Public administration sustainability and its organizational basis
| Author | Jarle Trondal |
| Published date | 01 June 2021 |
| Date | 01 June 2021 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0020852319869430 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
International
Review of
Administrative
Sciences
Public administration
sustainability and its
organizational basis
Jarle Trondal
University of Agder and University of Oslo, Norway
Abstract
Benefiting from a novel data set spanning nearly half a century, this study probes the
sustainability of public governance. Theoretically, it examines how sustainable public gov -
ernance rests on its organizational fabric. The study illuminates how organizational factors
systematically influence decision-making behaviour and thus public governance sustainabil-
ity. Moreover, the study argues that since organizational structure is amendable to delib-
erate manipulative change, it may thus be an important design instrument of the context of
choice in public governance. Accordingly, the article offers an avenue to build bridges
between the academic and practitioner worlds of public administration. Empirically and
methodologically, the study offers: a novel large-N(13,173) and longitudinal data set that
spans five observation points in 1976, 1986, 1996, 2006 and 2016; nine surveys at ministry
and agency levels; and several generations of government officials. Taken together, the data
set demonstrates that both administrative sustainability in public administration and sus-
tainable public governance rest on its organizational fabric.
Points for practitioners
A sustainable public administration is a necessary condition for public service delivery.
Based on observations that span 40 years (1976 to 2016), this study offers an oppor-
tunity to systematically trace public governance processes over half a century. Second,
this study examines how sustainable public governance rests on its organizational fabric.
Organizational factors systematically influence decision-making behaviour and arguably
influence administrative governance. Moreover, organizational structure is amendable
to deliberate manipulative change and may thus be an important design instrument of the
context of choice in public governance. As such, the article offers an avenue to build
bridges between the academic and practitioner worlds of public administration.
Corresponding author:
Jarle Trondal, University of Agder, PO Box 422, 4604 Kristiansand, Norway.
Email: Jarle.trondal@uia.no
International Review of Administrative
Sciences
2021, Vol. 87(2) 399–415
!The Author(s) 2019
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DOI: 10.1177/0020852319869430
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Keywords
central administration, decision-making behaviour, design, organizational approach,
public governance, sustainability
Introduction
Whereas a vast body of scholarly literature suggests that public sector organizations
are profoundly unstable and unsustainable in the long run (e.g. Ansell and Torfing,
2014; Ansell and Trondal, 2017), few studies offer longitudinal data. This study
suggests that public governance processes are profoundly sustainable. Whereas
most studies of public governance rely on cross-sectional data sets, this article bene-
fits from a novel data set that spans 40 years and is thus able to probe the sustain-
ability of public governance by using a longer time frame. Theoretically, it is argued
that public governance profoundly rests on its organizational fabric. The article thus
adds an organizational approach to public governance studies. These twin contribu-
tions are important since times of administrative reform and turbulence increasingly
question the sustainability of public sector organizations and reliable public service
delivery (e.g. Alvesson and Spicer, 2019; Ansell et al., 2017; Olsen, 2017, 2018).
Periods of political and economic turbulence call for studying conditions
for political order and sustainable public service delivery. However, polit ical science
and public administration harbour competing ideas on the robustness of governments
and public organizations (Bouilloud et al., 2019; Fligstein, 2001). A vast
literature suggests that public organizations are particularly dependent on and respon-
sive to their task environment (e.g. Meyer et al., 1997; Selznick, 2015; Tolbert and
Zucker, 1983). This argument advocates that public organizations are profoundly
embedded into their adjacent environments (Fligstein, 2001; Meyer and Rowan,
1977; Pfeffer and Salancik, 1978), and that they have to continuously reform if
they wish to grow and survive (Selznick, 1958). A pragmatist literature also suggests
a middle ground between stability and responsiveness in which organizations defend
core values at the same time as they permanently adapt to the ongoing problems that
they confront (Ansell et al., 2015; Bouilloud et al., 2019). Despite the critical literature
arguing that environmental demands are often diffuse or, at times, inconsis tent
(Kraatz, 2015), a general empirical forecast from this argument has been that
public administration tends to adapt effectively to its relevant task environment,
and consequently that public governance processes – and public administration writ
large – is unsustainable over longer courses of time. This article, by contrast, suggests
that public administration harbours profound sustainability and that sustainable
public governance rests on its organizational fabric (e.g. Mahoney and Thelen,
2010; March and Olsen, 1989). Two contributions are made to the literature:
•Theoretically, it introduces an organizational approach to the study of adminis-
trative sustainability. Three reasons motivate this choice: first, an organizational
400 International Review of Administrative Sciences 87(2)
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