The Future Development of Schools of Public Policy: Five Major Trends
| Published date | 01 February 2019 |
| Author | Jack H. Knott |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12648 |
| Date | 01 February 2019 |
The Future Development of Schools of Public
Policy: Five Major Trends
Jack H. Knott
University of Southern California
Abstract
I argue that five major trends have affected the development of public policy schools. These trends include the rational
bureaucracy approach of Max Weber and Woodrow Wilson, the application of behavioral and social science to administration
with Herbert Simon and James March, as well as the more recent trends of the new public management’s inter-sector govern-
ance approach and anti-government populism. As a result of these trends, schools in the United States typically fall into three
categories: policy analysis schools, smaller public administration programs, and larger comprehensive and interdisciplinary
schools. In my view, the most promising future for schools of public policy lies in the further development and expansion of
these comprehensive schools, and this expansion is, in fact, necessary if we want to effectively and collaboratively address
societal needs.
The article by Helmut Anheier is an important essay that
makes a major contribution to our understanding of the
future of public policy schools. It is informed by history,
while fully cognizant of the current political challenges to
rational and evidence-based analysis that underlie these
schools’contributions to public problem solving. It also
seeks to reconcile the tensions between different disciplines
that make up public policy and the gap between academic
knowledge and practical application.
The essay is based on an initial framework that sees public
policy schools as made up of three key components: eco-
nomic analysis and academia, public administration and man-
agement, and policy making and politics. While I see all three
of these areas as critical to public policy schools, it is unclear
to me why economic analysis is identified with academia,
while the other two areas are connected to government prac-
tice. I see all of these points in the triad as representing the
tensions among the academic fields in schools of public pol-
icy. Each of these three academic areas, in turn, has its prob-
lematic relationship with professional practice. Economic
analysis is often too abstract and mathematical; public admin-
istration does not address the practical problems faced by
administrators in implementing policy; and policy making
and politics do not help practitioners know how to overcome
obstacles and address real world problems.
My main argument is that five major trends have affected
the development of public policy schools. The first is the
Weberian and Wilsonian concept of a ‘neutral, professional
bureaucracy’. The second is the development after World
War II of rational economic and systems approaches to pol-
icy analysis. The third is the dominant influence of behav-
ioral social science and political science on the field of
public administration. The fourth is the current inter-sectoral
approach to public problem solving combined with a severe
anti-government and populist political culture. And, the fifth
trend is the dramatic growth in technology, including global
transportation, the Internet, and advanced computing. These
trends have shaped the three fields identified by Anheier
and the development and current state of affairs for schools
of public policy.
The first major trend is the Weberian neutral bureaucracy
model in Europe which led to the creation of academic insti-
tutions such as the German University of Administrative
Sciences in Speyer, or the
Ecole Nationale d’Administration in
Paris. The comparable movement in the US was articulated
most popularly by Woodrow Wilson (1887) in his article on
the dichotomy between politics and administration. This view
was linked to the Progressive Movement in the USA, which
drew in part from the scientific management movement and
*Anheier, H. K. (2019), ‘On the Future of the Public Policy School’,
Global Policy, 10 (1), pp. 75-83. First published online: 08 October
2018, https://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12599
A Response to ‘On the Future
of the Public Policy School’,
Helmut K. Anheier*
©2019 University of Durham and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Global Policy (2019) 10:1 doi: 10.1111/1758-5899.12648
Global Policy Volume 10 . Issue 1 . February 2019
88
Response Article
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