Postmodern

Public
Administration
Theory
by Frederickson, Smith, Larimer, Licari
(2012)

Sheila Lo Dingcong
 What is Postmodern Public
Administration Theory?
– Difficult to arrived at a description or definition of postmodern PA when using a
modernist framework (Farmer 1995)
– When we are “involved with the assumptions of modernity and regard them as constituting
common sense, we fail to understand and justify the claims of postmodernity in terms of
modernity.”
– Antithesis of positivism and the logic of objective social science
– Modernity is hyperreality – the blurring of the real and the unreal (Baudrillard, 1984)
– Language of public administration (Farmer 1995)
– Text – engaging in a pattern of reflexivity when analyzing a subject
– A process of continuous meaning-making
– Concerned more with values and the truth
Postmodern PA Theory Influences
– Influenced by the behavioral / humanistic school of thought – Hawthorne
experiment interpreted by Barnard (1948), X & Y Theory of McGregor (1960)
– New Public Administration (Minnowbrook, 1968)
– Public administrators and public agencies are not and cannot be either neutral or
objective
– Technology is often dehumanizing
– Bureaucratic hierarchy is often ineffective as an organizational strategy.
– Bureaucracies tend toward goal displacement and survival.
– Cooperation, consensus, and democratic administration are more likely than the
simple exercise of administrative authority to result in organizational effectiveness
– Modern concepts of public administration must be built on postbehavioral and
postpositivist logic – more democratic, more adaptable, more responsive to changing
social, economic, and political circumstances (Marini, 1971)
Postmodern PA Theory Influences

– Berger and Luckmann (1967) – logic of social construction of reality

– Harmon and Mayer (1986) – phenomenological approach of inquiry
(interpretative/action and critical theorists)
– Habermas (1970) – critical theory – modern social theory – critical reasoning
seeks to “emancipate” these in collective settings from asymmetric power
relations primarily through authentic discourse.
– Stivers (2002) – Feminist theory
Postmodern PA theory traits
(Farmer)

– Dialectic – interaction of contradiction – image and reality, black and white,

colonial and postcolonial, local and global, etc.
– Imagination (as against rationality) – the art of creative management;
“thinking outside the box”
– Deconstruction of meaning – efficiency, control, effectiveness
– Deterritorialization – anti-state or anti-jurisdiction; the declining salience of
the state; the advent of technology and the age of networks (FB with 1.2B
accounts); post-national framework – the declining comfort of geographical
boundaries will stimulate the discovery of new forms of human community
– Alterity – a forthright concern for the moral “other”; consequences of
bureaucratic functions to concrete, live, actual “others”
Postmodern critique of the
nation-state
In the postmodern perspective, legislative gridlock, the influence of money in
politics, and the power possessed by interest groups have so polluted the
political system that it has been drained of legitimacy. Modern politics has
moved from the pursuit of the general good to the professionalization of
interests. The litigious pursuit of individual rights coupled with exaggerated
individualism weakens the possibility of a greater good. Finally, the common
public understanding of politics is based on media coverage so shallow, so
inclined to sensationalism, so preoccupied with personalities, and so disinclined
to deal with issues that politics is reduced to sound bites and cliches.
Approach to Methodology –
the Naturalistic Inquiry (Lincoln & Guba 1985)

1. Natural setting 9. Negotiated outcome

2. Human interest 10. Case reporting mode
3. Utilization of tacit knowledge 11. Ideographic interpretation
4. Qualitative methods 12. Tentative application
5. Purposive sampling 13. Focused determined
6. Inductive data analysis boundaries
7. Grounded theory 14. Special criteria for
8. Emergent design trustworthiness
END