Society is naturally chaotic

Society is inherently chaotic. Initially, before society became what it is now, man survived solely on his might. It was all about survival of the fittest, and as a result, anyone took what he could fight for. This resulted in mayhem. When this chaotic nature became unbearable, society devised a solution to end the problem once and for all. Every man was to give up some of his rights to a sovereign authority that would aid in the protection of individual rights. Following that, the same sovereign entity would provide services to members of society, and everyone would be satisfied (Hampton, 1986). This was the foundation of government administration.This paper will analyse the thematic areas of public administration including finding its definition, analysing its significance, identifying the various models to public administration as well as their strengths and limitations and analysing the conflicting values of public administration such as effectiveness and responsiveness.

Public administration is a part is the detailed process by which any government attends to its subjects who in this case are its citizens by ensuring efficient distribution of resources and opportunities. It includes all efforts that are aimed at presenting the available resources to all the people without any discrimination by generating the best policies that can be used in the operation (Shafritz, et al., 20). Public administration is core to ensuring law and order is maintained and as such, the backbone of government administration. A lot of money is involved, a lot of effort comes into play and as such a lot of dedication comes into play.

A lot involved in the administration of the public. Windrow Wilson said that public administration is the law. He did a lot of research and is credited with bringing up the idea of public administration dichotomy. Ideally, one cannot separate politics from administration. On one hand, the government is busy making promises of efficient administration while on the other hand, the same government is engaging in politics. Once one becomes a politician, he loses the technocrat aspect administration. Widrow Wilson brought in the science of administration by saying that the reliance on this would actually make a government serious in terms of having a perfectly organised structure that would be flawless. The science of management as pointed out by Widrow has to do with the government being keen in taking note of the synthesis labor and as such improving the economy. This means the government must be managed well through an efficient public administration.

Many scholars have come up with many models of public administration to be a guide that would be used in any administration be it the federal government or not. David H. Rosenbloom is credited to outlining three approaches that have been used;

Managerial Approach

First, the managerial approach to public administration. This arose in USA as a cry from the civil servants who called for reforms. Ideally, the civil servants demanded for efficiency from government due to the numerous spoils in the system that arose out of bureaucratic leadership, corruption as well as general inefficiency (Rosenbloom, 1983). They needed the government to run things like managers in a business-like manner. This approach is basically based on maximising the output per unit of the input.

Managerial approach promotes efficiency in the following ways; first, equality is achieved because appointment to a certain position is on merit. Then, it enhances division of labour and as such, promotes specialization in the field. Further, it promotes the aspect of hierarchy in administration by allowing the technocrats to be at the helm of the leadership. However, it has various limitations that hinder its effectiveness. For instance, the mathematical analysis of efficacy through studying inputs and outputs is not the best method of analysing efficiency in public administration. Secondly, the hierarchical aspect involved brings in a lot of technicalities that laymen would not understand.

Political Approach

The birth of this approach can be traced back to the times around world war two. Scholars agree that the main problem to democracy is the responsiveness of administrative agencies and bureaucracies of elected officials. Due to this reason, political approach came into being to analyse this issue and provide ample solutions to the same (Rosenbloom, 1983). This approach focuses on making public administrators to participate in the making of policies. This approach enhances the aspect of public representation, public responsiveness and accountability. Unlike managerial system which focuses on hierarchy, the political aspect stresses on the importance of political pluralism and as such, addresses the conflicts that could arise in society in the arena of administration. The main importance herein therefore id the fact that this approach enables competing groups to counter each other by providing political representation to various groups. The major disadvantage in this is that there would so much overlap in the programs offered and as such, efficiency may not be attained.

Legal Aspect

This approach actually views public administration as a means of applying the law as it is. The origin of this approach is based on three aspects of law which entail; Administrative law which is concerned with the duties and liabilities of administrative officials; Constitutional law which governs the legality of a government action in the process of making policies that would run an organisation; judicalization of public administration which involves the judiciary in the process of administration such that should an administrator fail to execute his functions, then he would be in trouble under the law.

The legal aspect entails three values which are fundamental in the administration of justice. These values entail procedural due process, individual rights as well as equity. In light to this, a public administrator ought to follow the due process when performing a certain task, respect an individual’s right regardless of his or her status as well as being fair just and equitable in all that he does (Peters and Pierre 2003). The legal approach is very important because it stresses on the formal aspect of public administration. With this, its limitation would be that it would be to procedural and as such, often time consuming.



Efficiency and Responsiveness

Having analysed the various approaches to Public administration and discovered the strengths and weaknesses alike, the next dilemma is a conflict between efficiency and responsiveness. On one hand, the government has promised to be efficient, effective and economy oriented in the process of administration while on the other hand, the citizens are avid in demanding for their rights in terms of responsiveness, equity and representation in the public service. Ideally, the administrators ought to provide the best services to the public. There are various faces of public service that will ensure efficiency. First, there need to be efficiency in how resources are handled in the society ("Qualitative Research Approaches for Public Administration" 2010). Then there needs to be productive efficiency which entails the level of productiveness in any administrative agency. The administrators will then be in a position to execute their services well.

Citizens of any society however will always be requiring the best to be given to them. They will need perfection in the government functioning and in the administration of public affairs as well. They will require responsiveness from the government. This entails the aspect of the administrators responding to the demands of the citizens whenever they are not satisfied with the functioning of the functioning of the government. The public will also require things to be done in an equitable manner such that everyone gets a fair share of the resources availed by the government. The public is very careful to bring a distinction between equity and equality. In addition to this, the public always wants representation in public service. This is essential because once represented, there is usually a feeling of owning up the whole process.

However, there is a clear conflict that comes into play when determining which of the two aspect of public administration takes precedence. Is it efficiency or responsiveness? Well, the sum effect of these conflicting aspects ought to bring order in any society. Should efficiency be given more preference, then the administrators would be dictatorial and as such, the citizens would not be happy. Perhaps they would riot and chaos will be the order of the day. On the other hand, should responsiveness be given precedence, and then the effect would be that professionalism would be lost and by this, the long-time effect would be a failing economy (King, et al., 2009). For example, inflation would slowly creep in. In essence, there is a need to strike a balance when determining which of these values ought to be considered most. The method to be used would be based on a balance of probabilities. In this, the pros and cons of the two sides would be analysed and eventually, the sum effect would not be zero but happiness.



Conclusion

In conclusion, public administration is a key aspect in society. The various approaches to public administration in this paper have been extensively used by various jurisdictions of the world to produce efficiency and promote equity. The effect has been law and order. As per the social contract, society gives up some of its rights to be guaranteed by the government. This in the real sense is the basis of public administration. Society participates in policy making and is represented by some of its chosen technocrats in the management of the society through public administration. This produces a sum effect of satisfaction.







































References

King, S. M., et al. (2009) "Reflections on Defining the Public Interest." Administration & Society, vol. 41, no. 8, pp. 954-978.

Peters, B G, and Jon Pierre. Handbook of Public Administration. Sage Publications, (2003.)

"Qualitative Research Approaches for Public Administration." 

Rosenbloom, David H.(1983) "Public Administrative Theory and the Separation of Powers." Public Administration Review, vol. 43, no. 3, p. 219.

Shafritz, Jay M, et al. (2016) Introducing Public Administration.