Professional Documents
Culture Documents
LLB Assignment
LLB Assignment
1)
Introduction
Public Administration is a newly emerged discipline compare to other Social Sciences discipline. Public Administration has gained immense importance since the emergence of Administrative state. In Ancient Greek, Roman and Indian political system gave more importance to the concept of Administration. Kautilyss Arthasathra contributed large scale in the administrative system; it deals every aspect of the state and its relation to subjects. In simple sense Public Administration is state mechanism. In every Political System administration have significant role.
There are two divergent views regarding the nature of the Public administration. These views are following Integral View. According to this view, Public administration is a sum total of all the activities undertaken in pursuit of and in fulfillment of public policy. These activities include not only managerial and technical but also manual and clerical. Thus the activities of all persons from top to bottom constitute administration although they are of varying significance to the running of administrative machinery. Prof: L D White adopts this view of Public administration. According to him, Public Administration consists of all those operations having for their purpose the fulfilment or enforcement of public policy. This definition covers a multitude of particular operations, many in fields. Another scholar Marshal E Dimock also shares the same view. He holds that administration is concerned with the what and how of government. The what is the subject matter, the technical knowledge of a field which enables the administrator to perform his tasks. The how is the technique of management, the principles according to which cooperative programmes are carried to success. Managerial view. According to this view, the works of only those persons who are engaged in the performance of managerial functions in an organisation constitute administration. In this managerial view the administration has the functions of planning, programming and organise all the activities in an organisation so as to achieve the desired ends. Luther Gullick and Herbert Simon subscribe this view. Gullick says Administration has to do with getting things done; with the accomplishment of defined objectives. These two views are deals the nature of public administration. In simply the nature of Public Administration deals the execution.
Period IV (1947-1970):
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. 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. 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 analyses 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. This period witnessed the development and inclusion of other social sciences knowledge, predominantly, psychology, anthropology, and sociology, into the study of public administration. 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.
The 1960s and 1970s were the periods of turbulence, instability in public administration. The earlier dogmas of public administration economy and efficiency were found inadequate and incomplete objectives of administrative activity. It began to be said that efficiency is not the whole of public administration. Man is the centre stage of all administrative activity who cannot be subjected to the mechanical test of efficiency. The term New Public Administration was used to describe the new trends in administration. The two books Towards a New public Administration, the Minnowbrook perspective edited by Frank Marini and published in 1971 and Public Administration in a time of turbulence edited by Dwight Waldo and published simultaneously gave seeds of the concept of new public administration. The major factors for the emergence of New public administration 1. 2. Philadelphia Conference Minnow brook Conference
Rationality
In Public Administration there is a good deal of emphasis on rationality as the main criterion for administrative dimensions and actions. But this rationality really refers to the rationality of, the administrator and not as people would interpret it. The administratorneeds to consult the citizens as well not only about what'is proposed to be done but also about what ought to be done and by whom.
Structures
There is 'a need in adopting a dynamic approach to organizational structure. Appropriate Decentralization of authority and modification of hierarchies of control and subordination for instance, need continuous review so that the structure becomes relevant to the changing needs of environment.
Relevance
Public Administration has always emphasized efficiency and economy. Public Administrationis criticized as having little to say about contemporary problems and issues. At the Minnow brook Conference, the participants focused attention
on the need for policy-oriented.Public Administration must explicitly deal with Political, and normative implications of all administrative actions.
Values
New Public Administration is explicitly normative. It rejects value concealing behaviouralism as well as procedural neutrality of traditional Public Administration. The participants at the Minnow brook Conference clearly espoused that value neutral Public Administration is Impossible. They emphasized that public officials have to advocate the interests of the disadvantaged people.
Social Equity
Public Administration is indicated as an instrument of status quo, denying social justice to the less privileged groups. The leaders of New Public Administration emphasis the principle of social equity and it considered more welfare oriented administration.
Change
Achievement of social equity requires promotion of change by the public administrators. Change is necessary to prevent Public Administration from coming under the dominance of powerful interest groups. New public administrators should regard change as a constant fact of administrative life.
Features of C P A
1. 2. 3. 4. Studies different administrative systems in their ecological settings. It emphasized empirical study based on rigorous methods such as field observation, field experiments. It developed inter-disciplinary orientations It lays stress on the inter-action between administration and socio, economic, cultural and political phenomena.
5. It highlights the multi-organisational nature of P A and importance of interaction among organisations at different levels of government.
unprofitable business activity, even it is essential for public welfare. The ends of Public administration is communal, while those of private business is personal. The main beneficiary of public administration activities is the entire community, whereas that of business is the owner of business himself. Further, 'Profit' serves as a simple criterion to judge the efficient or inefficient performance of a business firm. But the abstract value of 'social good' promoted by public organization can not be measured in terms of monetary gain or loss. There is no direct comparison between governmental agency's cost and the value of its services to the public (c) Legal Framework Public Administration operates within a legal framework. The activities of Public Administration are fixed by a set of constitutional practices, law, rules and regulations. Government officials must always act within their legal power. They can not act outside the law. If they do so, their action can be challenged in the courts of law on the grounds. This is the reason why everything done by public officials must be supportable by reasonably clear statutory authority. The numerous legal constrains on the action of public officials account the limited discretion enjoyed by them in discharging duties. However, such legal constrains are essential to prevent the officials from abusing their powers. By contrast, the behavior of business organization and the activities of business administration are subject to less legal constrains. Business executives in the private sector can usually do anything which is not forbidden by law. This gives them freedom to select and carry on only profitable activities. (d) Consistency of treatment The government official is required by law to maintain a high degree of consistency in his dealing with the public. He has to observe the principle of equality of treatment in serving the people. He is under legal obligation not to show any discrimination against any person. In other words, the public officials is denied discretion in the interest of fairness and equality. On the other hand, the business administer is not legally obliged to treat the small and big customer alike. (e) Public Accountability Public Accountability is the hall-mark of Public Administration in a democracy. The Public administrator carries on his work in a "glass bowl". His actions are open to public review and scrutiny at all times. His activities must be guided by public needs and public opinion. In a democracy Public Administration is held accountable for its activities through legislative oversight and judicial review. This shows that in the sphere of Public Administration the initiative for securing accountability lies with those to whom it is due. Public accountability is not a value effecting business administration. Business
administration is not accountable for the public for what they do and what they fail to do. (f) Large-scale administration Public Administration is large scale administration. It is larger then any big business concern in terms of size, complexity and diversity of activities. The activities and policies of government affect entire socioeconomic structure of society. Public administration contrast with the private administration in size and diversity of activity. (g) Essentiality of some public services Certain public services such as national security, law and order, health care, transport and communications are vital to the existence of community itself. These services can not be neglected by any government. On the contrary, the service provided by the business organization such as supply of costly cloths and shoes and other luxury items are not essentials for existence of society.