Public Management and Administration - Owen E.hughes

114 Public Management and Administration
survey on the discipline of public policy argues, in the period roughly from the
1950s to the 1970s, ‘public policy really began to take off, and public administration
began to move into a state of decline which was to accelerate in the
1980s’ (Parsons, 1995, p. 7). Public policy could now be considered either as a
separate paradigm, competing with public administration and public management
or as a set of analytical methods applicable to both. It is argued here that
the public policy movement is closely related to the traditional model of public
administration, with its implicit acceptance of the bureaucratic model and
its ‘one best way’ thinking. The extent of its critique of the traditional model
was to argue for more usage of empirical methodology to assist or even supplant
decision-making, rather than more fundamental questioning. The managerialist
model may derive its interest in empirical methods from public
policy, but its theories are overwhelmingly those of economics – again often
empirical – rather than of public policy. To add to the terminological confusion
the use of economic analysis in political matters is also called public policy, but
economic public policy people are very different from those with a public
administration background.
The public policy movement is important to the study of the public sector
even though it may have lost some impetus recently. Its methods have been
criticized for being too narrow and its conclusions are seen as of dubious relevance
to the task of governing. The policy analysis school in particular has
certainly passed its peak while political public policy seems indistinguishable
from public management. However, public policy and policy analysis remain
useful in bringing attention to what governments do, as opposed to the public
administration concern with how they operate, and in using empirical methods
to analyse policy.
Public policy, administration and management
It is not possible to define public policy in any precise way. Students of
government have long struggled over what is meant by ‘policy’ and ‘policymaking’.
Definitions of public policy found in the literature range from
‘declarations of intent, a programme of goals, and general rules covering future
behaviour to important government decisions, a selected line or course of
action, the consequences of action or inaction, and even all government action’
(Lynn, 1987, p. 28). The word ‘policy’ could refer to: the intentions declared
by parties in an election; a rather more precise programme than an intention;
general rules such as ‘foreign policy’; government decisions in a policy document;
and to even larger things such as everything the government does. One
work finds ten separate meanings (Hogwood and Gunn, 1984).
There are differences in definition between the policy analysis and political
public policy schools. From a policy analysis perspective, Putt and Springer
argue: ‘The function of policy research is to facilitate public policy processes
through providing accurate and useful decision-related information. The skills