Special Issue || Some Questions about the Question

Some Questions about the QuestionAuthor(s): Harvey ShermanSource: Public Administration Review, Vol. 27, No. 4, Special Issue (Nov., 1967), pp. 337-339Published by: Wiley on behalf of the American Society for Public AdministrationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/973352 .

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HIGHER EDUCATION 337

need buttressing. The creation of additional schools and the buttressing of all is the business at hand. That is why I close as I opened these comments, with a plea that we not become distracted either by the university's problem in general, by the public service

aspects of the other professional schools, or even by the manpower requirements of the government itself. The whole is a set which fits together anyway. But let us address our own problems first, lest we lose our identity completely.

Some Questions About the Question BY HARVEY SHERMAN

The Port of New York Authority

JOHN HONEY'S REPORT on higher education for public service is a most useful docu-

ment-particularly in that it serves as a focus for commentaries such as appear here.

My main worry about the Report-and about the topic-is that I don't get a real sense of what the problem is. Is the problem that not enough good people are going into the public service? If this is the problem, isn't it the same complaint that is being made by business, by the universities, by the unions, by the churches, and by all segments of our society-each with respect to itself? In an afflu- ent and complex society, maybe there just aren't enough good people to go around. And who is to say what the proper proportion going into public service ought to be?

Moreover, the availability of more and better education for the public service will not necessarily motivate good people to go into the public service. More important determi- nants are salaries, exciting programs, prestige, and a climate that will provide rewards in relation to performance and a chance to achieve without being frustrated by the "dead hand of bureaucracy." If there is a bias against public service, such bias reflects attitudes in our society. These attitudes would have to change, or be changed, before there could be a significant increase in the number of talented persons seeking public service jobs.

Is the problem that we can't agree on how to educate people for the public service? If so, this may be all to the good-there is room in a country this size for a large number and variety of educational approaches. Some

schools should educate people for their first job, others for secretaries of departments, and still others for "a career." Some schools should emphasize the classics-the "hundred best books"; others should emphasize management techniques. Some schools should emphasize a specific substantive field; others should attempt to turn out a man of culture and character with broad interest in continuing to learn the rest of his life.

Of course, the prospective student should have better information than is now available as to which school fits into which type and why. But, let's keep the number of options open-with no guarantee and no assumption as to which approach is the "right" one. Cer- tainly as of now, it would seem that there are no hard (or soft) data to "prove" that any one of these approaches has turned out pro- portionately more competent people than any other. We don't even know for sure whether there is any approach by which a university can teach a person to be a good executive. Hopefully, we can prepare him at a university in such a way as to make it easier for him to learn how to be a good executive on the job.

Is the problem that we don't know whether public administration is a field, a discipline, a science, an art, a profession, or a process? Does anyone really care what label we put on it? Isn't it partly all of these things-and partly not? And if some august body pro- claimed it to be any one of these, would it be possible to get general agreement?

Is the problem that public administration (or public affairs) schools don't exercise



338 PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION REVIEW

enough influence in their universities? Again, professionals in every subject matter area probably feel the same way about their re- spective schools. An interesting question: If the school of public administration should play a bigger role in preparing people in the professions (law, medicine, engineering, etc.) for the public service, should the school of business administration play a bigger role in preparing them for the private service? Should the law school attempt to make sure that the public administration (or public affairs) school gives more attention to legal courses? (Incidentally, if we have a school of public affairs, should we not also have a school of private affairs?)

All these and other problems are men- tioned-but it's not clear which ones are ur- gent, which ones are real, and which ones we are trying to find solutions for. The answer to all of them seems to be more money-for more teachers, more students, better build- ings, more research. Everyone wants more money-and even though it appears to be self-serving, I have no scruples about trying to get it for my field of interest along with all the rest. But, while I haven't gone through the exercise, I wonder if we substituted any other field of study for public administration (or public affairs) throughout the Report; whether the conclusions and recommen- dations wouldn't be equally valid. And, I'm not sure that more money answers any questions except the provision of more money. Nor am I sure that money begets quality (even if it does beget quantity). On the other hand, I am relatively sure that quality begets money!

A basic problem is what we are talking about-and I don't think Professor Honey has helped matters by using the terms "public administration," "public affairs," and "public service" as if they all mean the same thing. They don't and they should not. A government surgeon extracting an appendix in a government hospital is "operating" in the public service; he is not, at least at that mo- ment, engaged in public administration. A private citizen making his selections in a vot- ing booth is engaged in public affairs; he is not at that time a public administrator. The word "administration" in the phrase "public administration" must have some relationship to the management process-whether that

process be conceived of as POSDCORB, get- ting things done through people, decision- making, problem-solving, or in some other terms. At one point, Honey appears even to be saying that public administration is the same as political science when he talks about the necessity of "equating public administration with the total government process."

The distinction between "pre-career" and "mid-career" education is made-but seems somehow to get lost. It is a crucial distinction in considering the whole problem. For pre- career education, I think we would do better to talk about "education about public service" rather than "education for public service." For one thing, many students in their early twenties (whether economists, nurses, mathematicians, teachers, or just plain old liberal arts majors) do not know whether they are going to work for the public service or the private service, whatever that is. Even those who "know" they will work for the private service may well later go into public service. And even those who will never draw a government salary remain citizens and should know something about their government.

Perhaps even more important is the fact that the lines between the public sector and the private sector (between public service and private service) are becoming so blurred that it is difficult to tell one from the other. Many traditional public services are being carried out by private contractors. Mixed public-private enterprises are likely to increase in number and importance. And private business on its own is becoming con- cerned with such public problems as what to do about our central cities with their ghettos, crime, poverty, congestion, pollution, etc.

Mid-career education is something else. Here, the education can well be directed at those clearly working in the public service. But the education need not be only at universities. Little is said in the Report about the role of the agency or the governmental juris- diction for mid-career education or training. How the new Federal Executive Institute, as well as the Federal Executive Seminar Centers at Kings Point and Berkeley, should relate to mid-career programs at the universities is an interesting question which probably won't be answered for many years.

Much is made of the shortage of qualified



HIGHER EDUCATION 339

professors in this field (public administration? public affairs?). But I didn't find any reference to the simple (to me, at least) rem- edy of abolishing the requirement for a Ph.D. and substituting the ability to teach and an interest in doing so.

Along this line, I would like to see much more imaginative attempts made to build a better understanding and relationship between the professors and practitioners in the public administration field. Possible approaches might include:

* "Sabbaticals" or other arrangements for experienced practitioners to teach or do research at universities-perhaps commis- sioning outstanding executives to write books codifying their experiences or using them in a team-teaching arrangement with appropriate professors.

* "Sabbaticals" or other arrangements for professors to undertake operating (as dis-

tinguished from research) jobs in government agencies.

* Advisory councils of practitioners to review public administration programs at particular universities-curriculum, teaching methods, goals, standards, etc.

* More effective utilization of the resources available in government for the education of future public administration professors.

* More Arden House-type conferences that would bring professors and practitioners together to discuss major problems of ad- ministrative policy and practice.

* Advisory groups of practitioners to rec- ommend the areas of research that professors could undertake that would be most fruitful for the practicing executive.

Such approaches as these might turn out to be a real "education" for both the practi- tioner and the academician.

Hit 'Em Harder, John, Hit 'Em Harder!

BY PAUL R. VAN RIPER

Cornell University

IN BROAD OUTLINE and most details I heart- ily concur with the Honey Report. There

is no question but that the role of schools of public administration and public affairs must be enlarged, that there is dire need for a massive infusion of funds for public affairs programs and students, and that there is need for considerable research on the matter of education for public affairs. More- over, who can argue with proposals for more money and more research Certainly both are required; a good many persons have said so for a decade or more. To have a competent experienced observer say so again in detail, under foundation auspices, can only help bring matters to a long overdue head.

My complaint is that the Honey Report is too soft-voiced and muted. It ends with too many implicit questions and not enough hard-hitting answers. My thesis is that we really do know the answers to a good many problems now and that it is time to bring the

basic conflicts out into the open. Let me give some examples.

Who Cares About Education for Public Service?

The Report calls for two major research efforts, one "a study of the universities and education for public service" and the other "a study of the professions and public service." Elsewhere the Report outlines many of the "conditioning factors" behind the current university and professional positions. But no- where is there a clearly and firmly stated con- clusion as to just what is the situation, when acutally it has become painfully obvious.

The truth is that almost none of our col- leges of liberal arts, the center of our educational universe in most institutions, really give a damn about education for the public service, or for anything which even remotely smacks of the practical or the applied. The



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Special Issue || Some Questions about the Question