Areas for Postwar Research

1945 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 741-757
Author(s):  
Joseph E. Mclean
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Science Research ◽  
American Political Science Association ◽  
Research Committee ◽  
The Public ◽  
Research Areas ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Subject ◽  
American Political Science

One of the principal recommendations contained in the recent report of the Research Committee of the American Political Science Association was that mature scholars “be influenced as to the subjects selected for research by the findings of research panels and committees.” Acceptance of this general recommendation may be facilitated by the tenor of the findings and suggestions of two research committees of the Social Science Research Council—the Committee on Government and the Committee on Public Administration. The report of the former committee, based upon three years of exploration of research areas, was published in October, 1944. The report of the Public Administration Committee will presently be published by the Public Administration Service under the title “Research in Public Administration, 1934–1945,” along with a report prepared by Professor John M. Gaus surveying general research developments in the area since 1930. Although essentially a review of major accomplishments and past activities, the report of the Public Administration Committee nevertheless outlines a research program of enduring and continuing interest. The scope and nature of the research proposals advanced by both committees are the subject of this brief review.

The Oxford Handbook of Political Methodology

2009 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Methodology ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Science Research ◽  
American Political Science Association ◽  
Political Methodology ◽  
Quantitative And Qualitative Research ◽  
Large N ◽  
The Social ◽  
Time Series Studies ◽  
American Political Science

The Oxford Handbook of Political Methodology is designed to reflect developments of all the key specific methodologies through comprehensive overviews and critiques. Political methodology has changed dramatically in the past thirty years. Not only have new methods and techniques been developed, but the Political Methodology Society and the Qualitative Methods Section of the American Political Science Association have engaged in on-going research and training programs that have advanced both quantitative and qualitative methodology. This Handbook emphasises three things. First, techniques should be the servants of improved data collection, measurement, conceptualization, and the understanding of meanings and the identification of causal relationship in social science research. Techniques are described with the aim of showing how they contribute to these tasks, and the emphasis is upon developing good research designs — not upon simply using sophisticated techniques. Second, there are many different ways that these tasks can be undertaken in the social sciences through description and modelling, case-study and large-n designs, and quantitative and qualitative research. Third, techniques can cut across boundaries and be useful for many different kinds of researchers. The articles ask how these methods can be used by, or at least inform, the work of those outside those areas where they are usually employed. For example, scholars describing large-n statistical techniques should ask how their methods might at least inform, if not sometimes be adopted by, those doing case studies or interpretive work, and those explaining how to do comparative historical work or process tracing should explain how it could inform those doing time-series studies.

“Reflections of a Law Professor on Instruction and Research in Public Administration”: An Exchange

1954 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 174-185
Author(s):  
Joseph P. Harris ◽  
Kenneth Culp Davis
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Science Research ◽  
Case Method ◽  
Graduate Courses ◽  
Undergraduate Instruction ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Conventional Type ◽  
September Issue

Teachers of public administration will welcome the challenging and provocative article of Professor Kenneth Culp Davis, “Reflections of a Law Professor on Instruction and Research in Public Administration,” which appeared in the September issue of the Review. It is my purpose to reply to some of his criticisms, to agree with him in some regards, and to discuss some of the issues which he raises. I am in entire agreement with him about the merits of the case method in teaching public administration, and I imagine that there would be little disagreement by other teachers of the subject, though as yet the collection and publication of cases suitable for undergraduate instruction has not reached the point where the use of texts of the conventional type may be discontinued. One of the first efforts to prepare and publish cases on public administration was undertaken fifteen years ago by the Committee on Public Administration of the Social Science Research Council when I was a member of its staff, and resulted in three volumes which were published in 1940 and the following years. The Stein collection is a vast improvement over the earlier case studies, and is being widely used, particularly in graduate courses. The cases were produced by the cooperative efforts of teachers of public administration at a number of leading universities.

Case Studies in Public Administration

1939 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 66-68
Author(s):  
William E. Mosher
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Public Administration ◽  
Research Council ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Science Research ◽  
Special Committee ◽  
The Social ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Administrative Problem ◽  
Science Research Council

A special committee on research materials has been set up by the Committee on Public Administration of the Social Science Research Council. As the title indicates, this Committee is sponsoring a program for the “collection of data limited in time and place, including the statement of relevant facts involved in an administrative problem, the decision taken with reference thereto, and results arising therefrom.” This program is worthy of the backing and coöperation of all political scientists interested in the field of public administration, and having faith in the possibility of developing a science of public administration.

scholarly journals The Public Administration Discipline in Slovenia: Between Legal and Administrative Sciences

2013 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 33-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Polonca Kovač
Keyword(s):  
Public Administration ◽  
Interdisciplinary Approach ◽  
Science Research ◽  
The Public ◽  
Research Areas ◽  
Study Programs ◽  
Historical Comparative ◽  
Scientific Achievements ◽  
Administrative Science

Abstract Th e article analyzes the historical development of public administration as a discipline in research and study programs situated between legal and administrative sciences in Slovenia as part of the Central European political and legal environment. Public administration in Slovenia was initially, and still is, primarily law-driven, but an integrative and furthermore interdisciplinary approach to public-administration studies is considered to be an inevitable trend due to its complex character. However, as indicated by the presented results of research on Slovene administrative study programs and teachers’ habilitation areas, combined with the classification of researchers’ scientific achievements, carried out in order to establish the state of the art of administrative science, research and study programs are developing rather in the framework of administrative-legal science. Hence, as grounded by historical, comparative and empirical analyses of the present study programs, habilitation and research areas in Slovenia, critical assessment of their design and classification leads us to draw several conclusions. Primarily, law is not sufficient, although, simultaneously, in the CEE area it is an indispensable basis for the study of a law-determined public administration. Both mentioned imperatives should systematically be taken into account in future (supra-) national field classifications as well as in the planning and accreditation of study programs and research in the field.

Thinking about the state, talking bureaucracy, teaching public administration

2012 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 76-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Barberis
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Public Administration ◽  
The State ◽  
Practical Activity ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Social ◽  
Public Bureaucracy ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Many

By examining issues concerning the role and nature of the state together with the character of public bureaucracy, this article shows that, as a practical activity, public administration retains a distinct identity. Notwithstanding the many changes that have taken place in the public sector during recent years, programmes of study in the subject still have much to offer. Such programmes should reassert their place within the social sciences. Their virtues should be proclaimed with confidence, while resisting misplaced calls for more narrowly focused vocationalism.

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