Administration

1. About WoodrowWilson
• Thomas Woodrow Wilson was born in Stanton, Virginia,
USA and studied politics, government and law.
• Woodrow Wilson is known as the father of public
administration.
• Published an essay "The Study of Administration" in 1887.
• The essay is regarded as the beginning of Public Administration
as a specified study.
• Wilson was governor of New Jersey(1911-1913) and President
of USA ( 1913-1921)

2. • Recipient of Noble Peace Prize in 1919
• Outstanding professor of political science, an administrative
scholar, a historian, an educationist, a reformer and a
statesman.

3. Backgroundscenario
• His essay "the study of Administration" publishes in Political
science quarterly in 1887.
• He wrote his essay in the era of Progressive Movement which
covered the last two decades of 19th Century.
• In USA this movement was developed in response to increasing
urbanization, immigration, the seeming loss of traditional
values, corruption etc.
• There was maladministration due to rampant political corruption
and the prevalence of "spoil System" introduces by president
Andrew Jackson.

4. • Woodrow Wilson was convinced that there was a need to
reform the government and reform should be in the field of
Public administration so as to make it more efficient.
• Wilson emphasized in his essay the development of science of
public administration as the appropriate cure for corrupt and
inefficient administrative system.

5. Administrative science
1) Administration is a science.
2) American administration deprived of scientific method because
administrative science first developed in Europe, so it best
suited interest of Europe.
3) It is difficult to organize administration in democracy than
monarchy.
4) Administration has to be responsive to public opinion.
5) Unless a nation stop tinkering with constitution, it is difficult
to concentrate on administration.

6. Because constitution need to be change according to time,
"it is more difficult to run a constitution than to frame
one“
6) To him; public administration is a detailed and systematic
execution of public faw

7. Politics & Administration
• Although he preferred politics and administration dichotomy
but his views on this do not appear to be very clear. This is
clear when he explains the interdependence and intimate
relationship between the two.
• He said “administration cannot be divorced from its
connections with other branches of Public law without being
distorted and robbed of its true significance”
• At other places, he argues that administration and politics
are separate. Administration lies outside the sphere of
politics. Administration questions are not political question.
He tries to establish a distinction between administration

8. • Conclusion
It appears that Wilson vacillated between separability &
inseparability of administration and politics.
• Mosher's view: Wilson made the most vigorous statement on
politics-administration dichotomy
• Riggs: for Wilson, not only politics & administration are
closely intertwined, but administration action are scarcely
conceivable except as implementation of general policies.

9. Wilson attempted to outline a coherent idea about politics &
public administration & how each should be separate & yet
work together. His idea was to improve efficiency of
government operations by developing an administrative system
free from political interference.

10. Administration& Business
• To Wilson:- the field of administration is a field of business
and is removed from hurry and strife of politics. Public
Administration is a part of political life only as the methods of
counting house are a part of life od society; only as machinery
is part of manufactured product.
• Buechnar- basic premise of Wilson argument was that
affairs of public administration were synonymous with private
administration

11. Administration& Public Opinion
• The question is that which part of public opinion should take in
conduct in Administration?
• To Wilson Public Opinion takes the place of an authoritative
critic.
• But the problem is to make public opinion efficient without
suffering it to be meddlesome.

12. Civil Service
-Wilson advocated civil service based on merit, necessary to
organize democracy.
• Opposed creation of bureaucratic elite not subject to democratic
control.
• In USA, earlier there was spoil system (the meaning of spoil
system was to give govt civil service jobs to loyal members
of pity in power) Wilson felt that study of administration was a
possible method for correcting the political abuse of spoil
system.
• As nicholas henry observed, Wison facilitated the expansion of
an ethical sense of public duty beyond the conceptual confines of

13. Comparative method
• He rejected philosophical method to study administration
Emphasised historical & comparative methods
• Why comparison?
• One can never learn virtue/weakness of any system without
comparison. The fear was that this method lead to import of
foreign system. So he said:
• "If I see a murderous fellow sharpening the knife cleverly, I
can borrow his ways of sharpening knife without borrowing his
probable intention to commit murder with it" There are
divergent interpretation of Wilson's thinking on the export of
administrative technology from one country to other.

14. • Riggs:- Wilson gave his highest loyalty to democratic
government and he would never have approved export of
administrative technology to non-democratic country. Heady
Wilson's essay seem to assume that there is no restriction on
the availability of administrative technology for export, and
his attention is given exclusively to the question of
circumstances under which it should be imported.

15. The Government:- New Meaning
• He published an article "the new meaning of government" in
1912
• Focuses more on implementation aspects of administration.
• In earlier article he talks of "consent of governed"
• But in this, he extends the consent to "participation in
government of all classes & interest"

16. conclusion
• The publication of Wilson's essay marks the birth of Public
administration as a recognised field of study.
• Doctrine after doctrine, which public administration has
accepted as valid, was first clearly mentioned by Wilson.
• Wilson observe that object of administrative study is to
discover what government can properly and successfully do in
the very opening paragraph of the essay.

17. • The study of administration as Wilson himself observed, is too
broad, too general, too vague. Wilson was ambivalent on many
issues and he raised more questions than providing answers.
• But these limitation do not undermine significance of Wilson's
contribution. As Waldo noted his essay is "the most important
document in the development of
• Public administration"