Public Administration means “the systematic study and

improvement of government capacity and practice in forming

policies, making decisions, implementing them, and securing the
desired results” (Ocampo, 1993).

There is also a view that public administration is both an art

and a science.

As an art, public administration involves creativity, leadership,

a good sense of judgment or what Waldo (1955) calls the
intangibles in administration.

This view is closely allied to the practice of public administration.

Public administration as a science means that there is a body

of knowledge or theories that can explain or predict certain
phenomena or variables in the field of public administration.
PUBLIC AND PRIVATE ADMINISTRATION

The often cited difference between public and private

administration is goal or mission. The former is service-
oriented and the latter is guided primarily by profits.

Another difference lies in the nature of goods and

services they provide. Public administration provides what are
called public goods which can be enjoyed by all regardless of
whether they have money to pay for them or not. Examples
public goods are national defense, streetlights, public parks, and
roads.

Private administration, on the other hand, provides goods and

services to those who can afford to pay for them. Using this as
criterion, it is quite selective in whom it is going to deliver goods
and services to. Like, if you want to eat hamburger in the mall,
you have to pay for it so you can enjoy it.
 Public administration is subject not only to public pressures
and scrutiny but also to internal legal administrative constraints
presented by government rules and regulations.

This characteristic distinguishes public administration from

private administration (Fry, 1989).

According to Caiden (1971), public administration has

peculiarities that separate it from other instructions.

First, it is unavoidable. Citizens cannot escape the reach of its

authority and have to deal with it in their daily life.

Second, it can compel obedience from the citizens because it

has a legal monopoly of coercive power.
The powers it enjoys is generally accepted and considered
legitimate by the people and necessary for maintaining a stable,
civilized, and productive society.
 Third, the activities carried out by public administration
have priority.
This means that the activities are important and significant
in making the life of citizens better, that these are all needed
in making society a better place to live in.

Fourth, having the largest single multipurpose

organization, public administration can provide, as it does,
people with a wide range or public services, from issuing birth
certificate to pollution control, granting franchise, maintaining
peace and order, vaccinating children, delivering mail,
sweeping the streets, maintaining public parks, etc.
 Fifth, public administration has, for its boss, the political
leadership to which it reports directly.

Sixth, measuring the performance of public administration

is difficult due to its political nature and the kind of functions
and processes it performs.

Seventh, there are public expectations which public

administration must meet but which are not heaped upon the
private sector.
 Criteria Public Administration
Goal/mission Public service
Relations to Subject to public scrutiny
environment (fishbowl existence); public
demands/ expectation; political
pressures
Accountability Accountable to public;
transparency in transactions is
expected
Measures of Performance difficult to measure; Profit is the bottomline
performance general public satisfaction is the
gauge; in the ultimate sense-
general improvements in quality
of life (which itself is open to
many interpretations)
Nature of Public goods – basically open to
goods/services all
provided
Private Administration
Profit
Less exposed to public
inspection; internal
processes are kept from
public; response to public
guided by market dynamics
Management accountable to
owners of
firms/corporations
Private goods – availment
based on one’s ability to pay.
DEVELOPMENT OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION STUDY

Public administration practice is as old as the history of many

nations; its existed in ancient Greece, Mesopotamia, Egypt and
China.

Administration was present when the leaders of nations built

their cities, constructed massive infrastructure projects, organized
huge armies, managed vast territories, and codified their laws.
 It was not until the seventeenth century when the term
“public administration” came into use.

This happened in monarchical Europe when distinction was

made between the king’s administration of public affairs and
management of his private household.

Later, as church and state were separated and

government grew to take care of increasingly diverse societal
activities, modern public administration emerged.

The first systematic studies in contemporary public

administration were done in Prussia. These studies, conducted
and taught by professors of cameral sciences, were designed
to prepare potential public officials of Prussia for government
service.
 In American shores, it is generally accepted that the first
call for a systematic study of public administration was
sounded by Woodrow Wilson in 1887 in his essay “ The Study
of Public Administration.”

Here in the Philippines, we can say that the formal

introduction of public administration study occurred when the
Institute, now College of Public Administration, was
established in the University of the Philippines in 1952.
ORGANIZATION THEORY

In public administration, we are interested in how public

organizations or the government bureaucracy work and how
we can further improve them.

MODELS OF ORGANIZATION THEORY

The simplify, we’ll use the commonly employed way of

categorizing organization theory:

(1) Classical
(2) Neoclassical or human relations, and
(3) Integration theory or modern theory.
CLASSICAL THEORY

Classical theories, so-called because they are timeless and

well- established, include the

1. Scientific management
2. Administrative management
3. The bureaucratic model.

Scientific management covers a number of ideas about

how work at the industrial shop or factory can be carried out
with utmost efficiency and minimum waste in human and
material resources.

Its principal proponent, also regarded as father of

scientific management in the United States, was Frederick W.
Taylor. (1856 – 1915).
 He contended that by subscribing to the best way of
carrying out a task, efficiency could be achieved and waste of
resources could be minimized. (Kernaghan and Siegel, 1991)

Scientific management emphasized, too, the importance of

a managerial cadre that would supervise the work in the
factory, clear division of duties between management and
labor.

Selecting through scientific means the best person for a

job, training the staff, and monetary incentives to reward
good performance or increased productivity.

The influence of scientific management on public

administration was its contribution to the wide acceptance of
efficiency as a primary objective of administration.
 Administrative management, also called principles of
management, was concerned with developing a set of
universal principles that can be applied to any type and all
levels of the organization.

Unlike scientific management which focused on the lower

level of organization, administrative management emphasized
the functions of management and the structuring of
organization.

How and when to use them depends on the executive’s

assessment of the situation.
The 14 principles of administration are:

• Division of labor – work is distributed among different

employees; greater efficiency is achieved if people become
more specialized in their jobs.

• Authority – formal authority gives superiors the right to

command people to get things done; authority emanates
from the position one is holding.

• Discipline – employees should respect the policies and

rules of the organization; good leadership at all levels of
the organization, fair agreement (for example, provision for
salary increases), and judicious application of penalty for
violation contribute to discipline.
• Unity of command – an employee should receive
instructions only from one person or from his or her
superior to prevent conflict and confusion.

• Unity of direction – organizational functions that have

the same objective should be directed by only one
supervisor.

• Subordination of individual interest to general

interest – the good or interest of the organization should
prevail over individual interest; employee interest should
not supersede the interest of the organization.

• Remuneration of employee – payment for work done

should be fair to both employees and employers.
• Centralization – management should have the final or
ultimate say in the organization but it should also be able
to decentralize adequate amount of decision making
powers or authority to its subordinates to enable them to
perform their functions well.

• Scalar chain or hierarchy – organization is structured

along a line of authority that starts from the top then down
to the lowest level of the organization; the topmost part
wields the ultimate power and responsibility in the
organization; hierarchy is usually depicted by the
organizational chart.

• Order – people and materials should be present in the

right places and at the right time (and perhaps in the right
amount?); people should be matched to the right jobs.
• Equity – supervisors should be friendly and fair to their
subordinates.

• Stability of tenure of personnel – security of tenure

among the staff provides continuity and efficiency in
operations; high employee turnover rate disrupts work and
consequently adversely affects the effective functioning of
the organization.

• Initiative – subordinate should be given a certain amount

of freedom to devise plans and carry them out even when
some plans do not turn out well.

• Esprit de corps – team or group spirit promotes

organizational unity and should thus be encouraged
(Stoner, 1987)
Bureaucratic model?

The bureaucratic model is derived from the construct of the

ideal bureaucracy of Max Weber (1864 – 1920).

In today’s parlance, bureaucracy is usually thought of with

pejorative meaning like red tape, slow, inept, etc.

But based on Weber’s study, the bureaucracy is the most

efficient form of organization for administrative purposes.

The main characteristics of the ideal bureaucracy, also called

rational-legal bureaucracy are:
1. hierarchy
2. division of labor
3. formally written rules and procedures
4. impersonality
5. neutrality
 The three theories have commonalities.

All of them focus on the organization and internal structure.

Very little regard is given to the worker or employee within the

organization as persons; when they do, it’s usually in terms of
how people can help accomplish organizational goals in the most
efficient manner.

All of them emphasize the value of efficiency, effectiveness,

and economy in carrying out administrative tasks.

All are concerned with productivity that should be attained at

least cost and human efforts.
 Neoclassical theory is commonly referred to as the human
relations or human behavior school.

It’s an attempt to improve on the classical concepts. It

prevailed in the late 1920s though the 1930s.

A shift from the mechanical view of organization in the

classical theory to a more humanistic perspective.

Human relations theory looked at organizations as a social

system consisting of interpersonal relationships.

It focused on the people and the dynamics of human

behavior in organizations – how people interact with one
another, how they behave in their workplaces, their feelings,
motivations, and aspirations.
INTEGRATIVE OR MODERN ORGANIZATION THEORY

Classical theory focused on the formal organization while

neoclassical emphasized the people aspect or informal group in
organizations.

Subsequent organization studies tried to explain and

understand organizational phenomena in a more holistic method,
integrating the classical approach with the social-psychological
perspective of human relations.

This represents the modern public administration.

Three streams of thoughts in modern public
administration are:
(1) decision-making theory;
(2) industrial humanism; and
(3) open-system theory.
Decision – Making Theory

One way to reconcile the classical model with the human

relations perspective (or rational and non-rational) was to focus
on the decision-making process in the organization.

Open – System Theory

Organizations are viewed as open social systems because they

continuously relate or transact with their environment. They
receive inputs from it. These inputs such as human and material
resources are essential to their operation and success.

Under the open systems perspective, organizations are

dynamic and have the capacity to make and adjust to internal
changes and respond to the changing conditions in the
environment where they are operating.
Contingency Approach

The contingency approach is also an attempt to integrate the

various schools of management ideas.

It proposes that no single technique or method is applicable to

all situations. That is, a particular method may successful work in
one situation but it does not necessarily mean that it will be
effective in other situations.

The main thesis of the contingency approach is that

administrators or managers have to identify the best solution or
strategy that is most suitable in a given situation. This suggests
that administrators must have an understanding of the various
factors, e.g., resources, policies, organizational structure,
technology, attitude and morale of employees, etc., that are at
play in a particular organization and circumstance and be able to
determine what will work best in each case..
DEVELOPMENT ADMINISTRATION AND NEW PUBLIC
ADMINISTRATION

Four models or varieties of public administration theory,

namely traditional public administration, development
administration, new public administration and development
public administration.

DEVELOPMENT ADMINISTRATION

The Development Administration (DA) school is the variety

or type of public administration theory that studied the
administration of new independent states or developing
countries in the ‘50’s and ‘60’s.
It aimed to identify administrative behavior and patterns
that would be useful for these countries to effectively run
their governments and to attain economic development.
 As defined by Gant, development administration refers to
the “complex” of agencies, management systems, and
processes a government established to achieve its
development goals” (Gant, 1979).

In other words, development administration aimed to

strengthen the bureaucracy to ensure that government
policies and programs for national development were
effectively and efficiently implemented.
NEW PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

In the 70s, a new thinking in public administration took shape.

This was the New Public Administration thought, or New PA for
short.

It emerged in the United States at a time of fast-paced

technological advancement and unprecented economic growth.

At the heart of the NPA doctrine is the principle of social equity

which seeks to redness the deprivation of the minority.

New PA called on public officials to abandon the façade of

neutrality and, instead, use their discretion to protect and promote
the welfare of the disadvantaged groups.

It called for a client-oriented administration, non-bureaucratic

structures, participatory decision-making, decentralized
administration, and advocate-administrators.
END OF SLIDES.