Global scientific production, international cooperation, and knowledge evolution of public administration
| Published date | 01 September 2023 |
| Author | Peng‐Hui Lyu,Ming‐Ze Zhang,Chuan‐Jun Liu,Eric W. T. Ngai |
| Date | 01 September 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/padm.12853 |
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Global scientific production, international
cooperation, and knowledge evolution of
public administration
Peng-Hui Lyu
1
| Ming-Ze Zhang
1
| Chuan-Jun Liu
1
|
Eric W. T. Ngai
2
1
School of Public Administration, Sichuan
University, Chengdu, China
2
Department of Management & Marketing,
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong
Kong, China
Correspondence
Eric W. T. Ngai, Li Ka Shing Tower, 11 Yuk
Choi Road, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong,
China.
Email: eric.ngai@polyu.edu.hk
Funding information
Youth Project in Humanities and Social
Sciences Fund at Ministry of Chinese
Education, Grant/Award Number:
19YGC630116; Hong Kong Scholars Program,
Grant/Award Number: XJ-2016064
Abstract
Public administration is a discipline with considerable
history, and is also a diverse, interdisciplinary field in social
science. To analyze its evolution, discover the present
research foci, and predict future development trends, this
study applied scientometrics visualization technology to
evaluate over 72,000 scientific articles from the 1920s to
2020s. This research referred to the SSCI and JCR data-
bases to gather scientific data of the discipline and the
journals' impact factor. Consequently, paper citations, cited
journals, journal co-citations, author co-citations, authorita-
tive papers, top countries, productive institutes, average
references, and research collaboration trends were analyzed
on the bases of the published literature. This study found
top productive journals in the discipline, discovered produc-
tive countries and institutes, present the research foci, and
predicted futuredevelopment trends. Through this study,sci-
entific production, international cooperation, and knowledge
evolution mode of public administration research offers a
clear knowledgemap of the public administration discipline.
1|INTRODUCTION
Public administration is a diverse field concerning the relationship between bureaucracy and democracy, including
what motivates workers, optimal governing structures, and ethical issues (Meier, 2014). In the early phase of public
administration research, cumulative knowledge base had not been developed by academic scholars, at least not on
the basis of social scientific principles (Houston & Delevan, 1990). Since the inception of public administration, this
Received: 9 November 2021 Revised: 18 April 2022 Accepted: 22 April 2022
DOI: 10.1111/padm.12853
1134 © 2022 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Public Admin. 2023;101:1134–1162.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/padm
field has been the topic of debates for its identity as a discipline or a profession (Ni et al., 2017;
Zalmanovitch, 2014); the debates were particularly fierce in the late 20th century. Although public administration
has been considered a social science discipline, numerous people, particularly in the US, have also considered the dis-
cipline as a profession as well. Public administration as a discipline is an interdisciplinary hybrid. It can draw as much
or more from political science as from other contributing disciplines (Whicker et al., 1993). Public administration also
relies on research and theories from law, management, and political science (Wright, 2011), which are also thought
as a trialectic system of relationships among the three pillars of public administration (Zalmanovitch, 2014). In recent
years, numerous scholars have endeavored to confirm the independent discipline status of public administration.
Riccucci (2010) proposed the polyphyletic epistemic approaches of public administration, including interpretivism,
rationalism, empiricism, positivism, postpositivism, and postmodernism (Riccucci, 2010). Other scholars have debated
on whether or not an intellectual core existing in public administration is becoming less relevant, and attracting con-
siderable attention is the self-consciousness of public administration scholars and improved articulation of these
existing paradigms (Lan & Anders, 2016). Therefore, disputes must be set aside, and the development of public
administration must be promoted.
Public administration has been a developing field since its inception as an independent academic program in
1926 in Syracuse University. This field borrowed theories and research methods from social science disciplines, such
as management and psychology, thereby resulting in the characteristics of an interdisciplinary field. However, public
administration focuses differently on research themes from these disciplines, thereby providing an opportunity for
the former to develop as an independent discipline. Although performance and efficiency are concerns of all these
disciplines, public administration focuses on drivers primarily embedded in the performance system, while other
social sciences (e.g., psychology and economics) focus mainly on individual factors that are mostly cognitive in nature
(Benaine, 2020). Evidently, public administration is burgeoning whether as an interdisciplinary research field or as an
independent discipline.
The development of public administration research has a distinct relationship with the development of national
economic and state strength. Research and practices of public administration as a discipline are linked with the solu-
tion of social issues by public policy. The development of the economy brings numerous social changes or issues and
causes corresponding changes thereafter to the public administration system (Wei et al., 2008). Moreover, the role
of public administration supports society in choosing a development path (De Oliveira et al., 2015). Therefore,
although the public administration discipline is a developing field and borrowed considerable foundation from other
social sciences, it continues to have significance in reflecting social changes and issues and provides solutions to
achieve improved social development. Moreover, research of public administration discipline varies by country.
Voices for the “indigenization”(i.e., attempt to transform what is externally influenced to fit the local culture) of
public administration have been echoed for a long time (Kim, 2012). The reason is that each country has a different
problem in the practice of administration, which requires adjusting measures to local conditions. Consequently, different
countries also have distinct topics concerned with public administration, although all countries continue to have certain
common problems (Deng et al., 2013;Podger&Yan,2013). Therefore, the current study aims to find common topics that
arise in the public administration discipline of major countries and provide a forecast for future trends.
Public administration is concerned with a wide range of topics. Traditional topics discussed include government
management, administrative management, city management, public policy, economic management of education,
labor, and social security. The themes of innovation and efficiency improvement have been popular topics in recent
years. Innovation in the public sector is necessary to bridge theoretical and practical knowledge. However, more
theoretical, and quantitative/multi method studies are warranted to construct this link. In particular, studies on prod-
uct and organizational innovation and innovation evaluations at the invention and implementation stages should be
conducted in the future (Sucupira et al., 2019). A topic example of innovation is e-governance. Researchers have
addressed the intellectual foundation of e-governance (Arias et al., 2019). Given the lack of such a foundation, public
administration often struggles with technological and organizational changes. Accordingly, e-participation initiatives
may fail owing to barriers within public administration (Steinbach et al., 2019). Thus, how to cope with innovation
LYU ET AL. 1135
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