The Public Administration Theory Primer

Postmodern Perspectives in Public Administration 143

indeed, two of the leading new journals in the fi eld, Governance and Public Man-
agement Review, are European.
Particularism also has to do with the emphasis on government in public ad-
ministration. H. George Frederickson argues for a conception that distinguishes
public from governmental: “Th e public lives independently of the government,
and government is only one of its manifestations.” Th e term “public” has come
to have such a narrow meaning in our time that “we think of public as pertaining
to government and having to do with voting and the conduct of offi cials.” An
adequate theory of the public, according to Frederickson, should be based on the
Constitution, on an enhanced notion of citizenship, and on systems for respond-
ing to the interests of “both the collective public and the inchoate public, and on
benevolence and love” (1991, 395).
Finally, particularism in postmodernity is overly preoccupied with effi ciency,
leadership, management, and organization. Th e current emphasis on perfor-
mance measurement is illustrative of the functional nature of modernist public
administration (Forsythe 2001). Especially interesting is that measures of perfor-
mance seldom ask the fairness question, performance for whom? Th e postmod-
ernist would insist on asking that question.

Scientism

It is everywhere evident that science has had a lot to do with developing contem-
porary public administration theory. Over the years, the scientifi c perspective in
public administration has evolved from

1. Luther Gulick and Lyndon Urwick’s Papers on the Science of Adminis-
   tration in 1937;


2. to Herbert Simon’s Administrative Behavior in 1947;


3. to the development of the Administrative Science Quarterly, still
   arguably the most prestigious journal in either business or public
   administration;


4. to Charles Lindblom’s use of the title “The Science of Muddling
   Th rough” to poke a bit of fun at science;


5. to modern scientifi c perspectives on the fi eld represented by the ratio-
   nal choice modeling perspective described in Chapter 8;


6. to the decision-theoretic perspective described in Chapter 7.

In this work, the word “science” is used in diff erent ways. Simon’s Th e Sciences
of the Artifi cial (1969) formed part of the basis of what is now described as arti-
fi cial intelligence, although there are, of course, debates over the intelligence of
artifi cial intelligence. Nevertheless, modern systems of communication, robotic
manufacturing, contemporary air travel, and many forms of modern medical
practice are all built on the scientifi c logic of artifi cial intelligence.