Public administration
1950s - 1970s

During the 1950s, the United States experienced prolonged prosperity and solidified its place as a world leader. Public Administration experienced a kind of heyday due to the successful war effort and successful post-war reconstruction in Western Europe and Japan. Government was popular as was President Eisenhower. In the 1960s and 1970s, the government itself came under fire as ineffective, inefficient, and largely a wasted effort. The costly American intervention in Vietnam along with domestic scandals including the bugging of Democratic Party headquarters (the 1974 Watergate scandal) are two examples of self-destructive government behavior that alienated citizens.

There was a call by citizens for efficient administration to replace ineffective, wasteful bureaucracy. Public administration would have to distance itself from politics to answer this call and remain effective. Elected officials supported these reforms. The Hoover Commission, chaired by University of Chicago professor Louis Brownlow, examines the reorganization of government. Brownlow subsequently founded the Public Administration Service (PAS) at the university, an organization that provided consulting services to all levels of government until the 1970s.

Concurrently, after World War II, the entire concept of public administration expanded to include policymaking and analysis, thus the study of "administrative policy making and analysis" was introduced and enhanced into the government decision-making bodies. Later on, the human factor became a predominant concern and emphasis in the study of public administration. This period witnessed the development and inclusion of other social sciences knowledge, predominantly, psychology, anthropology, and sociology, into the study of public administration (Jeong, 2007). Henceforth, the emergence of scholars such as Fritz Morstein Marx, with his book The Elements of Public Administration (1946), Paul H. Appleby Policy and Administration (1952), Frank Marini 'Towards a New Public Administration' (1971), and others that have contributed positively in these endeavors.

Stimulated by events during the 1960s such as an active civil rights movement, the Vietnam War and war protests, assassinations of a president and civil rights leaders, and an active women's movement, public administration changed course somewhat. Landmark legislation such as the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 also gave public administrators new responsibilities. These events were manifest in the public administration profession through the new public administration movement. “Under the stimulating patronage of Dwight Waldo, some of the best of the younger generation of scholars challenged the doctrine they had received”. These new scholars demanded more policy-oriented public administrators that incorporated “four themes: relevance, values, equity, and change”. All of these themes would encourage more participation among women and minorities. Stimulated by the events of the '60s, the 1970s brought significant change to the American Society for Public Administration. Racial and ethnic minorities and women members organized to seek greater participation. Eventually, the Conference on Minority Public Administrators and the Section for Women in Public Administration were established.
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