CHAPTER 1: NATURE OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

1.1. What is Public Administration?

Administration can be defined as a cooperative human effort towards achieving some

common goals. It is a means by which the policy decisions made by the decision
makers are carried out. It can be found in various institutional settings such as a
business firm, a hospital, a university, a government department and so on. As an
aspect of this more generic concept, public administration is that species of
administration which operates within a specific political setting.

Public Administration deals with the machinery and procedures of government

activities. It is decision making, planning the work to be done, and formulating
objectives and goals, working with the legislature and citizen organizations to gain
public support and funds for government programs.

It is also establishing and revising organization, directing and supervising employees,

providing leadership, communicating and receiving communication, determining
work methods and procedures, appraising performance, exercising controls and other
functions performed by government executives and supervisors.

It is the action part of the government, the means by which the purposes and goals of
the government are realized.

A close scrutiny of the above definitions reveals that public administration has the
following important characteristics or features:

It is part of executive branch of government,

It is related with the activities of the state,
It carries out the public policies, and
It realizes the aspirations of the people as formulated and expressed in the
laws.

1.2. Evolution of Public Administration

The origin of public administration as an academic discipline can be traced back to the
publication in 1887 "the study of public administration" by Woodrow Wilson. While
the art of administration has been practiced for centuries, it has not widely written and
documented until recent years.

In other words, in spite 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 lacking until the end of the 19th century.
The first systematic approach used was studying public administration though law,
which was devoted to the legal organization of public authorities, their legal forms of
action and the limits of their power. Later on attention has been also given to
administrative system primarily concerned with the nature of administrative
institutions and administrative functions.

Generally, the expansion of government function 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.

Rapid technological development created large scale social dislocation that made state
intervention imperative and desirable. Hence scholars came to pay increasing time and
attentions to the problems. The scientific management movement gave great impetus
to the study of public administration.

The gradual evolution of the concept of welfare state was decisively shifted the
philosophy of state function everywhere from traditional laissez faire to that of social
welfare. The welfare movement has tremendously enlarged the scope of government
functions and public administration has become the chief instrument of social welfare.

The movement of administrative reform which took place in the early years of the
19th century in USA to look for remedies of the then problems encountering the civil
service. The impact of the reform movement permitted American Universities to
popularize the study of public administration.

1.3. The Characteristics of Public Administration

Considering several definitions of PA, it is possible to identify public administration

as having the following characteristics:

1. It can be identified with the executive branch of government, but this does not rule
out the fact that public administration is also related in important ways to the
legislative and judicial branches;

2. It is identified with the formulation and implementation of public policies, and thus,
it is closely associated with private groups and individuals. In this sense, public
administration is concerned with the major goals of the society and with the
development of resources for achieving those goals within the context of a rapidly
changing political environment;

3. It is identified with human behavior and cooperative group effort;

4. It is identified with the production of public goods or services;

5. It is a field of study that can be differentiated in several ways from private
administration; and

6. It is identified by Promoting ‘public-ness’ - public administration has to be

explicitly ‘public’ in terms of democratic values, power-sharing and openness.

Other areas of concerns of public administration include:

 Policy sensitivity – it is identified by the innovative and timely policy formulation

which necessitates a new preparedness within the administrative set-up.

 Implementation Capability -effective policy implementation is going to test the

coping capacity of the government in today’s complex situations. Goals have to be
clearly set; planning, programming and projections have to be followed step by step;
and project management in all its ramifications has to have top priority in government.

 Shared understanding of social reality - in today’s complex administrative world,

construction of administrative reality has to be based on understanding the diverse
interests shared understanding of its actors such as the women/men at the top, the
middle managers, the employees, and the citizens. The centralized, insular
bureaucracy does not fit in with the contemporaneous socio-administrative reality.

 Administration as a learning experience -we cannot work with rusted ‘principles’

of the past or the administrative recipes of yesterday to solve current problem. Public
administration in modern times has to be proactive, more adaptable to changes, more
open to new insights, innovative, risk-taking, and often adventurous and has to be
learning organization.

 POSDCoRB, summed up by Gullick, denotes Planning, Organization, Staffing,

Directing, Coordinating reporting the Budgeting.

Planning means the working out in broad outline the things to be done, the methods
to be adopted to accomplish the purpose.

Organization means the establishment of the formal structure of authority through

which the work is sub-divided, arranged, defined and coordinated.

Staffing means the recruitment and training of the personnel and their conditions of
work.

Directing means making decisions and issuing orders and instructions. Coordinating
pertains to an aspect of inter-relating the work of various divisions, sections and other
parts of the organization.
Reporting means informing the superiors within the agency to whom the executive is
responsible about what is going on. Budgeting means fiscal planning, control and
accounting.

1.4. Role and Importance of Public Administration

In today’s modern state and in developing countries functions and role of Public
Administration is very important. The role and importance of Public Administration
are as follows.

1. It is the basis of Government –

Administration is an essential base for the existence of government.

It is possible for a state to exist without a legislature or judiciary; but not even the
most backward state can do without administrative machinery. The modern state
cannot confine its field of activities to merely maintenance of law and order,
dispensation of Justice, collection of revenue and taxes and participation in welfare
activities. The modern welfare state is expected to provide more and more services
and amenities to the people.

Public Administration is the machinery used by the state to place itself in a position to
make plans and programmes that can be carried out.

2. It is the instrument of change in the society/Tool for delivering services: -

Public Administration is regarded as an instrument of change and is expected to

accelerate the process of development. In many country, the government has
undertaken the task of leveling down the economic inequalities, spreading education
among all abolishing untouchability securing equality of status, rights of women and
effective and all round economic and industrial development. The burden of carrying
out these social changes in a planned and orderly way rests upon the Public
Administration of the country.

The modern governments under the welfare philosophy deliver number of services
especially in the area of health, education, recreation, sanitation, social security etc.
The performance of government is normally evaluated in terms of the efficiency,
effectiveness and economy ensured while performing functions to deliver these
services.

3. It plays vital role in the life of the people -

Today every aspect of human life comes within the range of Public Administration.
Various departments of government such as education, social welfare, food,
agriculture, health, sanitation, transport, communication etc. are run by the department
of Public Administration. Thus Public Administration is rendering various types of
services to the people from birth to death of an individual.

4. It is a stabilizing force in the society as it provides continuity

Public Administration is carried on by the civil servants who are the permanent
executives. Political executives i.e. ministers may come and go systems of
government or constitutions may undergo change but administration goes on forever.
Hence, Public Administration is a great stabilizing force in society. It is a preserver of
the society and its culture.

5. An instrument for implementing policies:

Modern governments go a long way in formulating and adopting sound policies laws
and regulations. It should not be forgotten that such policies, laws, etc. are not merely
printed papers. Such paper declarations of intent are translated into reality by public
administration thus converting words into action and form into substance.

6. An instrument of social change and economic development:

Public administration’s role as a change agent is particularly crucial in developing

nations. It is expected of the state at present to work for accelerating socio-economic
change and not to be a passive agency to maintain the status quo.

7. Technical character:

The present day government is expected to provide various services to its population.
The increase in the number of functions undertaken by the government requires highly
specialized, professional and technical, services. Modern public administration usually
represents a galaxy of all of a nation’s occupations.

According Gerald Caiden public administration has assumed the following

crucial roles in contemporary modern society:

1. Preservation of polity;

2. Maintenance of stability and order;

3. Institutionalization of Socio-Economic changes;

4. Management of large scale commercial services;

5. Ensuring growth and economic development;

6. Protection of the weaker sections of society;

7. Formation of public opinion; and

8. Influencing Public policies

1.5. PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION vs. PRIVATE ADMINISTRATION

The following are the differences between the two types of administration:

1. Political Direction or Ministerial Responsibility

Unlike private administration, public administration is subjected to political direction

in most policy matters. It is the minister who lays down broad policy outlines, under
which the bureaucrat has to implement the policy.

2. Profit Motive or Marginal Return:

Public administration is service oriented and profit-making is not its goal. A

businessman will never undertake a ventrue which is not likely to yield any profit to
him. In public administration, there is no correlation between income and expenditure,
since most government departments are spending departments and even in the so-
called revenue-producing departments, the primary motive is always public service.
Public utility services of most governments often run at a loss, yet the governments
are duty bound to spend on them.

3. Social Necessity:

Public administration caters to social needs and public utilities. For example, it
maintains transport to facilitate movement of goods and passengers; the post and
telegraph network facilitates communication; hospitals and pharmacies are meant to
provide medical aid and public health services to the people. The scope of private
administration is narrower. It is mostly concerned with providing marketable
consumer goods to the public, catering to the economic needs of citizens. Besides, the
nature of some of the government services is so wide, comprehensive and expensive
that no private administration can undertake them, e.g., maintaining a vast network of
police, army, railways or post and telegraph.

4. Public Responsibility:

The public administrators are trained and duty-bound to respect the wishes of the
public and cater to their needs. In the words of Appleby, "Government administration
differs from all other administrative work by virtue of its public nature, the way in
which it is subject to public scrutiny and outcry." Private administration has no such
obligation; its main objective is to secure its own ends.

5. Uniformity of Treatment:
Public administration should be consistent in procedure and uniform in its public
dealings. This principle is more applicable to public administration than the other,
because the former is mostly regulated by common and uniform laws and regulations.
Public administration is subject to the principle of external financial control.
Government revenues are controlled by the people’s representatives through the
legislature. In private administration finances are not controlled by any outside
agency.

6. Conformity to Laws and Regulations

The public administrators cannot do anything contrary to, or in excess of legal power.
It has to function within the legal framework, it can never break law. If it does so, its
actions can be declared invalid or, ultra-vires by the courts. Private administration has
no such responsibility.

1.6. Approaches to Study 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. Concise reviews 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
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. INSTITUTIONAL 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 behaviour 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.

1.7. The Environment of Public Administration (In Developed And

Developing Countries)
1. Public Administration In Developed (Industrial) Countries

The following are some of the important features of administrative systems of

developed countries as a group that differentiates 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. Incumbent 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.

Some of the characteristics have been reflected in the nature of the public
administration of these industrial societies.

1. Public bureaucracies are large, and organizationally complex with diverse

functions, divided as they are in numerous units and sub-units. These units require
personnel both of a generalist and technical character, and together they represent the
full range of occupational specializations that are found in those societies. Structurally
and functionally the bureaucracies tend to resemble the Weberian type.

2. The bureaucracy exhibits to a marked degree of professionalism both in the sense of

identification with the public service as a profession and in the sense of belonging to a
narrower field of professional or technical specialization within the service, such as
law, engineering or social work. This professional outlook is the result of various
factors, such as educational background, career orientation and standards of
competence applied in recruitment to the public service as against private sector.

3. Due to the relative stability of political systems, in these societies, the bureaucracy
is more fully developed, its role in the political process is fairly clear and it is
generally accepted in practice as an autonomous institution. In functional terms, the
bureaucracy is primarily involved in rule application, performing secondary functions
of rule-making and interest aggregation to a limited extent.

4. The bureaucracy in a modernized polity will be subject to effective policy control

by other functionally specific political institutions.

The tasks of public administration in industrial societies do not differ in theory from
other societies where the primary task of public administration is to implement public
laws and policies. However, as empirical studies have proved that numerous linkages
exist between the features of an administrative system and their environment, the role
and challenges of public administration in industrial societies have to be viewed in
their particular socio-economic and cultural context. The history of public
administration as an activity and as a discipline is inextricably linked with the
administrative evolution of industrial societies. The development of modern sciences
and technology in industrial societies has led to a tremendous impact on the life of the
people and the activities of the government. Industrialization has created huge
organizations. These in turn, have created complex problems of social cooperation and
administrative coordination, which if not met in time, may cause the ruin of society.
Unless the structure and functions of social organizations and management practices
keep pace with the increased powers, science and technology have placed into the
hands of man, these inventions may bring the doom of man.

2. Public Administration in Developing Countries

Many of the developing countries have got their independency 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.

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:

Non-merit considerations influence greatly assignments, promotions,

dismissals, and other personnel practices,
Widespread corruptions,
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:
 enact laws that cannot be enforced,
 Adopting personnel regulations that are peacefully by-passed,
 Announcing programs for delegation of administrative authority while keeping
tight control over decision-making at the center,
 Reporting as is 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.