PUBLIC MANAGEMENT NEEDS HELP! Steven Kelman Weatherhead Professor of Public Management Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government

THE PROBLEM Government organizations are an important part of the universe of organizations in most Western countries, 35-50% of GNP U.S. Department of Defense larger than ExxonMobil or Walmart Government organizations often have significant performance problems Little research is going on in mainstream organization studies on government organizations Research in public administration/public management often not up to the same research standards as mainstream organization studies research

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION RESEARCH: THE ROAD NOT TAKEN Many early classics in organization studies use government organizations as examples (Weber, Selznick, Crozier, Blau) Public administration was an important field inside political science The road not taken: Herbert Simon’s Administrative Behavior (1947) vs. Dwight Waldo’s The Administrative State (1948) Simon emphasizes performance (efficiency) as a goal and social science as a method Waldo emphasizes “democratic administration” as a goal and opposes social science as a method

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION RESEARCH: THE ROAD NOT TAKEN (continued) Public administration criticized in the political science discipline for preoccupation with “manhole covers” rather than political philosophy Waldo becomes an icon of public administration – the field’s highest award gets named after him Simon becomes an icon of social science and wins the Nobel Prize – but leaves the field of public administration! Public administration becomes separated from mainstream social science Mainstream organization studies embraces social science, stops studying government organizations, and starts studying business firms.

Decline in Research About Government in Mainstream Organization Studies

THE WAY FORWARD: STUDYING PERFORMANCE Movement by practitioners starting in the 1990’s to focus on the performance of government organizations (“New Public Management”) – goals vs. constraints Many in public administration resist this move object to bringing business techniques to government organizations (“managerialism”) object to idea of “customer service” (vs. “citizen”) object to idea of “entrepreneurship” in the public sector defend emphasis on process values (fairness, “rule of law”) over results values

THE WAY FORWARD: STUDYING PERFORMANCE (continued) This may condemn ordinary people to bad service and bad treatment People want better government performance – believe government is under-performing Public administration not serving results-oriented practitioners well enough Relevance to Korea??

THE WAY FORWARD: SOCIAL SCIENCE METHODS Compare leading mainstream journals in organization studies (Academy of Management Journal, Organization Science) with public administration journals Econometric methods prominent Psychological experiments prominent – recent change at Harvard Disciplined qualitative research Problems with case studies, “best practices research” (selection on the dependent variable) Recent changes: Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, International Public Management Journal

THE WAY FORWARD: TOPICS FOR RESEARCH Bureaucratic organizational forms Nonfinancial performance measurement Public service motivation Rare events (emergency management, finding terrorists) Interorganizational production and governance Relevant topics for Korea?

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