there
should first exist job description or specification that describes the nature and content of the work an
employee is expected to perform and the means of handling it. Thus, a manager has to check whether
the person holding the position has the necessary skill, ability, and interest before the actual work
starts.

(b) Concurrent control: this type of control is undertaken while the business or an activity is in
motion. In other words this is controlling an ongoing activity in the plan period without waiting for the
end of the planning period.

(c) Feedback control: is a type of control of performance at the end of the planning period.

ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: CASE STUDY
TOPIC:

 MAJOR AREAS OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

DURATION:

 1 week/ 3hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:
At the end of this chapter, the students will be able, among other things, to:

 Understand the major areas of public administration

 Identify the basic principles, approaches and objectives of public policy.

 Understand the personal administration concepts in public administration

CONCEPT NOTES:

Students; you have learnt the general functions of public administration in chapter
Three. Therefore, in this chapter we will discuss about the major areas of public
administration in brief manner.

PUBLIC POLICY

Public administration theorists have been concerned with attempts conceptually to distinguish
policy and administration. The distinction, which was probably based on a confusion of politics and
administration, has always been somewhat fictional. There are therefore two principle features of
policy:

(1) Policy is concerned with either change (its dynamic aspect), or with the preservation of the stats
quo (its static aspect), and

(2) There is no clear distinction between policy and administration and both contain dynamic
elements. The existence of a passive executory administration is no longer a justifiable
assumption.
Policy formulation is necessary prior to every action in every form of organization, be it private or
public. It is thus a prerequisite for all management. The different definitions of public policy reflects its
multi-faceted nature, yet all draw elements of public decisions, choices, positions and statements of
intents.

Meaning:

According to Rumki Basu (1994:270), Policy can be broadly defined as a "proposed course of action
of an individual, a group, an institution or government, to realize a specific objective or purpose
within a given environment".

Policy is a set of interrelated decisions taken by a political actor or group of actors concerning the
selection of goals and the means of achieving them within a specified situation.

Policy has been defined as "a matter of either the desire for change or the desire to protect something
from change" (Barber (1983:59). Barber further added, "Policy making occurs in the determination of
major objectives, in the selection of methods of achieving these objectives, and in the continuous
adaptation of existing policies to the problems that face the government".

Public policy can be comprehensively defined as a "purposive and consistent course of action
produces as a response to a perceived problem of constituency, formulated by a specific political
process; adopted, implemented and enforced by a public agency".

Policy lays down the framework within which organizational goals are set to be accomplished. The
objectives of an organization, which are often vague and general, are concretized in the policy goals
that set the administrative wheels in motion. Policy formulation is one of the vital tasks of any form of
government. As Basu (1994:270) puts it, "the essence of public administration is policy-making".
Dimock defines policy formulation as "the consciously acknowledged rules of conduct that guide
administrative decisions".

Public policies are those, which are developed by governmental bodies and officials. The special
characteristics of public policies as differentiated from other policies emanate from the fact that they
are by "authorities" in a political system namely, "elders, chiefs, executives, legislatures, judges,
administrators, councilors, monarchs, and the like".

The following are implications of the concept of public policy:

(i) Purposive or result oriented action rather than random behavior or chance happenings is the
hallmark (characteristic" of public policy,

(ii) Public policy refers to the action or decisional pattern by public administrators on a
particular issue over a period rather than their separate discrete decisions on that matter in
an ad hoc fashion,

(iii) Policy is what governments actually do and what subsequently happens, rather than what
they intend to do or say they are going to do,

(iv) Public policy may be either positive or negative in form. Positively, it may involve some
form of government action regarding any issue or problem; negatively, it may involve a
decision by government officials not to take action on a matter on which governmental
opinion, attitude, or action is asked for,

(v) Public policy in its positive form is based on law and is authoritative; it has a legal sanction
behind it, which is potentially coercive in nature and is binding on all citizens,

The question here is that why do we study public policy? There are both academic and political
reasons for studying public policy or engaging in policy analysis.

(a) The study of public policy formulation processes may help to gain greater knowledge and
understanding of the complexities of the interacting social, economic and political processes and their
implications for society. Policy may be viewed either as a dependent or independent variable.

If the former is the case, then attention is placed on the political and environmental factors
that help to determine the content of policy. If public policy is viewed as an independent
variable, the focus shifts to the impact of policy on the political system and the
environment.

(b) Factual knowledge about the policy-making process and its outcomes are a prerequisite
for prescribing on dealing with social problems normatively. The study of public policy
should be directed towards ensuring that governments adopt appropriate policies to attain
certain desirable social goals. It is not to deny, however, that substantial disagreements may
exist in society over what constitutes "desirable" or the "appropriate" goals of policy.
 In practice, policy formulation overlaps with policy decision in the policy-making process.
Policy formulation aims at getting a preferred policy alternative approved. A policy decision on the
other hand involves action by some official person or body to approve, modify, or reject a preferred
policy alternative. Policy decision when approving a preferred policy alternative takes such forms as
the enactment of legislation or the issuance of an executive order. Therefore, what is typically involved
in the policy decision stage is not selection from among a number of policy alternatives, but action on
the preferred policy alternative.

Another point of discussion in the study of public policy is about the factors determining policy
formulation. Policy-making cannot be adequately understood apart from the environment in which it
takes place. Demands for policy actions are generated in the environment and transmitted to the
political system. At the same time, the environment places limits and constraints upon what can be
done by policy makers. Hence, environment is a decisive factor on public policy formulation.

Environment, in turn, includes geographical characteristics as natural resources, climate and

topography; demographic variables like population size, age and sex ratio distribution and spatial
location; political culture; social structure; and the economic system. Of these environmental aspects,
political culture and socioeconomic variables are considered as the more influential factors in public
policy formulation.

A). Political Culture: culture has been defined as the entire pattern of social life, the inherited modes
of living and conduct that the individual acquires from the community or environment. Most social
scientists agree that culture is one of the many factors that shape or influence social action. Political
culture is also part of the general culture, which denotes widely held values, beliefs, and attitudes
concerning governmental policies and actions. What is relevant here is therefore to see some of the
implications and significance of this culture for policy formulation

Rumki Basu (1994:273) further identified three types of political cultures as parochial, subject, and
participant.

a) In a parochial political culture, citizens have little awareness of or orientation towards either the
political system as a whole or the citizen as a political participant. Citizen's participation in the
policy formulation in a parochial political culture is essentially non-existent, and government will
be of little concern to most citizens.

b) In a subject political culture as that of in many developing countries, citizens are oriented towards
the political system, yet they have little awareness of themselves as a participant. They are aware of
 governmental authority and they may have political views, but they are essentially passive. In the
subject political culture, an individual may believe that he/she can do little to influence public
policy, which may lead to his/her passive acceptance of governmental action.

c) In the participant political culture, like that is evidenced in the United States, citizens have a high
level of political awareness and information and have explicit orientations towards the political
system as a whole, and a notion of meaningful citizen's participation in politics. Such orientation
includes understanding of how individuals and groups can influence decision-making.

In the participant political culture, individuals may organize into groups to influence
government action to rectify their grievances. Government and public policy are viewed as
controllable by citizens. It is also assumed that more demands will be made on government in a
participatory political culture than in the other two types.

In general, the study of political culture is important because values, beliefs, and attitudes could
inform, guide, and constrain the actions of both decision makers and citizens.

B). Socio-economic variables: The term socioeconomic condition or variable is used here in the
widest sense to include geographical characteristics and demographic variables as being economic
resources. Public policies can be seen as emanating from conflicts between different groups often with
opposing interests and attitudes. Groups that are underprivileged, dissatisfied, or threatened by
economic changes often seek governmental intervention or assistance to improve their lot or status
through some sort of policy decision.

It is recognized that society's level of economic development will impose limits on what the
government can do in providing public goods and services to the community. The ways in which
socioeconomic conditions influence or constrain public policies have been subjected to considerable
analysis. Economic development shapes both political processes and policy outcomes.

In other words, differences in the policy choices of governments with different political systems
turn out to be largely a product of differing socioeconomic levels rather than a direct product of
political variables. Levels of urbanization, industrialization, income and education appear to be more
influential in shaping public policy outcomes than purely political variables like voters' participation,
inter-party rivalry, and political party strength.
 There are different conceptual approaches to policy making in the study of public
administration. As a field of study, public administration examines every aspect of governmental
efforts to get implemented public policies. But Herbert Simon (1948) disagreed with those who tried to
define public administration narrowly as a study of public policy. He instead viewed public
administration raging as wide as governmental problems or affairs and would eventually bring political
science and other possible social sciences to be part of it, and would become applied science.

Simon suggested in that while studying public administration, scholars should concentrate less
on public policy and on the behaviour of decision makers and the process by which they defined public
policy. For him, decision-making is the heart of administration; it pervades the entire administrative
process as much as the art of getting things done. He believed that there is a possibility of measuring
and evaluating efficient decision-making, and the need to define, quantify and measure administrative
choice.

Simon dropped the notion of optimal rational choice altogether and opted for bounded
rationality and a satisfying model of decision-making. In other words, he believed in that people accept
what is good enough or satisfying to them and don't search for all possible alternatives so as to select
the optimal rational alternative. Decision-making process could be broken down into intelligence
(searching the environment for conditions necessary for decision); design (inventing, developing, and
analyzing possible courses of action); and choice (selecting a course of action).

The three decision models, which Simon identified in 1960 include:

(a) Non-programmed decision-making based on instinct, judgment, intuition, and other extra-
rational factors,

(b) Pure rationality optimal decision-making, and

(c) Satisfying decision-making,

Charles Lindblom (1959) has noted the differences between the ways policy-making has been
described in theory (the rational comprehensive approach) and the way it is actually made (incremental
steps).

The rational comprehensive approach

In the rational comprehensive method, an administrator has to follow certain principles such as
identifying a priority objective, rationally ranking all the relevant "values" or "advantages" to pursue
the best policy, formulating several possible alternatives to achieve the stated objective, selecting the
best alternative, and so on.

This approach to decision-making is rational and comprehensive, because all alternatives and
values are taken into account and logically selected and weighed in their relative importance. But
rational

decision-making is difficult in practice since there are a variety of factors that complicate the task of
the policy maker.

The rational method has been criticized as being impracticable for a number of reasons:

(a) It is practically impossible to collect all information and make a complete list of policy options,

(b) The process involved in this approach is time consuming and expensive,

(c) The assumptions that values can be ranked and classified is erroneous, since there are always
differences among the legislatures, administrators and the public on the values that a nation
should pursue,

(d) The assumptions to consider everything before a new policy is decided is impossible since the
consequences of adopting a new policy is in most cases unknown

The incremental approach

Although the rational comprehensive approach is theoretically good, what actually occurs in
administrative decisions is quite different; i.e. "successive limited comparison" technique or
incremental step. Firstly, administrators operating under limited resources take up on a priority bases
programs of immediate relevance. Secondly, they do not outline a wide range of possibilities in
selecting appropriate policies, but only a few "incremental" steps that appear to them feasible on the
basis of their experiences.

Two advantages of incrementalism are identified, namely:

(1) Decision-makers could proceed through a succession of small incremental changes, thereby
have the advantage of avoiding serious alterations in case of mistakes in decision making,

(2) This method is truly reflective of the policy-making process by means of consensus and
gradualism and contemplates possible changes in public policies,
Though it is widely accepted that incrementalism describes the reality of the policy making process, it
has its own disadvantages or weaknesses, among which:

(1) Incrementalism can result in important policy options being overlooked,

(2) Incrementalism discourages social innovation and is partisan in approach, which in reality
means the interests of the most powerful get maximum attention by policy-makers,
(3) Incrementalism cannot be applied to fundamental decisions such as declaration of war, hence
cannot be considered as an approach without flaws or mistakes,

Another important topic in the study of public policy is that who the official policy makers are?
Official policy-makers are those who are legally empowered to formulate public policy. These include
legislatures, executives, administrators, and judges.

Legislature: The legislature formally performs the task of law making in a political system. This
doesn't necessarily mean that the legislature has an independent decision-making power or actually
frames the official policy since political parties, pressure groups, and so forth can influence it. But it
can safely be concluded that the legislature is more important in policy formulation in democratic than
in dictatorial systems, and within the democratic systems, it tends to have greater independency in
policy formulation in presidential systems (USA) than in the parliamentary (British) systems.

Executive: Modern governments everywhere mainly depend upon executive leadership both in policy
formulation and execution. In developing countries in particular, the executive has even more influence
in policy making than in developed countries because of the greater concentration of power in the
hands of the government with less responsiveness to the legislature.

Administrative Agencies: although it has been an accepted doctrine in political science that
administrators were merely implementers of policies determined by other organs of the government,
such distinctions are now found to be fallacious as politics and administration are blended, and as
administrators are highly involved in policy formulation in the modern world.

The technical complexity of many policy matters, legislature's lack of time and information are among
the major reasons for administrative agencies to have a formally recognized discretionary authority to
formulate policies. Public officials are associated with policy formulation in three important ways:
(a) They have to supply facts, data and criticism about the workability of the policy to the
legislature if the initiative for policy-making comes from them. In addition, since members of
the parliament might have lack of administrative acumen (intelligence) or experience on
technical or purely professional matters, they have to give due recognitions and rely on the
suggestions of the officials,
(b) Since the administrations are supposed have constant contact with the general public and thereby
to be in a better position to understand the difficulties that arise in the implementation of
policies, the initiative for policy legislation or amendments originates very often from the
administration
(c) On account of lack of time and knowledge, the legislature passes skeleton acts and leaves the
details to the administration.

The Courts: in countries where the courts have the power of judicial review, they have (as in the US)
played an important role in policy formulation. They can affect the nature and content of public policy
through exercising their judicial review and statutory interpretation power in cases brought before
them. Determining the constitutionality of actions by legislative and executive branches of the
government is basically the functions of the judiciary. The courts also specify the government's limits
to actions and states what it must do to meet legal or constitutional obligations.

Besides the official policy makers, many unofficial bodies may participate in the policy making
process. These may include political parties, interest groups, and individual citizens. These unofficial
bodies could participate in public policy making in terms of expressing demands, supplying official
policy makers with much technical information about specific issues and possible consequences of a
policy proposal, and presenting alternatives for policy actions.

Once we make public policy and implement it, it is imperative that the effects of such policies
have to be evaluated and analyzed. Public policy evaluation is concerned with the analysis of the
effects of governmental decisions on the target public. In other words, it is an attempt to assess the
content and effects of policy on those for whom it is intended. It means commenting on the merits and
demerits of a policy. Often policy evaluation occurs throughout the policy process, not necessarily at
its termination stage.

There are generally three recognized methods of policy evaluation; namely:

(a) Policy impact evaluation: It is an assessment of program (policy) impact and effectiveness,
the extent to which programs are successful in achieving the intended objectives,
 (b) Policy strategy evaluation: This refers to the assessment of the relative effectiveness of
program strategies and variables with emphasis on determining the most effective and
productive strategies, methods and procedures,

(c) Policy project appraisal: It is a process of assessing individual projects through site visits and
other means with emphasis on managerial and operational efficiency.

In discussing policy evaluation, we need also to understand the differences between policy
output and policy outcome. Policy output refers to the quantifiable actions of the government that can
be measured in concrete terms, while policy outcomes refers to the qualitative impacts of public
policies on the lives of the people.

PERSONNEL ADMINISTRATION (MANAGEMENT)

Personnel administration or management is that part of administration concerned with the

management of people at work. In other words the central concern of personnel management is the
efficient utilization of employees of an organization. Some people would argue that personnel
management is simply a collection of people-management techniques, which can be used in all
organizations. However, as Margaret Attwood and Stuart Dimmock (1996) noted, the validity of this
definition or understanding is doubtful since techniques applied in one organization for the effective
utilization of staff may fail elsewhere.

In recent years, the term "human resource management" has been frequently being used in
reference to "personnel management". Most organizations have a specialist personnel department that
gives support to managers and supervisors who have direct responsibility for the management of
people. Thus, the function of a personnel department is to assist with the acquisition, development and
retention of the human resources necessary for the success of the organization.

The Concept of a Career Civil Service

Herman Finer, quoted in Rumki Basu (1994:295), defines the civil service as a "professional body of
officials, permanent, paid and skilled". In this connection, a civil servant may be understood as a
"servant of the general public (not being the holder of a political or judicial office), who is employed in
a civil capacity and whose remuneration is wholly paid from the budget provided by the parliament any
legitimatised body of the government". This excludes members of the armed forces and judicial
services.
The civil service constitutes the "permanent" executive in the modern state. With the increasing variety
in the functions of the civil service, the new category of employees (both technical and generalist in
character) working under the public sector are being gradually added to the category of civil servants
everywhere. The major requirement of the civil service is that it shall be "impartially selected,
administratively competent, politically neutral, and imbued (instilled) with the spirit of service to the
community".

Willoughby defined career civil service as:

"A system that offers equal opportunities to all citizens to enter the government service,
equal pay to all employees doing work requiring the same degree of intelligence and
capacity, equal opportunities for advancement, equal favorable conditions and equal
participation in retirement allowances and makes equal demands upon the employees".

Career civil service has been understood as a system aimed at recruiting young people having the
talent and ambition, with capacity for learning and growth, training them in order to develop their
potentialities for the service of the state.

Despite there have been historical traces for the existence of some sort of a rudimentary civil
service, for example in ancient china and Egypt, concept of civil service as a career is comparatively a
recent origin even in those developed countries. England had no permanent civil service until the
th
middle of the 19 century and USA until the end of that century. The "patronage system" and the
"spoils system" that prevailed in England and the USA respectively have delayed the development of a
merit-based public career system until those mentioned periods.

According to Dr. Finer, the growth of the cardinal principles of modern civilization brought
about the establishment and growth of a professional civil service. Some of those principles were the
principles of specialization and division of labor, the democratic ideas of "career open to talents", etc.

The Civil service is the chief instrument for the implementation of the will of the state as
expressed through public policy. It is indispensable to the functioning of the modern state. With the
change in the philosophy of the state from the laissez faire to that of the social welfare, the modern
state involved itself in multifarious tasks, which are performed by the civil service.

The basic task of the civil servants is to transform politics into action. Besides, the higher
echelons of the civil service assist their political superiors in policy-formulation through expertise
advice, assistance, and information. With the diversification of the nature of the civil service personnel,
civil servants of the technical category engaged in various productive and public sector organizations
are rendering useful social and economic services to the people.
 Therefore, the tasks of the civil servants became comprehensive, directly impinging on the lives
and welfare of citizens. Due to the increasing significance of the civil service in modern societies and
the assumption of responsibility by the state for the performance of various socioeconomic functions, it
has become necessary or imperative to recruit persons and thereby build competence for the civil
service.

Professionalization of the civil service became absolutely necessary to attract the best available talent
to government jobs and enable them to make a rewarding career of it. For example a Commission
established in 1933 in the US defined the concept of career civil service and identified its main
characteristics as:

(1) High prestige and status attached to government service,

(2) Appropriate recruitment procedures,

(3) Broad avenues for promotion and transfer of personnel,

(4) Clear pay scales, and

(5) Adequate retirement and pension system

In addition/similar to the above outlined ones, the main characteristics of a career civil service that
have got common acceptance are:

(1) Permanence of tenure and stability of service,

(2) Equal opportunity of competing for government services,

(3) Merit to be the sole criteria of recruitment with due recognition to ability and personal
efficiency in a sound promotion system,

(4) Fairly large extent of territorial jurisdiction of public employees to enlarge their scope of
activity and improve their avenues for promotions, and

(5) Adequate steps taken to provide in-service training to civil servants to keep them in touch with
the latest trends and developments in administrative theory and practice.

Integrity in Public Administration

 The problem of administrative corruption is perhaps as old as administration itself, but the
problem of public accountability is as old as the theory and practice of democratic administration. The
enormous expansion of the government bureaucracy, touching all aspects of the citizens' live, has
brought the problem of effective public checks and control on public administration to the forefront.

The expansion of governmental tasks results in the multiplications of the volume of work where
administrative power and discretion are vested at different levels of the governmental hierarchy.
Accompanying this is that where there is power and discretion, there is always the possibility of abuse.
Executive discretion, delegated legislation, and administrative adjudication are vitally connected with
problem of public accountability of administration. The problem of administrative malpractices is a
universal phenomenon with different degree and form of existence.

Studies undertaken in many countries, particularly in those developing ones, indicate that there
are vast spheres of administrative actions in which the bureaucracy can exercise discretionary authority
without being accountable to citizens in case of abuse of authority. Statutory powers have been given
to all types of bureaucrats with ample scope of harassment, corruption, indulgence in malpractices, and
so on, by the misbehaving (errant) individuals.

In the democracies of the West, however, there are many informal agencies of public control
over administration like political parties, pressure groups, press, and public opinion, which by their
vigilance and initiative can manage to exert powerful influence and act as a check against
administrative excesses. Nevertheless, recent trends in the world administrative system, including in
developing countries, have showed encouraging responses through the establishment of institutional
devices to fight against such administrative excesses. The most common institutional devices are the
following:

(i) Administrative Courts or Tribunals: the French system of administrative courts set up to deal
with disputes between the administration and the individual citizens is a unique device that has been
adopted by many other countries. But, a distinction is made between the acts that government servants
perform in their personal capacity and official capacity. Administrative courts can be used to settle the
later type of acts. Members of the courts are civil servants with thorough knowledge of administrative
processes.

The administrative court exercises general supervision over administration and possess ultimate
authority over all disciplinary matters concerning civil servants. Decisions in these courts are taken as
promptly as possible and are much less expensive than in the other ordinary courts. The gradual spread
of this institutional device to many countries is a growing proof of its efficiency and popularity as a
device for prompt settlement of citizens' grievances.
This method has been practiced in Ethiopia since 1962 with the establishment of the "Central Personnel
Agency-CPA", in its former name. One of the strongest departments that existed within the structure of
CPA was the "Administrative Tribunal" that has been dealing in the settlement of such matters
mentioned earlier, specially disputes arising between employer public service organizations
(administrations) and their employees. Decisions made by the "Administrative Tribunal" has been also
respected as final. The court also currently exists in the Federal Civil Service Commission-FCSC",
which was formerly known as CPA with in fact reduced jurisdictional power as compared to what it
had previously.

(ii) The Procurator: the procurator system, which originated in the USSR, has now spread to many
other countries, especially in countries of East Europe. It is an important institutional mechanism for
redressing citizens' grievances and ensuring observance of legality at all levels of the administration.
The procurator is in charge of many functions including prosecution of crimes, supervision over
legality in the activity of the investigating agencies, judicial sentences and judgments, and legality of
the execution of sentences. However, its most significant function is that of "general supervision".

(iii) The Ombudsman: is a Swedish word that stands for an officer appointed by the legislature to
handle complaints against administrative and judicial action. It is a typical Scandinavian institution for
redressing citizens' grievances, which has aroused worldwide interest. It has been adopted in North
European countries. Although the political system of these countries may vary, they have common
interest in the democratization of public administration and finding ways and means for establishing an
effective system of public accountability and control over the administrative apparatus at all levels.

The Ombudsman is established as an instrument of the parliament for the supervision and
control of the administration. In investigating of complaints, the Ombudsman has free access to all the
files of the administration and can demand explanations from the officials or authorities concerned.
Ombudsman can investigate all cases of administrative malpractices and improper use of authority,
complaints against administrative decisions or actions as well as complaints of inefficiency and
negligence.
FINANCIAL ADMINISTRATION

Financial administration is the management of the finance of a state or of a public authority endowed
with taxing and spending powers. Sound Financial administration is vital to the success of any
organization. Efficiency and economy are the two watchwords (mottos) of public finance. Financial
administration seeks to arise, spend and account for the funds need for public expenditure.

Financial administration involves the activities of four agencies: the Executive, which needs and spends
the funds; the Legislature, which grants the funds and appropriates them to particular agencies; the
Finance Ministry, which controls the expenditure; and the Audit, which sits in judgment over the way
in which the funds have been spent. All these agencies have their own role in financial administration.

Sources of Public Finance

The main sources of finance in most governments are taxes, print money, borrowing, sales of
assets, user charges and fees. The method of government financial administration affects the economic
situation of a nation.

Taxes are the main sources of public finance or revenues. Taxes are defined as involuntary or
compulsory payments associated with certain activities of physical or legal persons without explicit
relationship. Taxes could also be further divided as direct and indirect. The difference between direct
and indirect taxes is that the later is paid in connection to production, consumption, imports or exports.
Whereas, direct taxes are levied on employed, self-employed and owners of partnerships.

An indirect tax can be general like Value Added Tax (VAT), or specific tax on certain goods and
services like excise tax. It can also be levied on imported goods, such as customs duties. Indirect taxes
can be levied to counteract the external effects of consumption and production, in addition to its aim of
generating public finance. Revenues from indirect taxation are not in general earmarked transfers, and
are used to finance public expenditure, investments and public transfers.

Budget
In public administration, the term "budget" refers to a financial document, which is annually
placed before the legislature by the executive, giving a complete statement regarding the government
revenues and expenditure of the past financial year and an estimate of the same for the next financial
year. However, it should be noted that there is unanimity in the definition of the term "budget" among
different writers. Despite differences in defining the term, most people agree that the budget is the
keystone of financial administration and the various operations in the field of public finance are
correlated through the instrument of the budget.
Budget is generally, an instrument of financial administration, and for the analysis of a government
policy in financial administration. A budget is a financial report of statement and proposals are
periodically placed before the legislature for its approval and/or sanction. It is a balanced estimate of
expenditures and receipts (revenues) for a given period of time. For the administrator, the budget is a
record of past performance, a method of current control, and a projection of future requirements or
plans.

Budgeting is aimed at gathering legislative support for government proposals. It is an attempt to

allocate financial resources through a political process. It reflects an organization's goals and aspirations
and its policies and proposals to realize them. The real significance of the budget lies in providing
orderly administration of the financial affairs of a government. The conventional pattern of government
budgeting serves the sole purpose of fiscal accountability and is merely a document for parliamentary
control of the financial operations of a government.

ASSESSMENT:

 Activity 1 (refer to attached rubric for grading system)

Name: __________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ________________
Score: _______________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: CASE STUDY

TOPIC:

 CONTROL SYSTEMS IN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

DURATION:

 1 week/ 3hours

LEARNING OUTCOME:
At the end of this chapter, the students will be able, among other things, to:

 Explain what an organ of government is

 Describe the three organs of government – Legislature, Executive and the Judiciary

 Analyse the functions of these organs in the present dispensation

 Identify the reason behind the declining power of the legislature

 State and explain the impact of military decrees in public administration.

TOPIC CONCEPTS

In all the political systems of the world, there are three arms of government – the Legislature,
the Executive and the Judiciary. These are respectively the rule making, rule application and rule
adjudication organs of government. In this unit, you will be introduced to the organs of government, the
three arms of government. We will also describe and analyze the functions of the three arms of
government we shall identify the reasons behind the declining power of legislature.

The Legislature
The Legislature is usually elected body which has the primary responsibility of making laws for
the whole society. Although practically everywhere, the universal duty of the legislative body is law
making, yet it does more than simply write laws.

The Legislative Control of Public Administration

The legislature is that arm of government whose responsibility is to make laws for the entire
country or state or local government as the case may be. Apart from law making, the legislature also
acts as a check on the activities of the other arms of government. Since administration involves the
implementation of public policies and laws made by the legislature, there is the need for the legislature
to exercise control over such implementation. This is to ensure that these policies or laws are being
implemented as intended.

The major reason behind this is to avoid and prevent tyranny, autocracy and maladministration.
It also allows for good government that will meet the yearnings and aspirations of the populace.
Though public administration theorists support the claim for administrative independence from detailed
legislative controls, the massive growth in the size of government and its extended powers over all the
citizenry has necessitated legislative intrusion in details of administration. Such controls run into the
particulars of policy formulated and to its manner of implementation and not just its general shape.

Legislative control of administration is through three (3) devices.

Control of Administration

In many countries, the most important function of the legislature is the control it exercises over the
administrative authorities. Since most existing departments and other administrative agencies were
created by the legislature, it may alter or abolish them at will. It may grant them generous or little or no
money at all.

Secondly, the legislature must ratify treatises and approve appointments to important state offices
before they become effective. It also has the power to discipline members of the executive or any
administrative officer by impeachment, by address or by voting due to lack of confidence. Such control
is necessary to check the abuse of office and excesses of the government, thereby enhancing individual
liberty.

Electoral
Most democratic legislatures play a significant role in selecting public officials. An example
could be seen in parliamentary dispensation where the prime minister is elected by the legislature.
These legislatures do not always, of course, directly cast ballots for various candidates for the office,
yet every time one votes on a question of confidence, it is, in effect re- electing or defeating the
incumbent prime minister. Even in presidential democracies, the legislatures have some electoral
powers. The constitution of the United States provides that, when no candidate for president or vice-
president receives a majority of electoral votes the House of Representatives (each state casting one
vote) will choose the president from among the top three candidates.

Financial
The legislatures also hold what is known as financial power. The legislature determines the nature
and amount of taxes and how public money should be spent, and only as a result of legislative
appropriations.

Executive
In addition to acting upon executive budgets, most democratic legislatures also pass upon certain other
executive proposals. International treatises are negotiated by the executives but must be approved the
legislatures before they become effective. In the United States of America and the 1979 Constitution of
Nigeria, presidential appointments are only provisional until approved by the majority of the senate.

Judicial

Some democratic legislatures also perform judicial functions. This is done through the instrument of
impeachment.

Investigative

The legislatures of most democratic nations perform investigative functions. Legislative committees are
set up for the purpose of digging up information desired by the legislators. These committees hold
hearings, subpoena witnesses, keep records and correspondence and often submit reports to the
legislatures. In the United States the Watergate Scandal investigations are good examples of
congressional investigations.

Constitutional
The legislatures in most democratic systems have certain powers over the establishment and
amendment of their nation’s constitutions. Many constitutions were originally drawn up by the
legislative bodies, and every legislature is authorized to play some role in formal amendments.

Representation

The legislature is the very essence of representative government. Law making has often been treated as
the method of expressing the sovereign will of the whole political community. In a number of nations,
provisions are made for submitting certain legislative proposals to popular referendum, so that there can
be no mistake about what the majority of the people or electoral desires. The legislature may be
considered a mechanism for achieving some form of representation. A legislature, more than any other
government institution, includes among its members, individuals representing the broadcast range of
interest and wide range of viewpoints.

Interest Articulation and Aggregation

The legislature might be viewed as one of the areas in which conflict occurs, or as a forum in which
demands made by different interests are identified, exposed and communicated. Demands and interests
by various groups in society can be articulated within the context of a national legislature. Once
interests and demands are articulated, the legislature can play an important role in aggregating them.
Aggregation means some efforts of reconciliation and compromise.

Supervision, Scrutiny and Surveillance

Legislatures serve as an overseer of the executive on behalf of the general public. The supervisory
function of the legislative extends to public institutions established by the legislature such as public
corporations, local authorities or activities which are supported by public funds. The legislature may
supervise the operation of such institutions to see if it is meeting the goals set forth for it, if the funds
are being well spent and if the operation is being performed within the limits prescribed for it. A

popular instrument of surveillance is the parliamentary commissioner or ombudsman. An ombudsman

is an officer of the legislature. Generally, his purpose is to investigate complaints about the behavior of
administrative officials.

Educating and Informing the Public

The last but not the least is the function which occurs in legislative debates, committee hearings and
elections and during the period between elections when legislators attempt to maintain ties with their
constituents by interpreting major issues in newsletters, in television and radio talks and through
visiting their constituencies. Legislatives are thus forums for educating the people about the activities
of government. The media coverage given to legislative debates and answers provided to questions
raised by the opposition enable the broader pubic to learn about what is going on in the polity.

Typology of Legislatures

Legislatures are classified according to the number of chambers. There are two main types:

unicameral and bicameral.

5.1.3.1.Unicameral Legislatures

Unicameral legislature is one made up of only one chamber and usually composed of members who are
directly elected by the electorate. Examples of unicameral legislatures include Greece, Turkey,
Bulgaria, Israel, Denmark and New Zealand.

Countries adopt unicameral legislatures due to certain factors. They work well in small countries with
homogenous, social and economic organizations. The structure is simple and definitely locates

responsibility. Here, legislations are easily passed into law without delay unlike bicameral legislatures.
Unicameral legislatures are less costly to maintain. The financial burden of paying salaries and
allowances to members of the second chamber is removed. But at times unicameralism is often frowned
at due to certain factors.

The factors in favour of unicameralism rest on the supposed demerits of bicameralism and conversely,
factors opposed to it are the assumed advantages of bicameralism.

Concretely, the virtues of checks and balances and the lessened likelihood that the two houses could be
subject to a demagogue, are absent in the single-chamber legislature. Also, in a state with many
conflicting interests, it is often impossible to provide a formula for representation in a single house.
Bicameral Legislatures

This type of legislature has two chambers: the upper and the lower house or the upper or lower
chambers. Examples of bicameral legislatures include Nigeria, United States, Canada, Britain and
India.

The lower chambers are made up of members elected in direct elections on the basis of universal, equal
and secret suffrage. Usually members of the upper chambers belong to an older age group and are more
experienced in public affairs than members of the lower house.

The upper house is in the main hereditary, but this is not applicable in the case of Nigeria as every
member of the Senate or House of Representatives are periodically elected.

Certain merits are likely to be attached to bicameralism. Here, two houses are less likely than one to be
carried away by the excitement of the moment or the influence of a demagogue. In bicameralism there
is greater likelihood of temperate and deliberate discussion resulting in

balanced equitable careful legislation. It checks upon hasty passages of laws by a single chamber. It is a
safeguard against the despotism of a single chamber. The bicameral system is a bulwark of individual
freedom against the tyranny of a legislature made up of a single interest.

In federal states, the second chamber affords an opportunity for equal representation of units. It enables
the use of the people of political and administrative experience and ability without necessarily
subjecting them to the rigorous process of electioneering.

Bicameralism allows the special representation of certain interests in a country. Thus, apart from
regional representation different interests, socio-economic, traditional and aristocratic are given special
representation in the second chamber. Such representation may serve to secure national unity.

The existence of two chambers allows a division of labour through the assignment of certain minor
matters to one house or the other. Despite the several advantages of bicameralism, there are certain
arguments against it.
The two houses are often deadlocked, preventing or delaying the business of legislation especially
during the period of emergency. A typical example can be seen in the Nigerian National Assembly on
the issue of constitution review where the House of Representative that wants to assume equal status
with the Senate which is often regarded as the upper house of upper legislative chamber.

Bicameralism encourages unhealthy competition between the two houses which may lead to the
paralysis in the process of governance.

Apart from the above mentioned, it is expensive to run. The financial burden of maintaining two houses
is considered an unnecessary waste of resources. There is also the issue of duplication of efforts as both
houses seek independently to obtain the same information and as both debate on the same “question.”

The operation of a cabinet system of government may become almost impossible where either house
can cause a cabinet to fall just by voting “lack of confidence” in the government. Bicameralism may
breed political instability of government.

If membership is by nomination it can be used as a dumping ground for those who were rejected at the
polls by the electorate.

Legislative-Executive Relations

In most nations, the legislature exercises some degree of control and influence over the executive.
Legislatures in parliamentary system of government influence the decision making process of the
executive during the “question period.” Law makers are provided the opportunity to question members
of the government on many points of policy administration.

In presidential system of administration, the legislature may influence the executive by delaying or
disapproving presidential nominations to high offices. Thus the powers of the legislature to approve
certain presidential appointments and ratify treatises negotiated by the president, provides an
opportunity for the legislature to influence the policy of the executive.

In parliamentary-cabinet systems of government, members of the cabinet are chosen from the
legislature. The prime minister and his cabinet are collectively responsible to the legislature. Even in
presidential systems where the executive is chosen outside the legislature, the executive still depends
upon the support of the legislature since all executive policies need its approval to become effective.
The success and stability of the executives in both systems of government depends significantly upon
the continuous mutual cooperation and understanding between the legislature and the executive. A
hostile legislature can frustrate the execution of executive programme.
The issue of financing government projects rests squarely on the shoulders of the legislature.
Legislatures in most countries debate on the appropriation bill before the President or the Prime
Ministry assents it to become a budget. Legislatures in most countries authorize the raising and
spending of the money by the executive. Financial control is a traditional weapon in the hands of the
legislature in seeking to exercise some control and influence over governmental policies. If the
legislature refuses to appropriate money, the executive cannot prosecute designated programmes.

There is also the investigative function of the executive. The legislature can launch investigations into
the conduct of administrative activities and into the personal conduct of and lives of members of the
executive. These investigations may be carried out by committees of the legislature. The abuse of
executive powers can be checked by the investigatory power of the legislature.

Moreover, parliamentary executives can be defeated by the legislature through ensure motion or vote of
no confidence in the executive. This system is designed to keep the executive closely in tune with the
desires of the voters and a majority of their representatives in the legislature. There is also the issue of
impeachments. The executive can be impeached and removed from office on being found guilty of an
impeachable offence by the parliament.

The Executive

The executive arm of government is that organ whose sole responsibility is mainly to implement rules
and regulations as necessitated by the legislature, the law making arm of government. Those who apply
the authoritative rules and policies of a society are called the political executives. This arm of
government gives effect to the will of state by carrying out or executing the law of the land being
constitutions, statutes, decrees and treatise as the case may be.

A Chief Executive is invested with the executive power and are assisted by the ministries extra-
ministerial departments. In modern times those officials generally called “Executives” perform two
distinct principal roles.

The first here is the chief-of-state. Here, he or she is acting as the nation’s official ceremonial head and
spokesman for the entire political entity. Secondly, he or she is referred to as the “Head of
Government” acting as the leader of office holders who propose, direct and enforce the nation’s public
policies. In a parliamentary system of government each role is performed by distinctly different
officials or groups of officials whereas in the presidential system both are performed by the same
official.

Executive Powers and Functions

The executive arm of government derives its powers mainly from the country’s constitution and
the laws that may be reviewed by the judiciary. Their major functions includes that of law enforcement,
the execution of administrative policy, the conduct of foreign affairs, the control of armed forces and
the authority to grant pardon and amnesty to offenders against the state.

The powers of the executive are enormous. Its discretionary authority is very great. It must not merely
execute laws, but must take action on many matters not covered by law. The executive branch of
government is responsible for much of the planning of the modern state. In reality, the executive is the
active force in any government. But these enormous powers conferred on the executive can be grouped
under the legislative, administrative and judicial.

Administrative Functions

The major function of the executive here is that of coordinating and controlling the administration of
the state; direction and supervision of the execution of law.

The power to nominate individuals and sending them to the senate for screening before their
appointments; the executive is also in control of the armed forces. These include the supreme command
of the army, navy and the air force. In some states, the chief executive has the power to declare and
prosecute war.

They also conduct foreign relations. The executive in every state is charged with conducting relations
with other states. At his discretion the chief executive appoints, instructs and controls the activities of
ambassadors, ministers, consuls and other foreign-service officers. He/she may dismiss the ambassador
of a foreign state by recalling his or her own ambassador. He determines the direction of the country’s
foreign policy and also sends representatives to international assembles and conferences. He/she has the
power to negotiate binding treatise with foreign countries.
Legislative Functions

The executive recommends and initiates bills for the consideration of the legislature. The
executive exercises suspensive veto of bills. They delegate legislation which is power to issue statutory
orders and rules under the power vested on t by the legislature. Such power is necessary to meet the
changing circumstances of modern day exigencies.

There is also the power of summoning, proroguing and dissolution of the legislatures especially in
parliamentary systems.

Judicial

The last but not the least is the judicial functions. The chief executive has the power to issue pardons
for offences against the state either before or after trial and conviction. Such a pardon either releases a
person from the legal consequences of a crime or remits the penalties imposed. The chief executive
may reduce a sentence or by a reprieve, delay its execution. Also he may issue a proclamation of
amnesty whereby a specifically described class of persons is freed from the legal consequences of their
actions.

The Judiciary

This constitutes the third arm of government. It entails law, judges and courts. The primary dut y of the
judiciary is the interpretation of law and application f existing laws to individual cases.

The role of the judiciary in modern day democracies cannot be over-emphasized. The liberty of
individuals depends upon the fairness of courts in protecting them both from other individuals and from
tyrannical or over-zealous member of government. To enable the judiciary to fulfill this important role,
it is separated from the control of the other branches of government – the legislature and the executive.
Also important to the preservation of individual liberty is that the judiciary should consist of judges
who are men of honesty, impartiality, independence and sound legal knowledge.
Functions of the Judiciary

The overall function of the judiciary is to interpret and apply the law with certainty and
uniformity to specific cases as they arise.
The major function of the judiciary is that of settlement of disputes. Here, the court deals with cases
between private individuals and the government. Both civil and criminal cases are settled by the court.

A civil case is the one brought in the name of the state against a person accused of a misdemeanor or
felony. It is the duty of the court to determine whether a person is innocent or guilty and accordingly
invoke appropriate penalties.

FINAL EXAM
 First is legislative evaluation. This device occurs after an administrative action has taken place.
This is to determine whether the intention equals the outcome. The second is what is known as
legislative vetoes that influences pending administrative actions. The third is the legislative
authorization that permits the legislature to shape government administrative policies, prior to their
initiations.
C.
 Republic of the Philippines
CITY COLLEGE OF EL SALVADOR
El Salvador City, Misamis Oriental
 Republic of the Philippines
CITY COLLEGE OF EL SALVADOR
El Salvador City, Misamis Oriental
 Republic of the Philippines
CITY COLLEGE OF EL SALVADOR
El Salvador City, Misamis Oriental
Email: [email protected]

 Activity 3 (Fill in the blanks)

Name: _____________________
Course, Year and Section: __________________
Date Completion: ___________________
Score: ________________
Topic: _______________
Instructions: Make a