Prague November 20121 public administration: theory and practice Prof. El Thalassinos Chair Jean Monnet University of Piraeus Editor, ERSJ, IJEBA .

Prague November 2012 1

public administration: theory and practice

Prof. El Thalassinos

Chair Jean Monnet

University of Piraeus

Editor, ERSJ, IJEBA

www.ersj.eu

www.jeanmonnet-emu.eu

www.maritime-unipi.gr


public administration

Public administration is both an academic discipline and a field of practice;

Public administration houses the implementation of government policy and an academic discipline that studies this implementation and that prepares civil servants for this work;

As a "field of inquiry with a diverse scope" its fundamental goal is to advance management and policies so that government can function;


definitions "the management of public programs" "translation of politics into the reality that citizens see

every day" "the study of government decision making, the

analysis of the policies themselves, the various inputs that have produced them, and the inputs necessary to produce alternative policies”


concerns

Centrally concerned with the organization of government policies and programmes as well as the behavior of officials (usually non-elected) formally responsible for their conduct;

Many unelected public servants can be considered to be public administrators, including heads of city, county, regional, state and federal departments such as municipal budget directors, human resources (H.R.) administrators, city managers, census managers, state [mental health] directors, and cabinet secretaries;

Public administrators are public servants working in public departments and agencies, at all levels of government;


Max Weber's theory of bureaucracy Until the mid-20th century and the dissemination of

the German sociologist Max Weber's theory of bureaucracy there was not much interest in a theory of public administration;

The field is multidisciplinary in character; one of the various proposals for public administration's sub-fields sets out six pillars, including human resources, organizational theory, policy analysis and statistics, budgeting and ethics.


more

Public administration has no generally accepted definition, because the scope of the subject is so great and so debatable that it is easier to explain than define.

Public administration is a field of study (i.e., a discipline) and an occupation. There is much disagreement about whether the study of public administration can properly be called a discipline, largely because of the debate over whether public administration is a subfield of political science or a subfield of administrative science.


the North American Industry Classification System definition

Public administration comprises establishments primarily engaged in activities of a governmental nature, that is, the enactment and judicial interpretation of laws and their pursuant regulations, and the administration of programs based on them.

This includes legislative activities, taxation, national defense, public order and safety, immigration services, foreign affairs and international assistance, and the administration of government programs are activities that are purely governmental in nature.


from the academic perspective Defines the study of public administration as a

program that prepares individuals to serve as managers in the executive arm of local, state, and federal government and that focuses on the systematic study of executive organization and management.

Includes instruction in the roles, development and principles of public administration; the management of public policy; executive-legislative relations; public budgetary processes and financial management; administrative law; public personnel management; professional ethics and research methods.


history: antiquity to the 19th century

Dating back to Antiquity, Pharaohs, Kings and Emperors have required pages, treasurers, and tax collectors to administer the practical business of government.

Prior to the 19th century, staffing of most public administrations was rife with nepotism, favoritism, and political patronage, which was often referred to as a spoils system.



Public administrators have been the "eyes and ears" of rulers until relatively recently. In medieval times, the abilities to read and write, add and subtract were as dominated by the educated elite as public employment.

Consequently, the need for expert civil servants whose ability to read and write formed the basis for developing expertise in such necessary activities as legal record-keeping, paying and feeding armies and levying taxes. As the European Imperialist age progressed and the militarily powers extended their hold over other continents and people, the need for a sophisticated public administration grew.



The eighteenth-century noble, King Frederick William I of Prussia, created professorates in Cameralism in an effort to train a new class of public administrators. The universities of Frankfurt an der Oder and University of Halle were Prussian institutions emphasizing economic and social disciplines, with the goal of societal reform. Johann Heinrich Gottlob Justi was the most well-known professor of Cameralism. Thus, from a Western European perspective, Classic, Medieval, and Enlightenment-era scholars formed the foundation of the discipline that has come to be called public administration.


history: antiquity to the 19th century Lorenz von Stein, an 1855 German professor from

Vienna, is considered the founder of the science of public administration in many parts of the world. In the time of Von Stein, public administration was considered a form of administrative law, but Von Stein believed this concept too restrictive. Von Stein taught that public administration relies on many pre-established disciplines such as sociology, political science, administrative law and public finance. He called public administration an integrating science, and stated that public administrators should be concerned with both theory and practice. He argued that public administration is a science because knowledge is generated and evaluated according to the scientific method.



In the United States of America, Woodrow Wilson is considered the father of public administration. He first formally recognized public administration in an 1887 article entitled "The Study of Administration." The future president wrote that "it is the object of administrative study to discover, first, what government can properly and successfully do, and, secondly, how it can do these proper things with the utmost possible efficiency and at the least possible cost either of money or of energy”.


history: antiquity to the 19th century Wilson was more influential to the science of public

administration than Von Stein, primarily due to an article Wilson wrote in 1887 in which he advocated four concepts:

Separation of politics and administration; Comparative analysis of political and private organizations; Improving efficiency with business-like practices and attitudes

toward daily operations; Improving the effectiveness of public service through

management and by training civil servants, merit-based assessment;

The separation of politics and administration has been the subject of lasting debate. The different perspectives regarding this dichotomy contribute to differentiating characteristics of the suggested generations of public administration.


history: antiquity to the 19th century By the 1920s, scholars of public administration had

responded to Wilson's solicitation and thus textbooks in this field were introduced. A few distinguished scholars of that period were, Luther Gulick, Lyndall Urwick, Henri Fayol, Frederick Taylor, and others. Frederick Taylor (1856-1915), another prominent scholar in the field of administration and management also published a book entitled ‘The Principles of Scientific Management’ (1911). He believed that scientific analysis would lead to the discovery of the ‘one best way’ to do things and /or carrying out an operation. This, according to him could help save cost and time. Taylor’s technique was later introduced to private industrialists, and later into the various government organizations (Jeong, 2007).


US in the 1940s

The separation of politics and administration advocated by Wilson continues to play a significant role in public administration today. However, the dominance of this dichotomy was challenged by second generation scholars, beginning in the 1940s. Luther Gulick's fact-value dichotomy was a key contender for Wilson's proposed politics-administration dichotomy. In place of Wilson's first generation split, Gulick advocated a seamless web of discretion and interaction.


Taylor's approach Taylor's approach is often referred to as Taylor's Principles,

and/or Taylorism. Taylor's scientific management consisted of main four principles (Frederick W. Taylor, 1911):

Replace rule-of-thumb work methods with methods based on a scientific study of the tasks;

Scientifically select, train, and develop each employee rather than passively leaving them to train themselves;

Provide ‘Detailed instruction and supervision of each worker in the performance of that worker's discrete task’ (Montgomery 1997);

Divide work nearly equally between managers and workers, so that the managers apply scientific management principles to planning the work and the workers actually perform the tasks.


Taylor's approach

Taylor had very precise ideas about how to introduce his system (approach). It is only through enforced standardization of methods, enforced adoption of the best implements and working conditions, and enforced cooperation that this faster work can be assured. And the duty of enforcing the adoption of standards and enforcing this cooperation rests with management alone.


Taylor's approach

Luther Gulick and Lyndall Urwick are two second-generation scholars. Gulick, Urwick, and the new generation of administrators built on the work of contemporary behavioral, administrative, and organizational scholars including Henri Fayol, Fredrick Winslow Taylor, Paul Appleby, Frank Goodnow, and Willam Willoughby. The new generation of organizational theories no longer relied upon logical assumptions and generalizations about human nature like classical and enlightened theorists.


POSDCORB Gulick developed a comprehensive, generic theory of

organization that emphasized the scientific method, efficiency, professionalism, structural reform, and executive control. Gulick summarized the duties of administrators with an acronym; POSDCORB, which stands for planning, organizing, staffing, directing, coordinating, reporting, and budgeting. Fayol developed a systematic, 14-point, treatment of private management. Second-generation theorists drew upon private management practices for administrative sciences. A single, generic management theory bleeding the borders between the private and the public sector was thought to be possible. With the general theory, the administrative theory could be focused on governmental organizations.


post–world war II to the 1970s The mid-1940s theorists challenged Wilson and

Gulick. The politics-administration dichotomy remained the center of criticism. In the 1960s and 1970s, government itself came under fire as ineffective, inefficient, and largely a wasted effort. The costly American intervention in Vietnam along with domestic scandals including the bugging of Democratic party headquarters (the 1974 Watergate scandal) are two examples of self-destructive government behavior that alienated citizens.


post–world war II to the 1970s There was a call by citizens for efficient administration

to replace ineffective, wasteful bureaucracy. Public administration would have to distance itself from politics to answer this call and remain effective. Elected officials supported these reforms. The Hoover Commission, chaired by University of Chicago professor Louis Brownlow, to examine reorganization of government. Brownlow subsequently founded the Public Administration Service (PAS) at the university, an organization which has provided consulting services to all levels of government until the 1970s.


post–world war II to the 1970s

Concurrently, after World War II, the whole concept of public administration expanded to include policy-making and analysis, thus the study of ‘administrative policy making and analysis’ was introduced and enhanced into the government decision-making bodies. Later on, the human factor became a predominant concern and emphasis in the study of Public Administration.


post–world war II to the 1970s Henceforth, the emergence of scholars such as, Fritz

Morstein Marx with his book ‘The Elements of Public Administration’ (1946), Paul H. Appleby ‘Policy and Administration’ (1952), Frank Marini ‘Towards a New Public Administration’ (1971), and others that have contributed positively in these endeavors.

Public administration can be defined as a department in the executive arm of government responsible for the formulating and implementation of government policies and programmes.


1980s–1990s

In the late 1980s, yet another generation of public administration theorists began to displace the last. The new theory, which came to be called New Public Management, was proposed by David Osborne and Ted Gaebler in their book Reinventing Government. The new model advocated the use of private sector-style models, organizational ideas and values to improve the efficiency and service-orientation of the public sector.

During the Clinton Administration (1993–2001), Vice President Al Gore adopted and reformed federal agencies using NPM approaches. In the 1990s, new public management became prevalent throughout the bureaucracies of the US, the UK and, to a lesser extent, in Canada.


1980s–1990s

Some modern authors define NPM as a combination of splitting large bureaucracies into smaller, more fragmented agencies, encouraging competition between different public agencies and encouraging competition between public agencies and private firms and using economic incentives lines (e.g., performance pay for senior executives or user-pay models.

NPM treats individuals as "customers" or "clients" (in the private sector sense), rather than as citizens.


1980s–1990s Some critics argue that the New Public Management

concept of treating people as "customers" rather than "citizens" is an inappropriate borrowing from the private sector model, because businesses see customers are a means to an end (profit), rather than as the proprietors of government (the owners), opposed to merely the customers of a business (the patrons). In New Public Management, people are viewed as economic units not democratic participants. Nevertheless, the model is still widely accepted at all levels of government and in many OECD nations.


late 1990s–2000 In the late 1990s, Janet and Robert Denhardt proposed

a new public services model in response to the dominance of NPM. A successor to NPM is digital era governance, focusing on themes of reintegrating government responsibilities, needs-based holism (executing duties in cursive ways), and digitalization (exploiting the transformational capabilities of modern IT and digital storage).One example of this is openforum.com.au, an Australian non-for-pronvites politicians, senior public servants, academics, business people and other key stakeholders to engage in high-level policy debate.


late 1990s–2000 Another new public service model is what has been

called New Public Governance, an approach which includes a centralization of power; an increased number, role and influence of partisan-political staff; personal-politicization of appointments to the senior public service; and, the assumption that the public service is promiscuously partisan for the government of the day.


approaches to the study of public administration i

Behavioural Approach System's Approach Ecological Approach Structural Functional Approach Public Choice Approach Contingency Approach


approaches to the study of public administration ii

In academia, the field of public administration consists of a number of sub-fields. Scholars have proposed a number of different sets of sub-fields. One of the proposed models uses five "pillars":


approaches to the study of public administration iii Human resource management is an in-house

structure that ensures that public service staffing is done in an unbiased, ethical and values-based manner. The basic functions of the HR system are employee benefits, employee health care, compensation, etc.

Organizational Theory in Public Administration is the study of the structure of governmental entities and the many particulars inculcated in them.


approaches to the study of public administration iv

Ethics in public administration serves as a normative approach to decision making.

Policy analysis serves as an empirical approach to decision making.

Public budgeting is the activity within a government that seeks to allocate scarce

resources among unlimited demands.


international public administration i There are several organizations that are active.

The Commonwealth Association of Public Administration and Management CAPAM http://www.capam.org/ is perhaps the most diverse, covering the 54 member states of the Commonwealth from India to Nauru. Its biennial conference brings together ministers of public service, top officials and leading scholars in the field.


international public administration ii The oldest is the

International Institute of Administrative Sciences. Based in Brussels, Belgium, the IIAS is a worldwide platform providing a space for exchanges that promote knowledge and practices to improve the organization and operation of Public

Administration and to ensure that public agencies will be in a position to better respond to the current and future expectations and needs of society. The IIAS has set-up four entities: the International Association of Schools and Institutes of Administration (IASIA), the European Group for Public Administration (EGPA).


international public administration iii

The Latin American Group for Public Administration (LAGPA) and the Asian Group for Public Administration (AGPA). IASIA is an association of organizations and individuals whose activities and interests focus on public administration and management.

The activities of its members include education and training of administrators and managers. It is the only worldwide scholarly association in the field of public management. EGPA, LAGPA and AGPA are the regional sub-entities of the IIAS.


international public administration iv

Also the International Committee of the US-based National Association of School of Public Affairs and Administration (NASPAA) has developed a number of relationships around the world. They include sub regional and National forums like CLAD, INPAE and NISPAcee, APSA, ASPA.

The Center for Latin American Administration for Development (CLAD), based in Caracas, Venezuela, this regional network of schools of public administration set up by the governments in Latin America is the oldest in the region.


behavioural approach i

Behavioralism (or behaviouralism) is an approach in political science, which emerged in the 1930s in the United States. It represents a sharp break from previous political science. This is because it emphasized an objective, quantified approach to explain and predict political behavior.

It is associated with the rise of the behavioral sciences, modeled after the natural sciences. This means that behavioralism tries to explain behavior with an unbiased, neutral point of view.


behavioural approach ii

Behavioralism seeks to examine the behavior, actions, and acts of individuals – rather than the characteristics of institutions such as legislatures, executives, and judiciaries – and groups in different social settings and explain this behavior as it relates to the political system.


behavioural approach iii

Behavioralists used strict methodology and empirical research to validate their study as a social science.

The behavioralist approach was innovative because it changed the attitude of the purpose of inquiry. It moved toward research that was supported by verifiable facts.

During its rise in popularity in the 1960s and 70s, behavioralism challenged the realist and liberal approaches, which the behavioralists called "traditionalism", and other studies of political behavior that was not based on fact.


behavioural approach iv To understand political behavior, behavioralism uses

the following methods: sampling, interviewing, scoring and scaling and statistical analysis.

Behavioralism studies how individuals behave in group positions realistically rather than how they should behave. For example, a study of the United States Congress might include a consideration of how members of Congress behave in their positions. The subject of interest is the how Congress becomes an "arena of actions" and the surrounding formal and informal spheres of power.


behavioural approach v

From the beginning, behavioralism was a political, not a scientific concept. Moreover, since behavioralism is not a research tradition, but a political movement, definitions of behavioralism follow what behavioralists wanted.

Therefore, most introductions to the subject emphasize value-free research. This is evidenced by Easton's eight "intellectual foundation stones" of behavioralism:


behavioural approach vi Regularities - The generalization and explanation of

regularities. Commitment to Verification - The ability to verify ones

generalizations. Techniques - An experimental attitude toward techniques. Quantification - Express results as numbers where possible or

meaningful. Values - Keeping ethical assessment and empirical explanations

distinct. Systemization - Considering the importance of theory in

research. Pure Science - Deferring to pure science rather than applied

science. Integration - Integrating social sciences and value


behavioural approach vi

According to David Easton, behavioralism sought to be "analytic, not substantive, general rather than particular, and explanatory rather than ethical.“

In this, the theory seeks to evaluate political behavior without "introducing any ethical evaluations"; Rodger Beehler cites this as "their insistence on distinguishing between facts and values."


criticism i The approach has come under fire from both

conservatives and radicals for the purported value-neutrality. Conservatives see the distinction between values and facts as a way of undermining the possibility of political philosophy.

Neal Riemer believes behavioralism dismisses "the task of ethical recommendation" because behavioralists believe "truth or falsity of values (democracy, equality, and freedom, etc.) cannot be established scientifically and are beyond the scope of legitimate inquiry."


criticism ii Christian Bay believed behavioralism was a

pseudopolitical science and that it did not represent "genuine" political research. Bay objected to empirical consideration taking precedence over normative and moral examination of politics.

Behavioralism initially represented a movement away from "naive empiricism", but has been criticized as an approach has been criticized for "naive scientism". Additionally, radical critics believe that the separation of fact from value makes the empirical study of politics impossible.


system's approach i

Systems thinking is the process of understanding how things influence one another within a whole. In nature, systems thinking examples include ecosystems in which various elements such as air, water, movement, plants, and animals work together to survive or perish. In organizations, systems consist of people, structures, and processes that work together to make an organization "healthy" or "unhealthy".


system's approach ii Systems thinking has been defined as an approach to

problem solving, by viewing "problems" as parts of an overall system, rather than reacting to specific part, outcomes or events and potentially contributing to further development of unintended consequences.

Systems thinking is not one thing but a set of habits or practices within a framework that is based on the belief that the component parts of a system can best be understood in the context of relationships with each other and with other systems, rather than in isolation. Systems thinking focuses on cyclical rather than linear cause and effect.


system's approach iii In science systems, it is argued that the only way to

fully understand why a problem or element occurs and persists is to understand the parts in relation to the whole.

Standing in contrast to Descartes's scientific reductionism and philosophical analysis, it proposes to view systems in a holistic manner. Consistent with systems philosophy, systems thinking concerns an understanding of a system by examining the linkages and interactions between the elements that compose the entirety of the system.


system's approach iv Science systems thinking attempts to illustrate that

events are separated by distance and time and that small catalytic events can cause large changes in complex systems.

Acknowledging that an improvement in one area of a system can adversely affect another area of the system, it promotes organizational communication at all levels in order to avoid the silo effect. Systems thinking techniques may be used to study any kind of system — natural, scientific, engineered, human, or conceptual.


system's approach v The several ways to think of and define a system

include:. A system is composed of parts. All the parts of a system must be related (directly or

indirectly), else there are really two or more distinct systems.

A system is encapsulated, has a boundary. The boundary of a system is a decision made by an

observer, or a group of observers. A system can be nested inside another system.


system's approach vi

A system can overlap with another system. A system is bounded in time. A system is bounded in space, though the

parts are not necessarily co-located. A system receives input from, and sends

output into, the wider environment. A system consists of processes that

transform inputs into outputs.


system's approach vii Science systems thinkers consider that: a system is a dynamic and complex whole, interacting as a

structured functional unit; energy, material and information flow among the different

elements that compose the system; a system is a community situated within an environment; energy, material and information flow from and to the

surrounding environment via semi-permeable membranes or boundaries;

systems are often composed of entities seeking equilibrium but can exhibit oscillating, chaotic, or exponential behavior.


system's approach viii

The systems thinking approach incorporates several tenets:

Interdependence of objects and their attributes - independent elements can never constitute a system.

Holism - emergent properties not possible to detect by analysis should be possible to define by a holistic approach.

Goal seeking - systemic interaction must result in some goal or final state.

Inputs and Outputs - in a closed system inputs are determined once and constant; in an open system additional inputs are admitted from the environment.


system's approach ix Transformation of inputs into outputs - this is the process by

which the goals are obtained: Entropy - the amount of disorder or randomness present in

any system; Regulation - a method of feedback is necessary for the system

to operate predictably; Hierarchy - complex wholes are made up of smaller

subsystems; Differentiation - specialized units perform specialized

functions; Equifinality - alternative ways of attaining the same

objectives (convergence); Multifinality - attaining alternative objectives from the same

inputs (divergence) ;


ecological approach i The ecological model of competition is a

reassessment of the nature of competition in the economy. Traditional economics models the economy on the principles of physics (force, equilibrium, inertia, momentum, and linear relationships).

This can be seen in the economics lexicon: terms like labour force, market equilibrium, capital flows, and price elasticity. This is probably due to historical coincidence. Classical Newtonian physics was the state of the art in science when Adam Smith was formulating the first principles of economics in the 18th century.


ecological approach ii

According to the ecological model, it is more appropriate to model the economy on biology (growth, change, death, evolution, survival of the fittest, complex inter-relationships, non-linear relationships).

Businesses operate in a complex environment with interlinked sets of determinants. Companies co-evolve they influence, and are influenced by, competitors, customers, governments, investors, suppliers, unions, distributors, banks, and others.


ecological approach iii We should look at this business environment as a

business ecosystem that both sustains, and threatens the firm. A company that is not well matched to its environment might not survive.

Companies that are able to develop a successful business model and turn a core competency into a sustainable competitive advantage will thrive and grow. Very successful firms may come to dominate their industry (referred to as category killers).


ecological approach iv Ecological economics is referred to as both a transdisciplinary and

interdisciplinary field of academic research that aims to address the interdependence and coevolution of human economies and natural ecosystems over time and space.

It is distinguished from environmental economics, which is the mainstream economic analysis of the environment, by its treatment of the economy as a subsystem of the ecosystem and its emphasis upon preserving natural capital.

One survey of German economists found that ecological and environmental economics are different schools of economic thought, with ecological economists emphasizing "strong" sustainability and rejecting the proposition that natural capital can be substituted by human-made capital.


ecological approach v

Ecological economics was founded as a modern movement in the works of and interactions between various European and American academics, see the section on history and development below.

The related field of green economics is, in general, a more politically applied form of the subject.


ecological approach vi Mainstream economics has attempted to become a

value-free 'hard science', but ecological economists argue that value-free economics is generally not realistic.

Ecological economics is more willing to entertain alternative conceptions of utility, efficiency, and cost-benefits such as positional analysis or multi-criteria analysis. Ecological economics is typically viewed as economics for sustainable development, and may have goals similar to green politics.


ecological approach vii Ecological economics is distinguishable from

neoclassical economics primarily by its assertion that the economy is embedded within an environmental system.

Ecology deals with the energy and matter transactions of life and the Earth, and the human economy is by definition contained within this system.

Ecological economists argue that neoclassical economics has ignored the environment, at best considering it to be a subset of the human economy.


ecological approach viii

Ecological economics challenges the conventional approach towards natural resources, claiming that it undervalues natural capital by considering it as interchangeable with human-made capital—labor and technology.


ecological approach ix

Neoclassical economists tend to maintain that man-made capital can, in principle, replace all types of natural capital. This is known as the weak sustainability view, essentially that every technology can be improved upon or replaced by innovation, and that there is a substitute for any and all scarce materials.


ecological approach x

At the other extreme, the strong sustainability view argues that the stock of natural resources and ecological functions are irreplaceable.

From the premises of strong sustainability, it follows that economic policy has a fiduciary responsibility to the greater ecological world, and that sustainable development must therefore take a different approach to valuing natural resources and ecological functions.


structural functional approach i Structural functionalism, or simply

Functionalism, is a framework for building theory that sees society as a complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability. This approach looks at society through a macro-level orientation, which is a broad focus on the social structures that shape society as a whole. This approach looks at both social structure and social functions. Functionalism addresses society as a whole in terms of the function of its constituent elements; namely norms, customs, traditions, and institutions.


structural functional approach ii A common analogy, popularized by Herbert Spencer,

presents these parts of society as "organs" that work toward the proper functioning of the "body" as a whole. In the most basic terms, it simply emphasizes "the effort to impute, as rigorously as possible, to each feature, custom, or practice, its effect on the functioning of a supposedly stable, cohesive system".

For Talcott Parsons, "structural-functionalism" came to describe a particular stage in the methodological development of social science, rather than a specific school of thought. The structural functionalism approach is a macrosociological analysis, with a broad focus on social structures that shape society as a whole.


structural functional approach iii Classical functionalist theories are defined by a

tendency towards biological analogy and notions of social evolutionism:

Functionalist thought, from Comte onwards, has looked particularly towards biology as the science providing the closest and most compatible model for social science. Biology has been taken to provide a guide to conceptualizing the structure and the function of social systems and to analyzing processes of evolution via mechanisms of adaptation ... functionalism strongly emphasises the pre-eminence of the social world over its individual parts.


structural functional approach iv Durkheim, who, following Comte, believed that

society constitutes a separate "level" of reality, distinct from both biological and inorganic matter.

Explanations of social phenomena had therefore to be constructed within this level, individuals being merely transient occupants of comparatively stable social roles. The central concern of structural functionalism is a continuation of the Durkheimian task of explaining the apparent stability and internal cohesion needed by societies to endure over time.


structural functional approach v Societies are seen as coherent, bounded and fundamentally

relational constructs that function like organisms, with their various parts (or social institutions) working together in an unconscious, quasi-automatic fashion toward achieving an overall social equilibrium.

All social and cultural phenomena are therefore seen as functional in the sense of working together, and are effectively deemed to have "lives" of their own. They are primarily analyzed in terms of this function. The individual is significant not in and of himself, but rather in terms of his status, his position in patterns of social relations, and the behaviours associated with his status. Therefore, the social structure is the network of statuses connected by associated roles.


structural functional approach vi

Auguste Comte, the "Father of Positivism", pointed out the need to keep society unified as many traditions were diminishing. He was the first person to coin the term sociology. Auguste Comte suggests that sociology is the product of a three-stage development.


structural functional approach vii1. Theological Stage: From the beginning of human history until

the end of the European Middle Ages, people took a religious view that society expressed God's will. In the theological state, the human mind, seeking the essential nature of beings, the first and final causes (the origin and purpose) of all effects—in short, absolute knowledge—supposes all phenomena to be produced by the immediate action of supernatural beings.

2. Metaphysical Stage: People began seeing society as a natural system as opposed to the supernatural. Began with the Enlightenment and the ideas of Hobbes, Locke,and Rousseau. Reflected the failings of a selfish human nature rather than the perfection of God.

3. Scientific Stage: Describing society through the application of the scientific approach, which draws on the work of scientists.


structural functional approach viii

Herbert Spencer (1820–1903), a British philosopher famous for applying the theory of natural selection to society. He was in many ways the first true sociological functionalist.


structural functional approach ix Spencer concluded that society is constantly facing

selection pressures (internal and external) that force it to adapt its internal structure through differentiation.

Every solution, however, causes a new set of selection pressures that threaten society's viability. It should be noted that Spencer was not a determinist in the sense that he never said that:

Selection pressures will be felt in time to change them; They will be felt and reacted to; or The solutions will always work.


structural functional approach x He was in many ways a political sociologist and

recognized that the degree of centralized and consolidated authority in a given polity could make or break its ability to adapt. In other words, he saw a general trend towards the centralization of power as leading to stagnation and ultimately, pressures to decentralize.

Spencer recognized three functional needs or prerequisites that produce selection pressures: they are regulatory, operative (production) and distributive.

He argued that all societies need to solve problems of control and coordination, production of goods, services and ideas, and, finally, to find ways of distributing these resources.


public choice approach i Public choice theory is the use of modern economic tools to study

problems that traditionally are in the province of political science. From the perspective of political science, it is the subset of positive political theory that models voters, politicians, and bureaucrats as mainly self-interested.

It studies such agents and their interactions in the social system either as such or under alternative constitutional rules. These can be represented in a number of ways, including standard constrained utility maximization, game theory, or decision theory.

Public choice analysis has roots in positive analysis ("what is") but is often used for normative purposes ("what ought to be"), to identify a problem or suggest how a system could be improved by changes in constitutional rules, the subject of constitutional economics.


public choice approach ii

Public choice theory is intimately related to social choice theory, which uses mathematical tools to study voting and voters.

Much early work had aspects of both, and both use the tools of economics and game theory. Since voter behavior influences the behavior of public officials, public choice theory often uses results from social choice theory.


public choice approach iii Prior to the emergence of public choice theory,

many economists tended to consider the state as an agent outside the scope of economic theory, whose actions depend on different considerations than those driving economic agents. (The many other economists who did place the state and its agents within such theory include Vilfredo Pareto.)


public choice approach iv Public choice theory attempts to look at

governments from the perspective of the bureaucrats and politicians who compose them, and makes the assumption that they act based on a budget-maximizing model in a self-interested way for the purpose of growing their own power and influence.

The theory aims to apply economic analysis (usually decision theory and game theory) to the political decision-making process in order to reveal certain systematic trends towards inefficient government policies.


public choice approach v Public choice theory is often used to explain how political

decision-making results in outcomes that conflict with the preferences of the general public. For example, many advocacy group and pork barrel projects are not the desire of the overall democracy.

However, it makes sense for politicians to support these projects. It may make them feel powerful and important. It can also benefit them financially by opening the door to future wealth as lobbyists. The project may be of interest to the politician's local constituency, increasing district votes or campaign contributions.


public choice approach vi One way to organize the subject matter studied by public

choice theorists is to begin with the foundations of the state itself. According to this procedure, the most fundamental subject is the origin of government.

Although some work has been done on anarchy, autocracy, revolution, and even war, the bulk of the study in this area has concerned the fundamental problem of collectively choosing constitutional rules. This work assumes a group of individuals who aim to form a government, then it focuses on the problem of hiring the agents required to carry out government functions agreed upon by the members.


public choice approach vii Another major sub-field is the study of bureaucracy. The usual

model depicts the top bureaucrats as being chosen by the chief executive and legislature, depending on whether the democratic system is presidential or parliamentary. The typical image of a bureau chief is a person on a fixed salary who is concerned with pleasing those who appointed him. The latter have the power to hire and fire him more or less at will.

The bulk of the bureaucrats, however, are civil servants whose jobs and pay are protected by a civil service system against major changes by their appointed bureau chiefs. This image is often compared with that of a business owner whose profit varies with the success of production and sales, who aims to maximize profit, and who can in an ideal system hire and fire employees at will.


contingency approach i Contingency approach, also known as situational

approach, is a concept in management stating that there is no one universally applicable set of management principles (rules) by which to manage organizations.

Organizations are individually different, face different situations (contingency variables), and require different ways of managing. Contingency approaches remain less common than change management approaches.


contingency approach ii Contingency approach evolved during the 1960s. Management

theory and research began to adopt a new orientation, one that embodied a simple concept and enabled significant advancements in the study of management and organizations, now referred to as the contingency approach.

It emphasised the importance of situational influences on the management of organisations and questioned the existence of a single, best way to manage or organise. Today, the contingency approach dominates theory and research in the management literature. Contingency approach challenged the classic process and models designed by management theorists such as Taylor and Fayol.


contingency approach iii A conceptual model of the contingency approach

was developed by Kieser and Kubicek. According to the model, the formal structure of an organization defines the roles of its members in a specific way and thereby directs their behaviour to a certain degree.

The performance of the organization depends on the degree to which these role definitions enable members to cope with the requirements resulting from the context of the organization.


contingency approach iv While classical management theorists such as Taylor and

Fayol, were looking for the one best way in management and organization design, in the late 50s and early 60s a shift of paradigm arose, claiming that the organizational structure of a company or administration has to fit to the situation in which it finds itself. As these situations vary, different structures turn out to be most effective.

In other words the optimal organizational structure is contingent, depending on certain contextual factors. Therefore this approach is labelled Contingency Approach, in German the context is termed “situation“; and the approach is called situational approach (“Situativer Ansatz“).


contingency approach v Different researchers focussed on different contextual factors

and investigated their influence in empirical studies. Joan Woodward (1958) looked into the production technology, Blau and Schoenherr (1971) into the size of the organizations, Burns and Stalker (1961) as well as Lawrence and Lorsch (1967) into the economic environment, in particular market competition and technological change.

A broader approach was developed by a British team of researchers at the University of Aston by developing a conceptual scheme for the comparative analysis of organizational structure which took account of several contextual factors at the same time (Pugh & Hickson et al., 1963).


contingency approach vi In a survey of more than 30 organizations, seven contextual

variables such as size, technology, geographical dispersion as well as five dimensions of organization structure (specialization, centralization of decision making, standardization, formalization and configuration) were operationalized by more than 80 indicators.

Statistical analysis was directed towards identifying correlations, which were found, for example, between the size of an organization and the degree of specialization and formalization, as predicted by Max Weber. Later John Child joined the Aston Team and added variables describing the role structure and behaviour of organizational members and the performance of the organization, which are considered to be the relevant criteria for judging the fit between the structure and its context.


contingency approach vii

The Aston research programme was adopted in studies in more than ten countries. The whole research is summarized in four volumes (Pugh/Hickson, 1976; Pugh & Hinings, 1976; Pugh & Payne, 1977; Hickson & McMillan?, 1981). Kieser and Kubicek summarized this and related research in a German Textbook in 1976, using the following conceptual model (figure 1):


contingency approach viii According to this model, the formal structure of an

organization defines the roles of its members in a specific way and thereby directs their behaviour to a certain degree. The performance of the organization depends on the degree to which these role definitions enable members to cope with the requirements resulting from the context of the organization.

For example if there is strong competition and a high degree of technological change, decisions about new products and marketing strategies have to be changed frequently and be taken close to the market.


contingency approach ix The method to analyze and assess these kinds of

relationships is the comparative quantitative analysis, in the most advanced stage a multi-level quantitative analysis, assigning data to the level of the context, the organization and its members.

These variables are operationalized in quantitative indicators, and data are collected by standardized questionnaires distributed to several members of each organization under investigation and afterwards aggregated to different indices for each level (for more details see Kubicek, 1975).


contingency approach x Empirical studies conducted according to this model

could identify some interesting relations but did not show very high correlations and clear cut patterns.

The introduction of additional variables did not increase the level of the correlations. The fit of an organizational structure with its context depends on too many aspects and seems to be too complex, to be precisely captured by linear quantitative relations.


contingency approach xi

However, the basic idea of the situational contingency of a particular object on its context as well as the idea that the performance of an institution depends on the fit between its properties and its relevant context is still valid and of great heuristic value as it suggests the critical examination of too early generalizations and asks for situational differentiation.


contingency approach xii This analytical approach can be found in other areas of management

theory too (e.g. leadership styles or strategic management) as well as in studies on the social shaping of technology.

For example Mayntz and Schneider in a comparative study of the introduction of videotex in the United Kingdom, France and Germany used a conceptual framework according to which the final design of the technical system and its institutional arrangement was influenced by different constellations of actors in each country which acted in different contexts, defined by the respective legal system, political system, market structure and a different technological pool. Kubicek and Westholm used a contingency model of the deployment of e-democracy tools in their scenarios of the future use of this kind of tools.

The map of the socio-technical research landscape employed to map different subjects of research in DEMO-net is based on a contingency approach as well.