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IPA
IPA
1.1 INTRODUCTION
Every system of public administration is the product of many influences. Its form and content reflect its
historical origin; existing patterns are a composite of practices and procedures of both ancient and
contemporary. As White (1955:13) noted, no administrative system can be well understood without
some knowledge of what it has been, and how it came to be what it is now. Therefore, when we
study public administration, it would be indispensable to look at it from a historical perspective.
The study of Public Administration is strictly related with the very existence and changing functions
of the government. Therefore, public administration must always be seen in the context (framework,
situations, perspective) of the problems confronting the government. Such problems, inter alia, may
include:
The conflict between sovereignty and responsibility, or the reconciliation of liberty with the
duty to govern. The government must be strong enough to command obedience and ensure
compliance to its rules as well as to administer effectively, whilst at the same time being
controlled in order to establish responsibility to certain standards.
The need to balance achievement of the common good and with the demands of vested
interests.
The need to balance present necessities with future desirability
The need to balance traditional attitudes with scientific curiosity.
Some of the challenging problems of the government role have been developed far beyond the basic
and conventional activities of external defense, internal law and order, and tax collection, to an
interventionist and active planning role.
What were the fundamental causes or factors behind the changes in the functions of the government?
A complex of combination of factors led to the expansion of the role of the state, and thus of public
administration, namely;
(a) Industrialization: the development of industry and the associated growth of towns
(urbanization) led to various socioeconomic problems such as those related to housing, health,
unemployment and so on. These problems were not satisfactorily resolved through the market
system, and thus political demands eventually led to state action.
(b) Social cost: as the scale of commercialization increased, it became apparent that the activities
of one organization or individual could impose extra costs upon the society in general; for
example environmental damage from pollution. Thus, pressure upon the state both to
regulate and to take certain responsibilities upon itself became necessary.
(c) Market inadequacies: certain basic facilities that would bring successful economic growth
were not being effectively provided by the private sector. Hence, the state, for example, took
an interest in communications: roads, posts, etc quite on early stage.
(d) Political demands: as a result of many factors like those mentioned above, various groups
organized themselves in order to present their views politically. Those groups requested an
integral and active intervention of the state in their interest and affairs.
In general, public administration showed tremendous growth, both as a profession and as a field of
study, alongside the expansion of government functions and changing trends in its essential roles
What several writers have agreed upon is that public administration as an activity is as old as
civilization, but as an academic discipline it counted only hundred years. In other words, public
administration as an activity has existed long before systematic study of the subject began. Official
academic status to the discipline didn't come until World War I, until when public administration was
recognized as an independent field of study and subject textbooks were published.
This, however, doesn't mean that thinkers in earlier times had never said anything significant about
public administration. Functioning of the government machinery has attracted the attention of scholars
and administrators in scattered ways since the earliest periods. The point is that, such scattered
thoughts didn't constitute a discipline, a systematic study of the subject.
Was authoritarian, patriarchal and elitist (or discriminatory) in character, informal and fluid
structure,
In contrast, state administration of the modern era that gave rise in the 19th Century to replace the old
patriarchal, hereditary state administrative system has, among others, the following features:
Takes the form of public bureaucracy, and administrators were recruited on the basis of public
law, became more formal,
More formal structure performing largely within a legal framework,
Performs multiple of functions, much beyond revenue collection, maintenance of law and order,
as well as security functions.
Tasks becoming by-and-large welfare concern and public oriented,
The present era is that of the modern administrative state. The question is that how modern
administration does came to exist and operate? All mass movements since the 18th Century have
contributed to the increasing volume, variety and scope of public administration. Increasing
population, urbanization, public communications, and mobility diversified governmental activities.
Public administration is indispensably (essentially) present in all forms of states, capitalist, socialist,
developed or developing in nature.
Modern public administration has assumed more and more functions within its scope and operates a
vast array of public laws and provides public services. The scope and importance of public
administration increases with an increasing social complexity, specialization and differentiation.
In the present age, there is hardly any aspect of a citizen's life, which doesn't involve public
administration. Public administration is increasingly loaded with additional works and responsibilities
like promoting efficiency, egalitarianism (social equality), and rapid socio-economic development.
Gerald Caiden (1971) has listed the following crucial roles as assumed by public administration in
contemporary societies:
The fact that people need public administration to operate well with the aforementioned and more other
functions enables it to become a key power constituent (element) both in developed and developing
societies alike.
Public administration is the management of governmental affairs or issues at all levels or tiers,
national, regional (state), and local. It is the branch of the wider field of administration. There are
slight differences between "administration" and "public administration".
The important elements of administration, according to these definitions, are cooperative effort,
systematic application, and purposefulness.
There have been many people writing or arguing public administration as possessing an element of
science since the 1880s. Woodrow Wilson, who was known as the pioneer of public administration as a
subject of study, called it the "science of public administration" as early as 1887
Willoughby (1927), who was one of the early writers of the field, also declared that the subject matter
possessed uniformities analogous to the laws of physical sciences. He wrote that there are certain
fundamental principles of general application in public administration analogous to those
characterizing any science.
Collections of papers were also presented in 1937 on the subject under the title of "Papers on the
Science of Administration". Writers of those papers reflected their positions in that for any discipline
to claim the title and status of science, there should exist a body of principles embodied in it. The
Hence, public administration can obviously be rated as a science if it proves that it has developed a set
of principles and acquires all the above three features. The question again is that does public
administration have a set of such principles and features?
Many writers agree in that counter arguments in public administration to deserve a science position are
feeble (weak, meager) and insufficient. Rather, the last hundred years have seen remarkable
development of the science of public administration. Evidences of which are:
The transformation of the laissez-faire (liberal, nonjudgmental) state into the modern
welfare state has enlarged its sphere, added to the functions of government and aroused
interest in the problems of efficiency in government, which remained to be an art for long
proceeding by way of trial and error.
The works of industrial engineers, like Taylor, pioneered the scientific methods with
emphasis on experimentation, observation, collection of data, classification and analysis, and
the formulation of laws and principles.
The development of other administration components such as organizing, planning,
personnel administration, and budgetary control as a result of the progress of the scientific
method.
The veritable (genuine) contributions of writers from different disciplines (backgrounds) to
administration and management such as Fayol, Peter Drucker, and others show that it is
derived from a body of cross-cultural studies.
All these arguments are aimed to strengthen discussions in understanding and accepting public
administration to be called as science.
In this regard, we find commentators arguing against the clarity of public administration to be entitled
the status of science. Rumki Basu (1994:5), for example, said that all the three features are yet
imperfectly present in public administration.
In other words, the debate is that public administration cannot be called a science until the following
three conditions are fulfilled.
The place of normative values in public administration should be clearly identified and made
clear,
(a) The Political environment: public administration is concerned with the implementation of
decisions made within the political system. In a democratic system, the policies of the
government duly approved by the legislature should represent the political will of the
people, or at least the resultant of the activities of the various competing political interests
in the society. In consequence:
(i) The government creates individual rights and imposes constraints on individual and
group behavior
(ii) The administrator is in frequent contact with his clients and his major concern is
with equity and impartiality
(iii) Administrative procedures are built around strict compliance with the law. On the
other hand, private industry is essentially guided by the principles of profit
maximization and doesn't act as an arbiter between conflicting social interests.
(b) Social costs: public administration decision-making varies from that of private business in
that where private business is primarily concerned with questions of financial cost and
benefit, public administration is intimately concerned with the concepts of social costs and
benefits in addition to those of a mere financial nature.
(c) Public interest: Public administration is often evaluated by the ability to operate in a
manner so as to maximize and integrate the public interest, whereas private business is
evaluated on the basis of profit maximization. In other words, although efficiency is
axiom number one in the value scale of both public and private administration, in private
business it has to do with the minimization of cost and maximization of profits, while in
the context of public administrative system the aims are more complex to include other
concepts like public service, public accountability, and social responsibility. Therefore,
In the context of this note, the term "developed" or "industrial" societies refer to those countries of
Western Europe and USA where industrialization has brought about major changes in economic
structure and growth accompanied by political and administrative modernization.
Nevertheless, it should be noted that administrative modernization is not a typical or exclusive feature
of developed countries. Because some developed countries might not have modern administrative
system, while we could find a developing country that employs modern administration.
In summary, we can generally say that the nature of public administration of these industrialized
countries can be differentiated from those of the developing ones in structure and function.
Structurally and functionally they tend to resemble to the Weberian model of bureaucracy.
The fact that bureaucracy in these countries exhibits (demonstrate) high degree of professionalism in
turn is the result of various factors like educational background, career orientation and standards
of competence applied in recruitment to the public service. Due to a relative stability of political
systems in these societies, bureaucracy is fully developed with fairly clear roles and practical
acceptance as an autonomous institution. In terms of function, bureaucracy is primarily involved in
rule application, but performing secondary functions of rule making.
Public administration in these countries is more responsive and responsible to the public; provides
efficient and effective public services; performs both routine and welfare tasks. For such and many
other reasons, citizens of the industrial societies often view public administration as an impartial and
expert body of professionals intellectually equipped to cope with their administrative needs.
For example, public administration in developed societies is extremely affected by the development of
modern science and technology, and communication networks. Relative autonomy of institutions in
developed countries has also its own (special) administrative problems, reflected in terms of lack of
coherence among numerous service and regulatory organizations or agencies.
Generally, according to Rumki Basu (1994:43), developed countries (especially in Europe) are typical
examples of what is known as the "administrative state"; and the bureaucracy in these states mainly
perform three types of functions:
Many of the developing countries have got their independence 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
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.
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
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.
(iv) The movement of government and administrative reform which took place in the early
years of the 19th century in USA to look for remedies of the then problems envisaged or
He further propounded (advocated) the following fourteen principles of organization; namely, (1)
Division of work, (2) Authority, (3) Discipline, (4) Unity of command, (5) Unity of direction, (6)
Subordination of individual interest to general interest, (7) Remuneration of personnel, (8)
Centralization, (9) Scalar chain, (10) order, (11) Equity, (12) Stability of tenure of personnel, (13)
The bureaucracy is a circle from which no one can escape. Its hierarchy is a hierarchy of
knowledge. The top entrusts the understanding of detail to the lower levels, whilst lower
levels credit the top with understanding of the general and so all are mutually deceived".
From his explanations, we can understand that he has overemphasized the malicious (evil) side of
bureaucracy, and his view is in clear contrast to the conception of his countryman, to the Weberian
conception of bureaucracy as "rationalization of organization". Nevertheless, whatever arguments he
has made and explanations he provided about bureaucracy, public administration as a discipline didn't
care much for his views since it was not his purpose to develop a theory of public administration. He
simply wrote a critique on bureaucracy alongside his famous critique of the political economy of
capitalism.
Robert Michels, who is equally known in the theory of bureaucracy, on the other hand concentrated his
analysis on the internal politics of large organizations and to the phenomenon of elite domination in
organizations. He concluded that all big organizations tended (had a propensity) to develop a
bureaucratic structure that ruled out the possibility of internal democracy.
The various meanings, which have been given to the term, include the following:
(a) Institutional meaning: the term "bureaucracy" may refer to government by appointed or
recruited officials as opposed to government by elected representatives. Alternatively, it may
be used to indicate that, although representative government exists, the dominant role is held
by officials. These definitions, however, tend to be inadequate in that they fail to distinguish
those common situations where government consists of a combination of elected and non-
elected members and officials.
(b) Activity of officials: in contrast, a definition may be attempted from the aspect of what
officials do or how they behave. In this regard the following interpretations exist;
(i) Derogatory: the synonymous use of "bureaucracy" and "red tape", resulting from the
real and supposed difficulties of dealing with the official environment. This is
however an extremely offensive yet subjective meaning of bureaucracy.
Weber stressed that the bureaucratic form of organization is capable of attaining the highest degree of
efficiency since the means used to achieve goals are rationally and objectively chosen towards the
desired ends. In this sense, it is the most rational means of carrying out functions effectively in any
organization, superior to every other form in precision, stability, discipline, and reliability. Weber tried
to identified the various factors and conditions that have contributed to the growth of bureaucracy in
modern times. Namely:
(a) The development of modern large-scale organizations and corporations has led to the
development and considerable spread of bureaucracy. Whatever may be the evils of
bureaucracy, it is indispensable for the running of complex administrative structures.
Max Weber principally developed the organizational definition of bureaucracy and conceived of the
concept in two aspects, namely:
(a) The social mechanism that maximizes efficiency in administration
(b) A form of social organization with specific characteristics. Social organization is described
as "institutionalized strategies for the achievement of administrative objectives by the
concrete efforts of many officials".
Weber specified the following structural and behavioral characteristics or conditions that an
organization must possess before properly being called or distinguished as a bureaucracy:
(1) Division of labor: This involves a specified sphere of competence, which has been marked
off as part of a systematic division of labor in the organization, and job placement is based
qualifications and/or special training. The regular activities required for the purpose of the
structure are distributed in fixed ways as official duties,
(2) Hierarchy: It is the feature of any bureaucratic form of organization. The organization of
offices follows the principles of hierarchy, with a clear separation between superior and
subordinate offices; i.e. each lower office is under the control and supervision of a higher
one. Being a bureaucratic official constitutes a career, and there is a system of promotion
and career advancement on the basis of seniority or merit, or both,
(3) Rules: Bureaucracy operates in accordance with a consistent system of abstract rules laid
down regarding the performance of official jobs. There is consistency in the application of
the rules to specific cases to avoid personal favoritism, arbitrariness, or nepotism that would
otherwise hinder the function of an organization,
(4) Rationality: Weber's ideas on efficiency and rationality are closely related to his ideal
(typical) model of bureaucracy. For Weber, bureaucracy is the most rational known means
This approach is mainly concerned with the scientific study of human behavior 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.
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.
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.
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.
The evolution of public administration as an academic discipline falls mainly into the following six
crucial stages.
Stage One
The first stage, which began with the publication of Woodrow Wilson's work, "The Study of
Administration" in 1887, can be called "the era of politics-administration dichotomy". Wilson is
considered as the founder of the academic discipline of public administration. Making a distinction
Another notable event of the period (first stage) was the publication of Goodnow's in title "politics and
administration" in 1900, which supported the Wilsonian idea further by conceptually distinguishing
the two functions. According to him, "politics has to do with policies or expressions of the state will"
whereas "administration has to do with the execution of these policies".
Apart from this, the institutional locations of these two functions were differentiated; the location of
politics were identified with the legislature and higher levels of the government where major policy
decisions were taken, while the location of administration was identified with the executive branch of
the government and the bureaucracy.
With an increasing recognition of the study of public administration in American universities, Leonard
D White (1926) wrote a book known as "Introduction to the Study of Public Administration", which
was recognized as the first textbook on the subject. This book, while advocating a politics-
administration dichotomy, stressed the human side of administration, dealing comprehensively with
administration in government.
Stage Two
The second stage of evolution is marked by the tendency to reinforce the idea of politics-administration
dichotomy and to evolve a value-free "science of management". The central belief of this period was
that there are certain "principles" of administration, which were the task of scholars to discover and
advocate. Important works of this period sharing the same approach were:
"Principles of Public Administration" by Willoughby (1927),
"Principles of Organization" by Mooney and Reiley,
"Creative Experience" by Mary P Follett,
"Industrial and General Management" by Fayol,
"Papers on the Science of Public Administration" by Gulick and Urwick, eds (1937),
The main reason for the upsurge of interest of administration in this period was absence of enough
skilled personnel to perform the rapid multiplication of government functions following the 1930s
The main difference between the protagonists of the politics-administration dichotomy of the first and
second stages in the evolution of the discipline is that, while the former ones emphasized the legal and
constitutional aspects, the new school of scientific management of the second period emphasized a
purely scientific approach to the study of public administration, but retaining ideas of the first period.
With the help of scientific management methods, the leaders of public administration tried to discover
certain principles of public administration, which could be of universal applicability. Gulick and
Urwick (1937) coined the word BOSDCORB to promote some of these principles of administration.
BOSDCORB stands for Planning, Organizing, Staffing, Directing, Coordinating, Reporting, and
Budgeting. These maxims (principles of administration were said to be of universal applicability in all
organizations.
Stage Three
The third stage began with a creation against the mechanical approach. The so-called "principles" of
administration were challenged and dubbed as "naturalistic fallacies" and "proverbs". The third stage
approach was based on experiments and organizational analysis. The experiments, which focused upon
work groups, have brought a major shook on the foundations of the scientific management school of
thought by clearly demonstrating the influence of social and psychological factors on the worker's
output.
This approach also drew attention to the effect of informal organization in the formal setup, the
phenomenon of leadership and influence, and impact of conflict and cooperation among groups in the
organizational environment. Thus, the approach revealed the vital importance of human relations in
organizations. Lastly, this approach criticizes the politics-administration dichotomous analogy of the
first and second period thinkers. Politics and administration couldn't be separated; one couldn't be taken
out of the other.
Stage Four
One was engaged in the development of a pure science of administration, which required a
solid base in social psychology, and the other was concerned with the normative aspects of
administration and prescription for public policy.
The second approach would require a broad understanding of political science, economics, and
sociology as well.
He favored the coexistence of both approaches, empirical and normative, for the development of the
discipline of public administration. Likewise, Dahl's essay identified three important problems in the
evolution of the science of public administration:
(i) The impossibility of excluding normative considerations from the problems of public
administration. Values inevitably (permeate) filter through administration while science is
value-free.
(ii) The inescapability of the fact that the study of administration must include a study of human
behavior, which is open to all possible variables and uncertainties making it impossible to
subject it to the rigors of scientific enquiry.
(iii) The tendency to pronounce universal principles based on few examples drawn from limited
national and historical settings.
Thus, the principles of public administration were attacked. They were not scientific but normative,
not universal but culture-bound. They were not grounded in evidence but based on misplaced
corporate analogies and autocratic assumptions.
Stage Five
Secondly, separate studies of public and private business administrations tended to merge into a single
science of organization, whose theories and concepts were to be equally applicable to both private and
public administration
Thirdly, the increasing use of the systems and the behavioral approaches encouraged the comparative
study of administrative systems in diverse social settings and environments. New perspectives were
seriously needed and the impetus for the study of comparative public administration and development
administration (a relatively unknown field before WW II) became apparent.
Planning is the primary (first) administrative or managerial function that sets the stage for other
functions. It is a process of deciding exactly what one wants to accomplish and how to best go about it
before action is required. When planning is done well, it creates a solid platform for further managerial
efforts of other functions. .
Planning is a means to an end. Planning is not an end by it self. It is a means to an end (meeting
objectives). Planning is an instrument that pushes people towards the achievement of objectives.
Planning is preparing today for tomorrow; it is the activity that allows managers to determine what
they want and how to get it: They set goals and decide how to reach them. Planning focuses on the
future: what is to be accomplished and how. Answers six basic questions in regard to any intended
activity:
Planning is an essential activity for any organization that wants to survive by achieving its objectives.
Otherwise the old management dictum (saying), "failing to plan is planning to fail" still holds true.
Objectives specify the expected results and indicate the end points of what is to be done, where the
primary emphasis is to be placed and what is to be accomplished by the network of strategies, policies,
procedures, rules, budgets and programs. In developing objectives, the manager should consider two
characteristics: (1) objectives should be realistic and specific, and (2) objectives should be compatible
with other organizational objectives.
The more specific the objectives are, the easier it will be to monitor progress and to note successful
completions.
(ii) Developing premises
Planning premises are assumptions about the environment with in which the plan is to be carried out.
Once objectives are established managers have to investigate the company's environment to know
factors that facilitate or block the attainment of these objectives. This involves examining the external
and internal factors which affect the performance of the organization: the external environment (for
treats and opportunities) through PEST analysis and internal environment (for strengths and
weaknesses) through self-audit.
The difference between that a firm would like to be (where we want to be) and where it will be if it
does nothing is called the Planning gap. Strategic planning is primarily concerned with closing that
gap. The success or failure of an organization depends up on the success or failure of strategic plans. It
makes premises for tactical plans.
Tactical Plan: Is a midway plan that helps to reduce long range planning in to intermediate one by
increasing the amount of specificity and making the actions goal oriented. Tactical plans are specific
and more goal-oriented than strategic plans. Middle level management in consultation with lower level
management develops them. Especially tactical plans:
Are the means charted to support the implementation of the strategic plans and achievement of
tactical goals. They are concerned with shorter time frames and cover a narrower scope.
Structures a firm’s resources to achieve maximum performance.
Make premises for operational plans.
Are narrower in scope than strategic plan and wider than operation plan; but more detailed than
strategic plan and less detailed than operational plan
Operational Plan: Is concerned with the day today activities of the organization and is made at the
lower level management in consultation with middle level management. Operational plans spell out
specifically what must be accomplished to achieve specific /operational goals. It is concerned with the
efficient, day-to-day use of resources allocated to a department manager’s area of responsibility. A
typical operational plan, for example, in a business firm could be production plan, financial plan,
facilities plan, marketing plan, and human resource plan.
Operational plans have relatively short time frame (< 1 year). It is the most detailed and narrowest plan
compared to the above two, because it is to be implemented on day-to-day basis. Unless operational
plans are not achieved in organizations, tactical and strategic plans will not be successful and goals at
those levels will not be achieved.
Not all policies are “written statements”; they are often merely implied from the actions of managers.
The president of a company, for example, may strictly follow perhaps for convenience rather than as
policy a certain practice. The practice may then be interpreted as a policy and carefully followed by
subordinates.
Top managers of the organization usually establish policies formally and deliberately. They can also
emerge informally and at lower levels in the organization from a seemingly consistent set of decisions
on the same subject made over a period of time.
Rules: spell out specific required action or non-actions, i.e., actions that must be or must not be taken,
allowing no discretion in a given situation; for example "No smoking", "cheating is prohibited". Rules
are unlike procedures in that they guide action without specifying a time sequence.
Procedures: are statements that detail the exact manner in which certain activities must be
accomplished. They put the precise order of activities to be carried out to do a task and thus,
procedures are chronological sequences of required actions. They provide detailed step-by-step
instructions as to what should be done.
When we compare the above three, policies, procedures and rules, we can understand that all are alike
in the sense that they are directives to guide people’s behavior to the desired ends and they are plans,
which are to be followed in the future. Conversely, procedures and rules are different from policies in
that the former are guides to actions while the latter are guides to thinking. So, procedures and rules
(b) Single use plans: are plans aimed at achieving a specific goal that, once reached, will most likely
not recur in the future and dissolved when these have been accomplished. They are designed to
accomplish a specific objective usually in a relatively shorter period of time and it is non-repetitive.
They are detailed courses of action that probably will not be repeated in the same form in the future.
The major types of single use plans are programs, projects, and budgets.
Programs: are a complex of goals, policies, procedures, rules, task assignments, steps to be taken,
resources to be employed and other elements necessary to carryout a given course of action. A program
is a comprehensive plan that coordinates a complex set of activities related to a major non-recurring
Budgets: is a statement of financial resources set a side for specific activities in a given period of time.
It a statement of expected results expressed in numerical terms. Budget is a single use plan that
commits resources to an activity over a given period of time. It may be expressed in Birr, worker
hours, units of product, machine hours, or any other numerically measurable term. It may be referred to
as a “numberized” program. Budget is also a control device. However, making a budget is clearly
planning.
Contingency planning can be added up to those major types of plans (standing and single use plans)
within the "use dimension of plans". Contingency planning is the development of alternative plans for
use in the event that environmental conditions evolve differently than anticipated, rendering original
plans unwise or unfeasible.
Futurity: Since a plan is a forecast of some future action, it must have the quality of futurity;
otherwise, it has little value as a basis for future action. If a plan is to be effective, it must foresee with
reasonable accuracy the nature of future events affecting the industry and the firm. The inability to
foresee future events, a human limitation that we cannot overcome, is the week link in planning
process.
Flexibility: Because no one can foresee the future, plans must be flexible. They must adjust smoothly
and quickly to changing conditions without seriously losing their effectiveness. The more difficult it is
to predict the future, the more flexible the plans must be.
Stability: Stability doesn't contradict with flexibility. A stable plan will not have to be abandoned
because of long-term changes in the company’s situation. It may be affected by long-range
developments, but it should not be changed materially from day to day.
Comprehensiveness: A plan must be comprehensive enough to provide adequate guidance, but not so
detailed as to be unduly restrictive. It should cover everything required of people, but not in such detail
that it inhibits initiative.
Simplicity and clarity: Although a good plan must be comprehensive, it should also be simple. A
simple plan seeks to attain its objective with the fewest components, forces, effects and relationships.
A plan should not be ambiguous. Lack of clarity makes understanding and implementation difficult.
Action-oriented: Good planning helps us to stay proactive rather than reactive to things because it
makes more:
Result-oriented- creating a performance-oriented sense
Priority-oriented- making sure that the most important things get first attention
Advantage-oriented- ensuring that all resources are used to the best advantage
Change-oriented- anticipating problems and opportunities, so they can be best dealt with.
Some of the useful planning tools and techniques include forecasting, benchmarking, and participation.
Forecasting: is a vision of the future, a process of assumptions about what will happen in the future.
Forecasting could be made on the basis of quantitative or qualitative analysis.. To plan managers have
to gather relevant information from around the environment. Information is one of the valuable
resources for planning to exist. In the final analysis, however, forecasting relies on human judgment,
thus it is always subject to error.
Benchmarking: is a frame of reference used as a starting point. It is a technique that makes use of
external comparisons to better evaluate one's current performance and identify possible actions for the
future. Benchmarking needs information, as basically no plan exists without information. The purpose
of benchmarking is to find out what other people or organizations are doing very well and to plan how
to incorporate these ideas into one's own operations. It allows an opportunity to analyze and compare
all systems and processes for efficiency and innovation.
Participation: the concept of participative planning requires that the process include people who will
be affected by plan outcomes and/or will be asked to help implement them. Participation can increase
the creativity and information available for planning. It can also create the understanding, acceptance,
and commitment of people in every aspect. In the modern time, planning should be formulated in a
participatory manner that includes the contribution of many people representing diverse
responsibilities.
3.2 THE ORGANIZING FUNCTION
3.2.1 The Meaning of Organizing
Once a manger develops a workable plan, the next step is bringing resources together in the most
effective manner to accomplish the plan. The manager should strive to match labor force to the right
place (job), which is an important part of management functions of an organization.
Planning, consequently, requires organizing the efforts of many people. It forces us to address several
basic questions:
What specific tasks are required to implement our plans?
How many organizational positions are needed to perform all the required tasks?
How should these positions be grouped?
How many layers of management (Organizational levels) are needed to coordinate them?
How many people should a manager supervise directly?
Organizing: is the management process or function that focuses on allocating and arranging human
and nonhuman (physical) resources so that plans can be carried out successfully and attained
organizational objectives. It is the management function that establishes relationship between activity
and authority. It is through the organizing function that administrators/managers determine which tasks
to be done, how tasks can be best combined into specific jobs, and how jobs can be grouped into
various units that make up the structure of the organization.
Organizing - refers to the coordination of resources; i.e. labor, managerial talent, material, machinery
and money. It is an activity of establishing the total system of social and cultural relationship among
peoples who are joined together to achieve some specific common objectives.
to each manager. Determining the span of control in turn has to do with the supervisory effectiveness
of managers.
3.2.2 THE ORGANIZING PROCESS
The organizing process has the following steps.
(j) Identification of objectives
This is to understand clearly the objectives of the organization, i.e., to reconsider the objectives
established during planning and identify the specific objectives to be pursued.
(ii) Identification of the specific activities needed which help the organization achieve its
objectives. Knowing the objectives clearly makes the identification of activities needed clear and
simple. Here we ask what work activities are necessary to accomplish the identified organizational
objectives. Creating a list of tasks to be accomplished begins if we identify clearly what objective in to
be accomplished or met. This identification of specific activities needed is called division of labor.
(iii) Grouping of activities necessary to attain objectives
The series number of activities listed and/or identified must be grouped together. That is, this involves
grouping together of activities in accordance with similarities (homogeneity) of the activities,
interdependence, job characteristics or any other grouping criteria, and this result in departments and
the process is called departmention. Grouping of similar activities is based on the concept of division
of labor and specialization.
Management has identified activities necessary to achieve objectives has classified and grouped these
activities in to major operational areas. The activities now must be assigned to individuals who are
simultaneously given the appropriate authority to accomplish task.
This step requires the determination of both vertical and horizontal operating relationships of the
organization as a whole. The vertical structuring of the organization results in a decision-making
hierarchy showing who is in charge of each task, of each specialty area, and the organization as a
whole. Levels of management are established from bottom to top in the organization. These levels
create the chain of command, or hierarchy of decision-making levels, in the company.
The result of this step is a complete organization structure. An organization chart shows this structure
visually. While developing organizational structure, managers make a variety of decisions; especially
they decide division of labor, delegation of authority, departmentation, span of control, and
coordination.
When joint accomplishment of a grand task is the goal of many people, this overall task must be split in
to its component jobs and apportioned among the people involved. It is only after these jobs are
correctly done that the grand task can be achieved.
The degree to which the grand task of the organization is broken down and divided in to smaller
component parts is referred to as division of labor. Division of labor is performed in light of
organizational objectives. It begins by determining (sub tasks) called jobs that are necessary to
After determining the sub tasks, sub tasks will be defined by enumerating the activities that each
individual sub tasks would entail in terms of what the incipient sub task performer is expected to do.
This is called job description. Job description is an account of activities what the sub task performer is
expected to perform and the associated authority and responsibility relationships among jobs.
The sub task assigned to the sub task performer is called job. Thus by doing so individuals specialize in
doing part of the task rather than the entire task, i.e., division of labor in effect is the assignment of
various portion of a particular task among organizational members. In short, division of labor involves:
Breaking down a task in to its most basic elements
Training workers in performing specific duties
Sequencing activities so that one person's efforts build on another's.
Authority - is the right to commit resources (that is, to make decisions that commit an
organization’s resources), or the legal (legitimate) right to give orders (to tell some one to do or not to
do something). It is the right to make decisions, carry out actions, and direct others in matters related to
the duties and goals of a position. It is the formal right of a superior to command and compel his
subordinates to perform a certain act. All managers in an organization have authority. It provides the
means of command.
Generally level of authority varies with levels of management. Higher-level managers have greater
authority, with ultimate power resting at the top. Authority decreases all the way to the bottom of the
chart, where positions have little or none. Authority is vested in a manager because of the position
he/she occupies in the organization, that is why we say, “authority comes with the territory.”
The person who occupies the position has its formal authority as long as he/she remains in the position.
As the job changes in scope and complexity, so should the amount and kind of formal authority
possessed. Even though a manager has formal or legitimate authority, it is wise to remember that the
willingness of employees to accept the legitimate authority is a key to effective management. Chester
Bernard called this Acceptance Theory of Authority.
Delegation of Authority - is the down ward pushing of authority from superiors to subordinates to
make decision with in their area of responsibilities. It is the process of allocating tasks to subordinates,
giving them adequate authority to carry out those assignments, and making them obligated to complete
the tasks satisfactory. Delegation is a concept describing the passing of formal authority to another
person. It is the assignment of part of a manager’s work to others, along with both the responsibility
and authority necessary to achieve expected results.
Delegation is necessary for an organization to exist. Just no one person in an enterprise can do all the
tasks necessary for accomplishing a group purpose, so is it impossible, as an enterprise grows, for one
person exercise all the authority for making decisions.
In delegating authority a manager doesn’t surrender his power because he does not permanently
dispose of it; delegated authority can always be regained. This is called recovery of delegated
Assignment of tasks
Specific tasks or duties that are to be undertaken are identified by the manager for assignment to the
subordinate. The subordinate is ten approached with the assignment.
Delegation of authority
In order for the subordinate to complete the duties or tasks, the authority necessary to do them should
be delegated by the manager to the subordinate. A guideline for authority is that it be adequate to
complete the task - no more and no less.
Creation of accountability
Accountability is having to answer to some one for your results or actions. It means taking the
consequences - either credit or blame. It is the requirement to provide satisfactory reasons for
significant deviations from duties or expected results. When the subordinate accepts the assignment
and the authority, he or she will be held accountable or answerable for actions taken.
A manager is accountable for the use of his/her authority and performance. The manager is also
accountable for the performance and actions of subordinates. The manager should take the time to
think through what is being assigned and to confer the authority necessary to achieve results. The
subordinate, in accepting the assignment becomes obligated (responsible) to perform, knowing that
he/she is accountable (answerable) for the results.
The terms centralization and decentralization refer to a philosophy of organization and management
that focuses on either the selective concentration (centralization) or the dispersal (decentralization) of
authority with in an organization structure. Centralization or decentralization is a relative concept when
applied to organizations. They are tendencies of delegation of authority.
Managers cannot ordinarily be for or against decentralization of authority. They may prefer to delegate
authority, or they may like to make all the decisions. Some factors that affect the degree of
centralization or decentralization- delegation of authority- are:
Whether authority will be decentralized frequently depends upon the way the business (organization)
has been built. Those enterprises that, in the main, expand from with in show a marked tendency to
keep authority centralized. On the other hand, enterprises that result from mergers and consolidations
are likely to show, at least first, a definite tendency to retain decentralized authority. In other words,
Organizations, which were centralized or decentralized at their establishment, tend to centralize and
decentralize authority to repeat what they have done before. When centralized organization is changed
in to decentralization and the vice versa people feel discomfort.
The costlier and the riskier the decision is, the more centralized the authority will be. Cost may be
reckoned directly in dollars and cents or in such intangibles as the company’s reputation, its
competitive position or employee morale. The fact that the cost of mistake affects the decentralization
isn’t necessarily based on the assumption that top managers make fewer mistakes than subordinates.
A real shortage of managers would limit decentralization of authority, since in order to delegate,
superiors must have quantified managers to whom to give authority. In addition to the availability of
LLMs the quality of the existing LLMs, (subordinates) has impact on centralization or decentralization.
4. Management philosophy
The character and philosophy of top executives have an important influence on the extent to which
authority is decentralized. Sometimes top managers are despotic, tolerating no interference with the
authority they jealously hoard. At other times, top managers keep authority not merry to gratify a desire
for status or power but because they simply cannot give up the activities and authorities they enjoyed.
The larger the organization, the more decisions to be made, and the more places in which they must be
made, the more difficult it is to coordinate them. These complexities of organization may require
policy questions to be passed up the line and discussed not only with many managers in the chain of
command but also with many managers at each level, since horizontal agreement may be as necessary
as vertical clearance.
Slow decisions - show because of the number of specialists and managers who must be consulted - are
costly. To minimize the cost, authority should be decentralized wherever feasible. Also important in
determining size is the character of a unit. For decentralization to be thoroughly effective, a unit must
possess a certain economic and managerial self-sufficiency.
7. Environmental uncertainty
Environmental uncertainty tends to produce a need for more decentralization. In this case, the fast pace
of change interferes with top management’s ability to assess situations with the speed necessary to
make timely decisions.
1. Fear of loss of power - if the subordinate does too good a job. Some managers’ fear when they
delegate authority because they expect that they will be substituted/replaced by their subordinates if
subordinates have got the experience and skill of decision-making.
2. “I can do it better myself” fallacy: Some managers have an inflated worth of them selves and
think that they do everything better than their subordinates.
3. Lack of confidence in subordinates: There perception of managers that my subordinates just are
not capable enough” When managers delegate authority to their subordinates they do not also delegate
responsibility. That is, managers are accountable for the actions of their subordinates and may fear the
blame if subordinates fail, if subordinates lack knowledge and skill.
5. Difficulty in briefing: Many times managers are reluctant to delegate authority if they conclude
that the time for briefing is more than the time for decision-making or if they believe they lack the time
to train subordinates. “It takes too much time to explain what I want done”.
1. Fear of failure and criticism: Subordinates who fear criticism or dissemble for mistakes are
frequently reactant to accept delectation. The solution for this problem can be teaching
subordinates when they make mistakes than criticizing or dismissing.
2. Subordinate may believe that the delegation increases the risk of making mistakes but doesn’t
provide adequate rewards for assuming greater responsibility.
3. Lack of incentive or reward for assuming a greater workload. Accepting delegation frequently
means that they will have to work harder under greater pressure. Without appropriate
compensation subordinates may be unwilling to do so.
4. Lack of adequate information and resources. If subordinate managers think that they don’t have
enough factual information on which to base a decision or other resources necessary to carryout the
assigned duties, they tend to decline/reject accepting authority delegated. If subordinates are
already overworked.
5. Lack of self - confidence
6. Believing / Thinking that decision-making is the boss’s job.
In an organization different types of authority are created by the relationships between individuals and
between departments. There are three types of authority.
Line Authority: Defines the relationship between superior and subordinate. It is a direct supervisory
relationship. It exists in all organizations as an uninterrupted score or series of steps. In line authority, a
superior exercises direct command over a subordinate. Line authority is represented by the standard
chain of command that starts with the most superiors and extends down though the various levels in the
hierarchy to the point where basic activities of the organization are carried out.
Staff Authority - is advisory in nature. The function of people in a pure staff capacity is to give
advice, expertise, technical assistance, and support to help line managers to work more effectively in
accomplishing objectives. Advisory authority doesn’t provide any basis for direct control over the
subordinates or activities of other departments with whom they consult (With in the staff manager’s
own department, he or she exercises line authority over the department’s subordinates).
Departmentation: All organizations, regardless of their size or mission, divide there over all
operations in to sub activities and then combine these sub activities in to working groups. This process
of grouping specialized activities in a logical manner is called departmentation.
Department: is a distinct area, division, or branch of an organization over which a manager has
authority for the performance of specified activities. It is a unit formulated as a result of the
departmentation process. The physical and mental limitations of individual managers to effectively
oversee and coordinate activities beyond a given limit partly justify the need for departmentation.
Departmentation is not an end in it self but is simply a method of arranging activities to facilitate the
accomplishment of objectives.
1. Departmentation by Function
It is the grouping together of activities in accordance with the functions of an enterprise - on the basis
of similarity of expertise, skills or work activities. In other words, jobs that call for certain skills or the
use of similar working methods will be put together. It is probably the most common base for
departmentation and is present in almost every enterprise at some level in the organization structure. It
asks the question “what does typically the enterprise/organization do” what kind of activities. Example
of which are Engineering, production, marketing, Finance, etc
Geographic departmentalization works best when different laws, currencies, languages and traditions
exist and have a direct impact on the ways in which business activities must be conducted. For
example, Western region, Eastern region, Southern region
5. Departmentation by Process
Manufacturing firms often group activities around a process or type of equipment. Making plywood,
for example, involves several sequential process: poling (removing bark from logs); sawing logs in to
8’ lengths, heating; veneer stripping and stamping veneer sheets in to 4' segments; drying and grading
according to quality; gluing plies together; finishing and bundling.
Span of control: simply means the number of subordinates or the units of work that an administrator
can personally direct.
Span of management - refers to the number of subordinates who report directly to a manger, or the
number of subordinates who will be directly supervised by a manager. This varies from one situation to
another. There is no magical number for the span of control. There are various factors affecting the
span of management. Based on the number of subordinates who should report to a manager or the
number of subordinates that a superior should supervise, we can have:
Wide span of management and
Narrow span of management
Narrow Span of Management: This means a superior controls few numbers of subordinates or few
subordinates report to a superior. When there is narrow span of management in an organization, we get:
Advantages
1. Close supervision and control
2. Fast communication between subordinates and superiors.
Disadvantages
Superiors tend to get too involved in the subordinates work
The problem of setting more trained managerial personnel
Excessive distance between lowest level and to level management. This kills intuitive for top-level
positions
High costs due to many levels.
Wide Span of Management: This means many subordinates report to a superior or a superior
supervises many subordinates. If the span of management is wide, we get:
A flat organization structure with fewer management levels between top and lower level.
Many number of subordinates and decentralized authority.
Managers are overstrained and their subordinates receive too little guidance and control.
Advantages
1. Superiors are forced to delegate
2. If initiates the development of clear polices
3. Subordinates must be carefully selected and trained.
Disadvantages
1. Tendency of overloaded superiors to become decision bottle necks
2. Danger of superior’s loss of control
3. Require exceptional quality of mangers.
The principle of span of a management states that there is no any specific number of subordinates to be
supervised by a manager. Rather, it states, there are factors that affect the span of management. Some
are:
Normally, there is an inverse relationship between a manager’s span of control and the geographic
dispersion of his/her subordinates. For example, a sales manager whose sales people are scattered over
a wide geographic region cannot supervise as many subordinates as a manager can whose subordinates
are in one building. This is especially true when the manger and subordinates must meet on a regular
basis.
3.3 STAFFING
After the organizing function is completed (after jobs or positions are created within each
organizational unit incorporated in the structure), staffing becomes the next task of managers. Staffing
in broad sense is also known as personnel management or human resource management. It is the
process of assigning prospective employees to fill up the vacant jobs or positions created at the
preceding managerial function.
Staffing is the process of matching job demands with the people with required qualifications; i.e.
knowledge, skill, ability, experience and the like. Staffing involves a number of activities and
processes, such as:
Recruitment (searching for candidates by using different means),
Selection (choosing of eligible and fit candidates),
Induction (orientating new employees about their jobs, colleagues, facilities, benefits, and the
general working environment),
Placement (arrangement to the proper job),
Appraising (periodic evaluation of the performance of employees),
Promotion (upgrading permanent employees to a higher rank in the grade levels of an
organization),
Record keeping, training, reward and reprimand, retirement and related activities,
Are the concerns of the staffing function mainly performed by the personnel or human resource
department, division, or unit.
Leadership function is essentially influenced by the type of leaders an organization might have. There
are three basic types of leaders who exercise leadership roles differently:
Authoritarian Leaders: they lead by using power, followers are alienated, performance is
proportional to power
Transactional Leaders: they lead by using rewards, followers are willing but calculative, use
linkages between performance and goals as well as between performance and rewards
Transformational Leaders: they lead by articulating and communicating realistic vision,
intellectually paying attention to individual differences, make followers committed and loyal.
Public administration theorists have been concerned with attempts conceptually to distinguish policy
and administration. The distinction, which was probably based on a confusion of politics and
administration, has always been somewhat fictional. There are therefore two principle features of
policy:
(1) Policy is concerned with either change (its dynamic aspect), or with the preservation of the stats
quo (its static aspect), and
(2) There is no clear distinction between policy and administration and both contain dynamic
elements. The existence of a passive executory administration is no longer a justifiable
assumption.
Policy formulation is necessary prior to every action in every form of organization, be it private or
public. It is thus a prerequisite for all management. The different definitions of public policy reflects its
multi-faceted nature, yet all draw elements of public decisions, choices, positions and statements of
intents.
Meaning:
According to Rumki Basu (1994:270), Policy can be broadly defined as a "proposed course of action
of an individual, a group, an institution or government, to realize a specific objective or purpose within
a given environment".
Policy is a set of interrelated decisions taken by a political actor or group of actors concerning the
selection of goals and the means of achieving them within a specified situation.
Policy has been defined as "a matter of either the desire for change or the desire to protect something
from change" (Barber (1983:59). Barber further added, "Policy making occurs in the determination of
Public policy can be comprehensively defined as a "purposive and consistent course of action
produces as a response to a perceived problem of constituency, formulated by a specific political
process; adopted, implemented and enforced by a public agency".
Policy lays down the framework within which organizational goals are set to be accomplished. The
objectives of an organization, which are often vague and general, are concretized in the policy goals
that set the administrative wheels in motion. Policy formulation is one of the vital tasks of any form of
government. As Basu (1994:270) puts it, "the essence of public administration is policy-making".
Dimock defines policy formulation as "the consciously acknowledged rules of conduct that guide
administrative decisions".
Public policies are those, which are developed by governmental bodies and officials. The special
characteristics of public policies as differentiated from other policies emanate from the fact that they
are by "authorities" in a political system namely, "elders, chiefs, executives, legislatures, judges,
administrators, councilors, monarchs, and the like".
(i) Purposive or result oriented action rather than random behavior or chance happenings is the
hallmark (characteristic" of public policy,
(ii) Public policy refers to the action or decisional pattern by public administrators on a
particular issue over a period rather than their separate discrete decisions on that matter in
an ad hoc fashion,
(iii) Policy is what governments actually do and what subsequently happens, rather than what
they intend to do or say they are going to do,
(iv) Public policy may be either positive or negative in form. Positively, it may involve some
form of government action regarding any issue or problem; negatively, it may involve a
decision by government officials not to take action on a matter on which governmental
opinion, attitude, or action is asked for,
(v) Public policy in its positive form is based on law and is authoritative; it has a legal sanction
behind it, which is potentially coercive in nature and is binding on all citizens,
The question here is that why do we study public policy? There are both academic and political reasons
for studying public policy or engaging in policy analysis.
(a) The study of public policy formulation processes may help to gain greater knowledge and
understanding of the complexities of the interacting social, economic and political processes
and their implications for society. Policy may be viewed either as a dependent or
independent variable.
If the former is the case, then attention is placed on the political and environmental factors
that help to determine the content of policy. If public policy is viewed as an independent
variable, the focus shifts to the impact of policy on the political system and the
environment.
(b) Factual knowledge about the policy-making process and its outcomes are a prerequisite for
prescribing on dealing with social problems normatively. The study of public policy should
be directed towards ensuring that governments adopt appropriate policies to attain certain
desirable social goals. It is not to deny, however, that substantial disagreements may exist in
society over what constitutes "desirable" or the "appropriate" goals of policy.
Another point of discussion in the study of public policy is about the factors determining policy
formulation. Policy-making cannot be adequately understood apart from the environment in which it
takes place. Demands for policy actions are generated in the environment and transmitted to the
political system. At the same time, the environment places limits and constraints upon what can be
done by policy makers. Hence, environment is a decisive factor on public policy formulation.
A). Political Culture: culture has been defined as the entire pattern of social life, the inherited modes
of living and conduct that the individual acquires from the community or environment. Most social
scientists agree that culture is one of the many factors that shape or influence social action. Political
culture is also part of the general culture, which denotes widely held values, beliefs, and attitudes
concerning governmental policies and actions. What is relevant here is therefore to see some of the
implications and significance of this culture for policy formulation.
Differences in public policy making of various countries can be partly explained in terms of variations
in their political culture. For example, the time orientation of people-their view of the relative
importance of the past, the present and the future has implications for policy formulation. A political
culture oriented more to the past may recognize age-old traditions, customs and social moves, while
future oriented political culture comprehends to change and innovation.
a) In a parochial political culture, citizens have little awareness of or orientation towards either the
political system as a whole or the citizen as a political participant. Citizen's participation in the
policy formulation in a parochial political culture is essentially non-existent, and government will
be of little concern to most citizens.
b) In a subject political culture as that of in many developing countries, citizens are oriented towards
the political system, yet they have little awareness of themselves as a participant. They are aware of
governmental authority and they may have political views, but they are essentially passive. In the
subject political culture, an individual may believe that he/she can do little to influence public
policy, which may lead to his/her passive acceptance of governmental action.
c) In the participant political culture, like that is evidenced in the United States, citizens have a high
level of political awareness and information and have explicit orientations towards the political
system as a whole, and a notion of meaningful citizen's participation in politics. Such orientation
includes understanding of how individuals and groups can influence decision-making.
In the participant political culture, individuals may organize into groups to influence government
action to rectify their grievances. Government and public policy are viewed as controllable by
citizens. It is also assumed that more demands will be made on government in a participatory
political culture than in the other two types.
In general, the study of political culture is important because values, beliefs, and attitudes could
inform, guide, and constrain the actions of both decision makers and citizens.
B). Socio-economic variables: The term socioeconomic condition or variable is used here in the
widest sense to include geographical characteristics and demographic variables as being economic
resources. Public policies can be seen as emanating from conflicts between different groups often with
opposing interests and attitudes. Groups that are underprivileged, dissatisfied, or threatened by
Charles Lindblom (1959) has noted the differences between the ways policy-making has been
described in theory (the rational comprehensive approach) and the way it is actually made (incremental
steps).
The rational comprehensive approach
In the rational comprehensive method, an administrator has to follow certain principles such as
identifying a priority objective, rationally ranking all the relevant "values" or "advantages" to pursue
the best policy, formulating several possible alternatives to achieve the stated objective, selecting the
best alternative, and so on.
This approach to decision-making is rational and comprehensive, because all alternatives and values
are taken into account and logically selected and weighed in their relative importance. But rational
decision-making is difficult in practice since there are a variety of factors that complicate the task of
the policy maker.
The rational method has been criticized as being impracticable for a number of reasons:
(a) It is practically impossible to collect all information and make a complete list of policy options,
(b) The process involved in this approach is time consuming and expensive,
(c) The assumptions that values can be ranked and classified is erroneous, since there are always
differences among the legislatures, administrators and the public on the values that a nation
should pursue,
(d) The assumptions to consider everything before a new policy is decided is impossible since the
consequences of adopting a new policy is in most cases unknown
The incremental approach
Although the rational comprehensive approach is theoretically good, what actually occurs in
administrative decisions is quite different; i.e. "successive limited comparison" technique or
incremental step. Firstly, administrators operating under limited resources take up on a priority bases
programs of immediate relevance. Secondly, they do not outline a wide range of possibilities in
Though it is widely accepted that incrementalism describes the reality of the policy making process, it
has its own disadvantages or weaknesses, among which:
(1) Incrementalism can result in important policy options being overlooked,
(2) Incrementalism discourages social innovation and is partisan in approach, which in reality
means the interests of the most powerful get maximum attention by policy-makers,
(3) Incrementalism cannot be applied to fundamental decisions such as declaration of war, hence
cannot be considered as an approach without flaws or mistakes,
Another important topic in the study of public policy is that who the official policy makers are?
Official policy-makers are those who are legally empowered to formulate public policy. These include
legislatures, executives, administrators, and judges.
Legislature: The legislature formally performs the task of law making in a political system. This
doesn't necessarily mean that the legislature has an independent decision-making power or actually
frames the official policy since political parties, pressure groups, and so forth can influence it. But it
can safely be concluded that the legislature is more important in policy formulation in democratic than
in dictatorial systems, and within the democratic systems, it tends to have greater independency in
policy formulation in presidential systems (USA) than in the parliamentary (British) systems.
Executive: Modern governments everywhere mainly depend upon executive leadership both in policy
formulation and execution. In developing countries in particular, the executive has even more influence
in policy making than in developed countries because of the greater concentration of power in the
hands of the government with less responsiveness to the legislature.
Administrative Agencies: although it has been an accepted doctrine in political science that
administrators were merely implementers of policies determined by other organs of the government,
The technical complexity of many policy matters, legislature's lack of time and information are among
the major reasons for administrative agencies to have a formally recognized discretionary authority to
formulate policies. Public officials are associated with policy formulation in three important ways:
(a) They have to supply facts, data and criticism about the workability of the policy to the
legislature if the initiative for policy-making comes from them. In addition, since members of
the parliament might have lack of administrative acumen (intelligence) or experience on
technical or purely professional matters, they have to give due recognitions and rely on the
suggestions of the officials,
(b) Since the administrations are supposed have constant contact with the general public and
thereby to be in a better position to understand the difficulties that arise in the implementation
of policies, the initiative for policy legislation or amendments originates very often from the
administration.
(c) On account of lack of time and knowledge, the legislature passes skeleton acts and leaves the
details to the administration.
The Courts: in countries where the courts have the power of judicial review, they have (as in the US)
played an important role in policy formulation. They can affect the nature and content of public policy
through exercising their judicial review and statutory interpretation power in cases brought before
them. Determining the constitutionality of actions by legislative and executive branches of the
government is basically the functions of the judiciary. The courts also specify the government's limits
to actions and states what it must do to meet legal or constitutional obligations.
Besides the official policy makers, many unofficial bodies may participate in the policy making
process. These may include political parties, interest groups, and individual citizens. These unofficial
bodies could participate in public policy making in terms of expressing demands, supplying official
policy makers with much technical information about specific issues and possible consequences of a
policy proposal, and presenting alternatives for policy actions.
In discussing policy evaluation, we need also to understand the differences between policy output and
policy outcome. Policy output refers to the quantifiable actions of the government that can be
measured in concrete terms, while policy outcomes refers to the qualitative impacts of public policies
on the lives of the people.
Personnel administration or management is that part of administration concerned with the management
of people at work. In other words the central concern of personnel management is the efficient
utilization of employees of an organization. Some people would argue that personnel management is
simply a collection of people-management techniques, which can be used in all organizations.
However, as Margaret Attwood and Stuart Dimmock (1996) noted, the validity of this definition or
understanding is doubtful since techniques applied in one organization for the effective utilization of
staff may fail elsewhere.
In recent years, the term "human resource management" has been frequently being used in reference to
"personnel management". Most organizations have a specialist personnel department that gives support
to managers and supervisors who have direct responsibility for the management of people. Thus, the
function of a personnel department is to assist with the acquisition, development and retention of the
human resources necessary for the success of the organization.
Ideally, we may sometimes find differences of administrative systems within the "public sector" as the
"civil service" and "public corporations" or "public enterprises" distinguished on the ground of their
basic functions or engagements, the former largely engaged in regulatory function or services while the
Herman Finer, quoted in Rumki Basu (1994:295), defines the civil service as a "professional body of
officials, permanent, paid and skilled". In this connection, a civil servant may be understood as a
"servant of the general public (not being the holder of a political or judicial office), who is employed in
a civil capacity and whose remuneration is wholly paid from the budget provided by the parliament any
legitimatised body of the government". This excludes members of the armed forces and judicial
services.
The civil service constitutes the "permanent" executive in the modern state. With the increasing variety
in the functions of the civil service, the new category of employees (both technical and generalist in
character) working under the public sector are being gradually added to the category of civil servants
everywhere. The major requirement of the civil service is that it shall be "impartially selected,
administratively competent, politically neutral, and imbued (instilled) with the spirit of service to the
community".
Career civil service has been understood as a system aimed at recruiting young people having the
talent and ambition, with capacity for learning and growth, training them in order to develop their
potentialities for the service of the state.
Despite there have been historical traces for the existence of some sort of a rudimentary civil service,
for example in ancient china and Egypt, concept of civil service as a career is comparatively a recent
According to Dr. Finer, the growth of the cardinal principles of modern civilization brought about the
establishment and growth of a professional civil service. Some of those principles were the principles
of specialization and division of labor, the democratic ideas of "career open to talents", etc.
The Civil service is the chief instrument for the implementation of the will of the state as expressed
through public policy. It is indispensable to the functioning of the modern state. With the change in the
philosophy of the state from the laissez faire to that of the social welfare, the modern state involved
itself in multifarious tasks, which are performed by the civil service.
The basic task of the civil servants is to transform politics into action. Besides, the higher echelons of
the civil service assist their political superiors in policy-formulation through expertise advice,
assistance, and information. With the diversification of the nature of the civil service personnel, civil
servants of the technical category engaged in various productive and public sector organizations are
rendering useful social and economic services to the people.
Therefore, the tasks of the civil servants became comprehensive, directly impinging on the lives and
welfare of citizens. Due to the increasing significance of the civil service in modern societies and the
assumption of responsibility by the state for the performance of various socioeconomic functions, it has
become necessary or imperative to recruit persons and thereby build competence for the civil service.
Professionalization of the civil service became absolutely necessary to attract the best available talent
to government jobs and enable them to make a rewarding career of it. For example a Commission
established in 1933 in the US defined the concept of career civil service and identified its main
characteristics as:
(1) High prestige and status attached to government service,
(2) Appropriate recruitment procedures,
(3) Broad avenues for promotion and transfer of personnel,
(4) Clear pay scales, and
In addition/similar to the above outlined ones, the main characteristics of a career civil service that
have got common acceptance are:
(1) Permanence of tenure and stability of service,
(2) Equal opportunity of competing for government services,
(3) Merit to be the sole criteria of recruitment with due recognition to ability and personal
efficiency in a sound promotion system,
(4) Fairly large extent of territorial jurisdiction of public employees to enlarge their scope of
activity and improve their avenues for promotions, and
(5) Adequate steps taken to provide in-service training to civil servants to keep them in touch with
the latest trends and developments in administrative theory and practice.
Powell also suggested the incorporation of (a) planned and continuing upward progression system, and
(b) planning of staff needs to be included in the provisions of a career civil service. The system of
career civil service is applicable to all ranks of administration from the highest to the lowest grades and
to all levels of government.
Ideally, a career civil service is a system of service, with recruitment on merit, security of tenure, and
due recognition of service and merit through timely promotions. Every organization has its own service
systems comprising permanent civil service groups, whose size and function depend on the nature of
the organization. Modern civil service constitutes people with both general and technical qualifications.
Personnel administration involves a number of tasks that range from recruitment to retirement and
pensioning. The most identifiable tasks of personnel management (administration) are discussed in
brief as follows.
Recruitment of personnel is one of the crucial tasks of modern governments and lies at the heart of the
problem of personnel administration. The main test of any machinery of recruitment of personnel lies
in its ability to recruit the right type of persons to the right job. An effective recruitment process is that
attracts the best available talent.
1.Develop/obtain accurate job description: management should ensure that clear, concise and accurate
job descriptions are available for every position. Accurate job descriptions are the basic building
blocks on which advertisements, interviews and other aspects of fair selection are constructed.
2.Defining the ideal candidate: having prepared the job description for the vacancy under
consideration, we now need to match the characteristics of the job with the characteristics of
candidates who may apply for it. In order to undertake this process successfully, we need to have
what is known as a "person specification" that defines the knowledge, skills, and experiences
required for the successful accomplishment of the tasks summarized in the job descriptions. Hence,
criteria used in the person specification must be related strictly to job requirements.
3.Announcement of vacancies (invitation of candidates) through newspapers, journals, and any other
appropriate media,
4.Short-listing of the most appropriate applicants: short-listing is sorting the best potential candidates
by eliminating inappropriate applicants simply by referring to their curricula vitae, application
letters, filled-out forms and so on with out the need to see them in person. This process has to be
followed by notifying short-listed applicants to appear for exams or necessary tests,
5. Holding of examinations for testing or determining the abilities of recruits (exams would be in the
form of interviews, written tests, or practical tests),
6. Selecting the best or eligible candidate/s from among those who have been examined or tested
The aims of the induction process are: (i) to make the new employee efficient as quickly as
possible, (ii) to encourage new employees to become committed to the organization, (iii) to
familiarize new employees with the job.
One of the main problems in the recruitment system of modern civil service is laying down proper
qualifications to suit the needs of the diverse tasks of administration. Broadly, there are two types of
qualifications required of public servants; general and special.
General qualifications relate to the civil status, domicile, sex and age, while special qualification may
include educational background, technical experience, and personal qualifications. We may need some
clarification only about what personal qualifications, since all other items of qualifications included in
the general and special qualifications are self-explanatory.
A public servant is required to posses many personal qualifications like integrity, resourcefulness, tact
and sincerity. Besides devotion to public duty, other desirable personal qualifications are:
(a) Flexible and recognition of the need for coordination,
(b) Familiarity with the subject matter of organization and management,
(c) Facility at problem solving,
(d) Highly developed reading and writing ability,
(e) Ability to settle vexing situations through interpersonal contact,
There are also various ways of determining qualifications, which have been adopted in most countries
today; such as:
Personal judgment of the appointing authority,
Certificates of character, ability, and educational qualification,
Record of various experiences-educational and occupational,
1. Written tests may further fall under the following main categories:
(a) Ability tests, the purpose of which is to assess the general mental ability of the candidate, hi
memory, response to problems, and power of logic. This in turn could be sub divided as;
General intelligence test: the device of measuring mind,
Unit trait system: a process of identifying for example, perception, memory, reasoning ability,
and comprehension,
Social intelligence test: devised to measure the quality of adaptability to kinds of new
situations and ability to influence people,
Administrative ability test: devised to test the ability of a candidate to appraise people,
capacity to make prompt decision, etc.
Mechanical intelligence test: used to test the ability of thee mechanical performance of lower
level grades,
(b) Aptitude tests, which are meant to test particular aptitude of the candidate towards the job,
(c) Achievement tests, which are meant to the standard academic qualifications laid down for
recruitment to various services,
(d) Personality tests, devised to measure, for example, emotion and temperament, confidence and
sociability, qualities of ascendance and submission, hidden traits,
2. Oral interview is the commonest, least complex, and inexpensive method of personnel recruitment
test, which is also known as "viva voce". This test, however, is not entirely free from bias and
subjectivity, hence usually supplemented by written test.
Training is another crucial task in personnel management (administration). The terms training and
education are often used as if they are synonymous. But they are not, and an understanding of the
differences between them is important to understand the training process in organizations. Both
training and education are processes, which help people to learn, but they differ in orientation and
objectives. Attwood and Dimmock (1996:96) simply described:
Training as "...oriented towards the needs of the organization, specific to the employee's work
situation, aimed at making workers more effective in their jobs, relatively short in timescale, and
often fairly narrow in content".
Education as "...oriented to the needs of the individual, more abstract in nature, geared to the
needs of the individual and to the society generally, generally a long-term process in terms of
timescale, and widely drawn in content".
In the words of Basu, training is the systematic imposition of skilled knowledge to all categories of
civil servants for their advancement and efficiency in service. The training of civil servants has got
special significance today, and an indication of this is the gradual proliferation of training programs
and institutions to train public servants in many countries.
The general conception of training is a mixture of many elements. For example, training means
imparting of specialized knowledge of facts and their interrelationships; or teaching of techniques that
require the coordinated handling of tools, appliances and physical faculties; or the formation of mental
and physical habit patterns to ensure automatic responses to work efficiency.
Because of the increasing importance of training, many countries have adopted training policy.
Training policies must be supportive of organizational policies and goals. To ensure the effectiveness
of the organization's workforce, the training function is suggested to be acquainted with or involved
with the strategic planning process. Training, as one of the personnel administration activity, should be
receded by a training need assessment and analysis and should be conducted on a continuous basis.
There are different types of appraisal systems. These may include: personality-based (trait-based)
appraisal, performance-based (result-based) appraisal, and critical incident appraisal methods.
(a) Trait-based or personality-based performance appraisal system largely depends on the judgments
of managers about their subordinates on such dimensions or personality characteristics as
intelligence, initiative or loyalty. In this appraisal system, the roots of prejudice tend to be very
close to the surface. The appraisal criteria involved in this system are more of behavioral,
personality related rather than actual job performance. Further, the appraised person may not
have the chance for feedback since evaluation results will be kept confidential in most cases.
4.2.5 Promotion
A sound promotion system is of vital importance for the continued efficiency of the public service.
Promotion in the words of White implies "an appointment from a given position to a position of higher
grade, involving a change of duties to a more difficult type of work and greater responsibility
accompanied by change in title and usually an increase in pay".
Promotion is a reward to an employee, which entails a change in position and status in the
organizational hierarchy and pay scale. A system of graded promotions is essential to help build morale
and efficiency of employees. Unless the organization has adequate promotional avenues, it will not be
able to attract talented people towards it.
A proper promotion system helps to retain the services of the ablest amongst its employees and also in
giving them opportunity to improve their capabilities and qualifications. It is thus useful to the
employee individually as well as to the administration as a whole. But to improve the morale and
efficiency of administration, a promotion system must be based on the principles of equity and fair pay.
Unjust prejudice, favoritism, corruption, or bias on the part of the promoting officer, by pushing up
unqualified employees are some of the factors that affect the establishment of sound promotion system.
1. The seniority Principle: this principle is widely prevalent in government services as a method
of promotion in most countries. This principle is automatic, and avoids the need for making invidious
distinctions among persons. It is greatly followed in the public service everywhere since it is objective
and easy. It greatly eliminates chances for favoritism and corruption. It also reduces unhealthy rivalry
in the organization thereby promotes harmony and increased morale.
However, this system has its flaws. It doesn't necessarily lead to the selection of the best performer
who is eligible for promotion. It leads to demoralization and non-complacency in service. This system
encourages only mediocrity (weakness).
2. Merit principle: this system ensures that the best person is promoted to the higher post based on
specified criteria alone. This would encourage hard work, and efficiency, reward talent and increase
morale in the service. However, this system is criticized for being greatly subjective, making it
susceptible to all kinds of pressure and prejudice. It often leads to unhealthy rivalry and causes
considerable ill-will among those who may miss for promotion.
The theory of the neutrality of the civil services was developed in England to maintain the continuity of
the civil service within the unstable political system due to periodic elections and the resultant change
of government. Career administrators perform mainly the following functions:
(a) The process of policy decision-making is no longer confined to the political executive; it
trickles down or percolates through the entire structure or makeup of the government resulting
in the inescapable items of delegation that let administrators to make bylaws or sub-policy
decisions.
(b) In the context of large-scale welfare governments, neutrality is neither possible nor desirable.
A certain commitment to the goals and objectives of the state is inescapable in the face of the
civil servant-neutrality cannot be allowed to degenerate into disinterestedness.
(c) In the sphere of policy advice and execution, modern bureaucracy takes an active part.
(d) As a human being, civil servant cannot be psychologically neutral on issues and problems,
which confront them.
A generalist is a public servant who has no specialized background and who can be moved to any
department or branch of administration. The generalist is well versed in the procedures of
administration and generally performs POSDCORB functions. In some instances, a generalist officer is
understood as one with a liberal college education and, after some training, appointed to a middle level
supervisory post, which doesn't call for any compulsory technical qualification.
(i) Administrative Courts or Tribunals: the French system of administrative courts set up to deal
with disputes between the administration and the individual citizens is a unique device that has been
adopted by many other countries. But, a distinction is made between the acts that government servants
perform in their personal capacity and official capacity. Administrative courts can be used to settle the
later type of acts. Members of the courts are civil servants with thorough knowledge of administrative
processes.
The administrative court exercises general supervision over administration and possess ultimate
authority over all disciplinary matters concerning civil servants. Decisions in these courts are taken as
promptly as possible and are much less expensive than in the other ordinary courts. The gradual spread
of this institutional device to many countries is a growing proof of its efficiency and popularity as a
device for prompt settlement of citizens' grievances.
(ii) The Procurator: the procurator system, which originated in the USSR, has now spread to many
other countries, especially in countries of East Europe. It is an important institutional mechanism for
redressing citizens' grievances and ensuring observance of legality at all levels of the administration.
The procurator is in charge of many functions including prosecution of crimes, supervision over
legality in the activity of the investigating agencies, judicial sentences and judgments, and legality of
the execution of sentences. However, its most significant function is that of "general supervision".
(iii) The Ombudsman: is a Swedish word that stands for an officer appointed by the legislature to
handle complaints against administrative and judicial action. It is a typical Scandinavian institution for
redressing citizens' grievances, which has aroused worldwide interest. It has been adopted in North
European countries. Although the political system of these countries may vary, they have common
interest in the democratization of public administration and finding ways and means for establishing an
effective system of public accountability and control over the administrative apparatus at all levels.
The Ombudsman is established as an instrument of the parliament for the supervision and control of the
administration. In investigating of complaints, the Ombudsman has free access to all the files of the
administration and can demand explanations from the officials or authorities concerned. Ombudsman
can investigate all cases of administrative malpractices and improper use of authority, complaints
against administrative decisions or actions as well as complaints of inefficiency and negligence.
Financial administration involves the activities of four agencies: the Executive, which needs and
spends the funds; the Legislature, which grants the funds and appropriates them to particular agencies;
the Finance Ministry, which controls the expenditure; and the Audit, which sits in judgment over the
way in which the funds have been spent. All these agencies have their own role in financial
administration.
The main sources of finance in most governments are taxes, print money, borrowing, sales of assets,
user charges and fees. The method of government financial administration affects the economic
situation of a nation.
Taxes are the main sources of public finance or revenues. Taxes are defined as involuntary or
compulsory payments associated with certain activities of physical or legal persons without explicit
relationship. Taxes could also be further divided as direct and indirect. The difference between direct
and indirect taxes is that the later is paid in connection to production, consumption, imports or exports.
Whereas, direct taxes are levied on employed, self-employed and owners of partnerships.
An indirect tax can be general like Value Added Tax (VAT), or specific tax on certain goods and
services like excise tax. It can also be levied on imported goods, such as customs duties. Indirect taxes
can be levied to counteract the external effects of consumption and production, in addition to its aim of
generating public finance. Revenues from indirect taxation are not in general earmarked transfers, and
are used to finance public expenditure, investments and public transfers.
4.3.3 Budget
In public administration, the term "budget" refers to a financial document, which is annually placed
before the legislature by the executive, giving a complete statement regarding the government revenues
and expenditure of the past financial year and an estimate of the same for the next financial year.
However, it should be noted that there is unanimity in the definition of the term "budget" among
Budget is generally, an instrument of financial administration, and for the analysis of a government
policy in financial administration. A budget is a financial report of statement and proposals are
periodically placed before the legislature for its approval and/or sanction.
The art (practice) of administration has existed since the earliest time, has been one of the essential
human possessions ever since the sprouting of social organizations. It started with the Christian
accounts of Noah. Abraham and his descendants exercised the “management” of a large number of
people and resources to accomplish a variety of objectives.
Building the pyramids was an administrative achievement of the first order. The ancient civilization of
Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome displayed the marvelous results of good administrative practices.
Every purposeful activity involves any sort of administration, thus it has been and still is part of our
lives. In other words, we are administrators of our own lives, and the practice of administration is
found in every facet of human activity.