Thinking about the state,talking bureaucracy,teaching public administration

What is the state?

Max Weber famously defined the state as ‘a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory’ (Gerth and Mills, 1948: 79 – parentheses and italics in original). This definition serves, first, as a reminder that the state is a deliberate construct of human endeavour. Second, there is an implicit capacity for change. The process of change may be varied in character, manifold in its sources. But it will not be arbitrary. For, third, Weber reminds us that the authority of the state is underpinned by legitimacy. In the liberal democratic state the source of legitimacy rests ultimately with the people, or public, working through the institutions of representative government, perhaps incorporating some measure of participatory citizenship. Whatever the case, citizens accept an obligation to obey the state. Such obligation may be conditional and will usually obviate the need for compulsion. But, fourth, the state retains a long-stop physical power or facility for enforcement. Crucially it has a monopoly of such power, giving it a unique character; the state is not simply any old institution. Servants of the state exercise a power like no other, be it the judge handing down sentence for a serious crime or the local authority official imposing a fine upon the citizen who has overfilled his or her wheelie bin.

Implicit in the legitimate exercise of force is the existence of a set of prevailing values that find expression in the state, at least tacitly. The notion of any prevailing set of values may be tempered by the existence of different and competing value systems. In any event, values are susceptible to change over time. Moreover in a liberal democracy the state, while enjoying a monopoly of coercive power, will make no claim to a monopoly of morality, for which values are the springboard (Benn and Peters, 1959: 277). This invokes vexed questions about the extent to which the state merely reflects or, alternatively, induces changing values – that is to say, questions about the role of the state.

What the state does – its changing role

There are few questions in politics as contentious as the role of the state. Here we can only sketch some of the possibilities, with an eye on the past as well as the present. The so-called night watchman state of the early to mid-19th century was founded in part upon assumptions about orderly laissez-faire capitalism, a necessary condition for which included the maintenance of national security, law and order and a modicum of health and education. There was an inherent tension between the minimalist and more active roles for the state in securing health, happiness, peace and prosperity. The state took on more and more functions. As it did so its role changed in two vital respects. First, it no longer simply held the ring, merely reflecting wider social concerns; rather it began from the late 19th century to set the pace. In Bosanquet’s famous phrase it became more the ‘flywheel of society’. Second, as the 20th century unfolded, the state became a provider, no longer simply supervising those who did the providing.

By the second half of the 20th century the term ‘positive state’ was part of the accepted coinage (Fry, 1969: 13–33). The much vaunted Keynesian consensus embraced the welfare state, an assumed responsibility to care for the citizen from ‘cradle to grave’. It implied, among other things, principles of universalism in the provision of public services and state benefits (Fraser, 1973: 192–222). What is more, not only did the state manage the economy, it would now step in as a producer. There may never have been a clear consensus about the positive state – or at any rate a highly imperfect one. And, even at its apogee, it fostered principles of public administration that germinated and coalesced with other ideas that would again bring into question the role of the state. For in the NHS and in the use of public corporations to run the nationalised industries, principles of arm’s length administration were employed (Morrison, 1964: 258–61). At the same time local authorities, often the authors of ‘experiments’ in public services, felt the need more vigorously to assert their autonomy, feeling that they had been sucked closer to the vortex of central government. Such fears had their political foundations; and there were administrative factors, too.

The final quarter of the 20th century ushered in what may be seen as the reformation of the positive state. Where others had championed its utility in helping to solve economic and social problems, the so called New Right saw the state as the source of many problems. Supporters of the state were forced on to the defensive. Some simply reaffirmed their faith as unreconstructed positive statists; others, including the champions of New Labour, tried to recast the role of the state in partnership with other institutions. The state would retain a broad responsibility but need not undertake to do all itself. More than ever before it would operate in close association with non-state and quasi-state agencies. And it would be more adaptable – or reflexive – where it continued to play a role as provider. More customised services were preferable to the ‘one size fits all’ model of earlier vintage. Universalism gave way to a new wave of selectivity and ‘consumerism’.

There are of course important differences between the New Right and New Labour. The former wanted to redefine and reduce the role of the state; the latter sought to reorder its functioning without necessarily reducing its reach. Yet many of the changes introduced, first under Thatcher and Major, then under Blair and Brown, had a superficially similar trajectory (Jenkins, 2007). This can be seen, among other things, in boundary issues.

Boundary issues

There are two types of boundary issue. The first concerns demarcations between state and non-state institutions; the second relates to shifting patterns within the curtilage of the state.

Today the state directly employs far fewer people than it did 30 years ago. The trend is common across the public sector. Sustained programmes of privatisation and financial stringency are among the more visible manifestations. In addition, there have been many instances of outsourcing or contracting out of ‘public’ functions to private agencies. Rarely, though, has the state retreated from its responsibilities. In many ways, its reach is as pervasive as ever; but it is a more contorted reach. For example the former nationalised industries, many of them state-run as public corporations, are now privately owned, non-state enterprises. But the state exerts a greater or lesser degree of supervisory oversight, through institutions such as OFCOM and so forth.

As noted above, public corporations were designed to function at arm’s length from the core of the state. At the same time, the state has long been adept at working in partnership with other agencies, feeding upon their intelligence and entrusting to them a vital role in administering public policies (Beer, 1969: 318–39). Over the last two decades this trend has gathered momentum, featuring governance through markets, through communities and through associations (Bell and Hindmoor, 2011). It is a moot point as to whether there has been a hollowing out of the state (Rhodes, 1994) or whether the state has maintained if not enhanced its capacity to govern. The revolution in governance associated with Thatcher and then New Labour is nevertheless burnished into the system, almost above party, as it were. Many state functions and much of its day-to-day work now involve non-state agencies in some way or other.

All this means that the boundaries between state and non-state institutions are more loosely drawn and that relationships are more complex than ever before. There is what may be called a large twilight sector, reflecting not only those who are employed therein but also those in core state organisations with whom they interact. At the same time, there have been shifting patterns within the curtilage of the state – that is, agencies that are unambiguously statist. Here there have been some of the most notable changes (Moran, 2002). Among the more striking innovations have been the executive agencies, created from the late 1980s onwards. These agencies operate at arm’s length from their supervising departments and now employ well over 90% of all civil servants. Tending to eschew classical forms, British central government has never borne the appearance of tidiness. But untidiness has become distinct convolution. Within core departments, greater complexities ensue. There is no diminution in the penchant for ‘unititis’ – that is, the creation of cross-cutting units to supervise, monitor or control the work of line management and front-line functionaries.

Among local authorities similar trends are evident. For example ‘off-shore’ units to promote economic development and the matrix of community and neighbourhood institutions have occasioned the creation of agencies that do not fit neatly within the ordinance of the traditional local authority department. Again, the greater autonomy now enjoyed by schools has changed forever the role and shape of the local education authority.

The state and the citizen

In a liberal democracy it is an article of faith that there are areas of social activity in which the citizen may engage beyond the purview of the state. Put bluntly, society is bigger than the state. There are limits to the legitimate business of the state. Quite where the limits should lie is of course a highly contentious question, the answer to which will depend upon one’s ideological touchstone. Two distinct and in some ways competing guiding principles can be identified: reasons of state; and rule of law. Reasons of state is the more nebulous and less well known; rule of law is well known, though sometimes misunderstood.

As a concept, ‘reasons of state’ is closely associated with that of ‘national interest’. It is most obviously invoked where the integrity of the state is threatened, usually implying exceptional circumstances of national security. Here the needs of the state become paramount; all else must yield. There are two implications. First, that the state must be granted exceptional powers, even involving the negation or suspension of principles that would normally be regarded as the hallmark of the responsible state – for example detention without trial, various forms of surveillance or the withholding of passports. Second, it is necessary for the judge, the police officer, the civil servant and other functionaries to exercise discretion in the activation of reasons of state. Whatever the case, it involves the suspension of normal rules of accountability. That is not all. There may be more routine circumstances where the integrity of the state is not threatened but where procedures are streamlined or short circuited in order to expedite business. Thus ministers of the crown – in practice their officials – are granted authority to formulate laws under the rubric of delegated legislation or dispensation to proceed without normal scrutiny. Reasons of state thus become more highly contentious, arousing suspicions that normal rules are being circumvented (Chapman, 1993). The more strenuous the attempt to broaden and normalise the application of reasons of state, the greater the tensions with the second guiding principle – rule of law.

Rule of law is, as Jowell (2004: 5) says, a principle of ‘institutional morality’. There are two main strands. The first strand concerns the way in which laws and associated regulations are made; the second relates to the way in which they are upheld. Both are of considerable importance, though the second strand is more germane to the present discussion.

First, then, laws and regulations carrying the force of law must be made by due process and by the legitimate law-making body. In the traditional formulation associated with A. V. Dicey this meant, unambiguously, by Parliament, the sole sovereign body. But the advent of the EU, not to mention the principle of delegated legislation and devolution (to which Dicey was opposed) has brought added complexity. Yet while sources of sovereignty are less clearly located, the rule of law still demands adherence to the agreed procedures for the making of laws.

Second, no one stands above the law. Crucially, this applies to government and to all state agencies. Were special privileges to be granted allowing, say, government ministers to bypass the law or to make laws other than by due process or to act without scrutiny, there would be the danger of mild tyranny. In a wider sense, this dimension of rule of law may therefore be seen as a charter for citizens, serving to limit the application of state discretion and to grant redress from its excesses. It embraces not only the rule of the formal law but also the panoply of administrative law, including tribunals, ombudsmen and provisions for human rights, not forgetting the role of elected representatives and investigative journalists. All these mechanisms may be seen as safeguards or facilities at the disposal of the citizen as a counterweight to the potentially overweening power of the state.

Clearly, in this second sense, there is a tension between rule of law and reasons of state. The one attempts to curb the discretion exercised by state functionaries; the other seeks to give more generous rein. At least two tricky issues arise. First, it may be necessary on occasion to suspend rule of law applications in order to keep intact its very principles – for example in cases of terrorism, threat of anarchy or subversion by a foreign power. Second, the power that the rule of law tries to curb – that of the state – may be a beneficent power. Such may be the judgement where the state is a source of empowerment for the citizen, for example in upholding human rights, administering welfare or in dispensing other largesse.

Characteristics and context of state bureaucracy

The characteristics of Max Weber’s ideal type bureaucracy included the organisation of activities into regular structures; the discharge of duties through a system of hierarchical order; a set of strictly delineated rules by which the coercive powers of the state are placed at the disposal of officials, employing only those people who possess specified qualifications (Gerth and Mills, 1948: 196). As an ideal type, Weber was offering a template for purposes of comparison and analysis, not an empirical description or normative evaluation. He nevertheless extolled the technical superiority of bureaucracy over other forms of organisation, noting its association with the emergence of the modern state. In particular, he recognised the historical connection between state bureaucracy and democracy (Gerth and Mills, 1948: 224). The Weberian state bureaucracy rests essentially within the institutions of representative government. In the UK there emerged during the 19th century what came to be known as a ‘constitutional bureaucracy’ (Parris, 1969). The state bureaucracy became quite distinct from the political level of government, both in its role and in its personnel. At the same time it would work within the parameters of representative institutions. As expressed in the Armstrong Memorandum, ‘The civil service as such has no constitutional personality or responsibility separate from the duly constituted government of the day’ (Cabinet Office, 1993: 4.1, Annex A, para. 3). The state bureaucracy functions constitutionally at the behest of democratically elected politicians and to the wider canons of public accountability and scrutiny.

These are the broad characteristics sometimes described as the Westminster model or narrative. It is an essentially formal, constitutional account of the role of public bureaucracy. As such, it has been challenged by two main groups of critics. First, there are those who want to emphasise the importance of ‘governance’ and of ‘networks’ in explaining how the system works. As noted above, the role of the state, the boundaries between state and non-state institutions and the relationship between the state and the wider society have become more complex, the processes involved more permeable. With its formal structures and processes, the Westminster model alone is no longer satisfactory, if ever it was, as an explanatory tool. Yet that does not render it obsolete. Indeed some adherents to the ‘governance’ school acknowledge a continued descriptive utility in the Westminster model, seeking to supplement rather than to supplant it (Rhodes, 2011: 280–84).

The second challenge has come from what is known as the New Public Management (NPM). Whether prescriptive or descriptive, NPM gives precedence to, among other things, business and management methods over the more traditional processes of public administration associated with the Westminster model. The latter are downplayed in favour of a more techniques orientated approach. Distinctions between public and private (non-state) organisations and corresponding practices are seen as minimal, perhaps non-existent.

The allure of NPM is understandable. There has, as a matter of fact and for good or ill, been a heavy and increasing emphasis upon management. It has been associated with some of the developments in the state noted earlier. One may wonder how the broader political framework, the strictures of public accountability and other hallmarks of traditional public administration bear upon the work of the clerk in the welfare benefits office, or the administrator in the quasi-state agency. Where functions are contracted out, mechanisms of accountability may become more attenuated. Clearly, some ‘public’ servants are more public than others. But all operate within the orbit of the Westminster model, even if some are drawn more closely than others by its gravitational pull. The force of this point can be seen by examining the nature of administration in the public service.

The nature of public administration

Public sector administration takes place within a particular context. In this regard it is different from management. For, as Elcock (1995) says, management has little meaning unless engaged with some purpose. It has no abstract focus, often finding expression in a series of maxims and slogans. The same may be said about administration. But in the public sector it is given shape by the constitutional bearings described above – the political context and the canons of scrutiny and accountability. These bearings pervade the activity of public administration at all levels.

The British tradition of public administration is thus characterised by what Thomas (1978: 33–71) calls a fusion of the political and the administrative. The political environment is seared into the skin of the public administrator, as it were. Yet it was accompanied by a sharp distinction both of personnel and function between the political and administrative levels of executive governance. The work of the public administrator is governed, with a greater or lesser degree of immediacy, by the political environment while conducted with political impartiality and by a cadre of people who are politically neutral. At the same time it was always less given to the ‘classical’ forms of bureaucracy found in continental Europe and in the United States. It was therefore Weberian in one sense, less so in the other. It was perhaps among the most successful in meeting Weber’s hopes for a state bureaucracy that operated within the framework of representative institutions. But the classical forms and procedures of Weber’s ideal type of bureaucracy were less evident in Britain than elsewhere. There was always much untidiness, make-do-and-mend, sheer muddling through in both the structures and processes of British public administration.

Hand-in-hand with this feature is a further peculiar character of ‘traditional’ British public administration. It was never seen as something that could as a practical activity be learnt in the abstract from books or in the classroom. On the contrary, administration was something that was not amenable to a mechanical approach. Writing about the Treasury mandarin, Sir Edward Bridges (1950: 28) talked of how ‘by dint of practice in weighing up the facts, testing evidence and judging men, it is his business to form a layman’s judgement’. Today, this approach seems outmoded, almost a self-caricature. It was very much the target of criticisms unleashed during the 1960s by the Fulton Committee and the Maud Committee on the civil service and local government respectively. They wanted greater technical competence and more training – management training at that. The activities of the Civil Service College and, until recently, the National School of Government, are testimony to these sentiments. But while management is amenable to training schemes, administration is less so. There may have been – and there may still be – something to be said for the Bridges school. The honing of the craft by experience remains a vital factor in the shaping of the administrator and a necessity for good administration. So, too, is the exercise of judgement (Vickers, 1965).

None of this is to deny the utility of techniques orientated training or courses of instruction. They have their place. But techniques will not in themselves make better administrators. Nor of course will accumulated experience, though its importance should not be understated, as often it is. Much will depend upon who is being trained, who is gaining experience – in other words the human dimension, the public servant.

The idea of the public servant

From what has been said already it will be clear that public service is not simply any old kind of employment. The public servant operates within a particular framework that is characterised by the premises of representative democracy, public scrutiny and accountability, subject to the rule of law, yet allowing the exercise of sometimes considerable authority vis-a-vis the citizen. One way or another, the public servant is an agent of the state, dispensing both its largesse and its strictures; he or she is invariably the most visible point of contact between state and citizen.

These conditions are not found in the same way outside the public sector. The public servant bears special responsibilities. They require for their exercise a particular ethos, sometimes referred to as the public service ethos, or ethic. Certain qualities are required of the public servant. There is the requirement for technical competence, detailed knowledge, efficiency and effectiveness in the conduct of business. In addition, there are vital personal qualities that are the mark of the public servant. They include integrity, selflessness, incorruptibility, probity, dedication and loyalty to the cause of public service. As Elcock (2011: 195) says, following Rawls, ‘the structure of rights and duties defined by the constitution must be administered by a corps of public servants who have been educated and trained to preserve and promote those rights and duties’. It means something more than discharging an immediate task. It is rather like the citizen army, preferred by Machiavelli (1961: 77–87) to the hired mercenaries. There is a need, as the late Richard Chapman put it, for the public servant as ‘good citizen’ (Chapman, 1988: 12). The implication is not always fully understood. It means that the public servant should have some sense of right and wrong, of how to behave and how not to behave – in short, a sense of public office. But it means more besides. It implies something that has come to be known as virtue ethics. This involves, among other things, the (Aristotelian) idea that virtues are ‘not only character traits but excellencies of character’ (Hursthouse, 2001: 12). That is to say, not only should the public servant be concerned to do the right things; it is necessary to be the right kind of person.

All this seems like a counsel of perfection – a tall order for any public servant, perhaps impossible for many. As expressed above it is, of course, an ideal. Necessity will demand greater latitude, seeing the ideal as a set of compass points, rather than a series of tick boxes. But it is important to recognise the desirability of these qualities and to understand that something of substance is involved when we talk about the public service ethos. The idea of the public service ethos has been challenged from two main quarters – from the champions of public choice theory and from what may be called the new managerialism.

Public choice theory presents a head-on denial of the public service ethos. It asserts, instead, that state officials will seek to maximise their own position rather than to serve the wider public good (Niskanen, 1971). As a statement about the motives and behaviour of public officials it is no easier to verify or deny than are contrary beliefs about the existence of a ‘high’ public service ethic, though there is some empirical evidence for the latter (Rayner et al., 2011). Public choice theory has become the leitmotif for many on the right who seek to reduce the role of the state. Based upon notions of rational ‘economic man’ it is best regarded as an intellectual model, rather than a piece of descriptive reality.

It is tempting to link public choice theory with the other challenge to the idea of the public service ethos – that of managerialism. The connections between the two are understandable, though somewhat illusory. There is a shared distrust of the traditional public servant. The managerial agenda translates this distrust into the call for the employment of more business methods and of more business people into the public sector. This desire is founded upon the belief that therein lies the royal road to greater efficiency. More business, more management, less traditional public administration is the cry. But those who have inspired the public choice school have often doubted the utility or appropriateness of importing private sector business methods into the public sector (Mises, 2007 [1944]: 39–43). There is thus an ironic coalescence between those who most distrust the stewardship of the public servant and those who champion the virtues of the public service ethos. At the same time, the growth of managerialism in the public sector is the product of many factors, often uncoordinated (Barberis, 2011). There is no discrete school of managerialism, still less a philosophy. Its advance has nevertheless been corrosive of the traditional idea of the public servant and of the public service ethos. The latter it has sought to marginalise. Yet, so long as there remains a need for agencies, however constituted, to conduct the business of the state then notions of public service and of a public service ethos will continue to be vital, perhaps more so given the camouflage of uncertainty and complexity outlined so far in this paper.

Public administration – academic discipline or subject?

There is a subtle yet important distinction to be made between an academic discipline and a subject area. Collini (2012: 54–5) identifies the hallmarks of an academic discipline – ‘reflection … free to proceed without the imperative to contribute to a specific purpose’ and where ‘the open-ended quest for understanding has primacy over immediate outcome’. In this sense, public administration is not an academic discipline and never has been – not at any rate an independent, primary discipline. Rather it has fed upon the primary discipline of politics, drawing too upon other established disciplines. The particular mixture gives public administration its multidisciplinary bearings and its identity as a respectable academic subject – that is, an area of study which, while not itself a primary discipline, feeds upon other disciplines as necessary to its purpose.

The heavy reliance upon the discipline of politics was – and is – understandable and necessary on account of the centrality of the state, the political environment and the constitutional dimension. Traditionally it melded with institutional approaches to the study of politics and with the more specific focus upon government, while political theory provided underpinnings for discourse not only about the state but also about concepts such as freedom, equality and justice. These were and are important issues. But public administration could never remain totally eclipsed within the shadow of political studies, or political science. At one level, it would be necessary to embrace other established disciplines – most notably law, economics and, to an extent, history. Other cognate areas would include aspects of sociology (including organisational theory), psychology, social welfare and (ethical) philosophy. At another level – and more recently – public administration has been wont to embrace other subject areas. Such areas have typically included management, business studies and marketing. Hence the title public administration has been abandoned among undergraduate programmes, often rebranded or else subsumed within a broader framework of management or business studies.

These changes in the subject no doubt have something to do with the need to respond to perceived changes in the real world of the public sector. Of course it is difficult to establish the prime movers in a complex pattern of causes and effects. There may have been elements of anticipation among those who teach the subject, especially at undergraduate level. Again, it is difficult to judge the extent to which there has emerged a new generation of ‘non-traditionalists’ or to which there has been some sort of ‘reformation’ among the older hands, though clearly not among all of them! Whatever the case, the need to demonstrate the utility of public administration as being vocationally relevant and with ‘real world’ application has compromised its claim to a distinct identity.

All this is regrettable but need not be a counsel of despair. First, there is much published research into the subject that proceeds freely and is not driven by application or immediate outcomes. Second, public administration in the UK continues to thrive and to present itself at the postgraduate level, as indeed it does at undergraduate level in other countries. Third, at all levels, even if it cannot pass muster as an independent academic discipline, public administration can still hold its place as a distinct and respectable subject area. To do so it must recall where it came from and rekindle its intellectual roots. As has been shown above, many of the traditional hallmarks that made public administration distinctive as a practical activity remain valid, even if they no longer hold the field to themselves. And those who teach the subject would do well to reflect upon that fact. At the same time, there is an urgent need critically to reassess the case for vocationalism.

Vocationalism

Public administration has suffered as much as any subject and perhaps more than most from a misplaced demand for vocational relevance. Such demand rests on the premise that programmes of study be tailored to the needs of the ‘real world’; that their worth is to be measured by the extent to which they equip students to perform workplace tasks. More severe forms of vocationalism may insist that programmes of study focus almost exclusively upon that which has more or less immediate application to the workplace.

There are many professions for which such a philosophy is appropriate, perhaps desirable. They include medicine, law, accountancy and engineering – to mention but a few. In these cases, there are specific activities, skills and knowledge that translate readily and unambiguously into programmes of study. Public administration is not of that ilk. The characteristics, outlined earlier, that give public administration its distinctiveness are not task specific. They are what may be described as contextual factors. It is useful and even important for public administrators to acquire knowledge and understanding across a wide canvas, including something about the nature of the state, the significance of the political environment, principles of the constitution, the system of administration and what it means to be a public servant. As well as knowledge and understanding, the student should, it is hoped, develop powers of critical thought, reflection and, perhaps, an ability to theorise or to appreciate the logic of theory. These things are not the stuff of day-to-day administration. They are very much the hallmarks of the social science based programme of traditional public administration. And there is the rub: students who are immersed in such programmes of study are thereby better equipped for a career in public administration. There is therefore a strong vocational dimension to the ‘academic’ study of the subject. But it is not the direct, immediate transfer from classroom to workplace.

What, then, about the more explicitly task related, techniques orientated approach normally associated with, say, management or business studies? The misplaced excesses of management and business methods may be a cause for regret in the real world of public services. It must nevertheless be acknowledged that managerialism now pervades the public sector. Some critical appreciation of ‘management’ should have a place within the public administration curriculum. But this should not extend to the detailed application of such techniques; nor should the character of public administration be subverted by undue concentration upon such things.

The irony of the argument presented here should not be lost. It is that public administration as a subject taught in higher education can have a stronger vocational dimension the less it adopts a specific workplace, task centred focus. In other words, it can be of greater value the less it strains to be narrowly vocational. The point is reinforced by two further considerations. First, as we have seen, the public sector is an increasingly varied entity. Second, patterns of employment are more permeable, featuring greater movement of personnel both within and between sectors. On both counts, the real world of public administration is better served by more general, educational programmes of study for would-be practitioners. It is necessary then to make some comment about the distinction between education and training.

Education and training

It is clear from what has been said that public administration programmes in universities should be educational. They should not and cannot be vocationally specific. There is, as has been seen, a corpus of knowledge with which the student should be familiarised. Beyond that, programmes of study should encourage and develop processes of reflection and critical thought. Much the same may be said about many subjects taught in universities. Public administration is no exception and it is important that these qualities are neither wilfully jettisoned nor allowed to wither in the clamour for greater vocationalism, particularly where this translates into work or task related specificity. The latter is the province of training. Neither undergraduate nor postgraduate programmes in public administration should be tortured to the needs of the training agenda. First, it would destroy the intellectual integrity and undermine the educational value of public administration as a university subject. Second, even if that were not the case, the pursuit of the training agenda would be futile. Training is essentially task orientated, often job specific. It is a necessary and perfectly respectable pursuit. And for public administration these pursuits are far better engaged within the workplace or at any rate tailored to the specific needs of the workplace. Training courses are better developed and delivered by serving practitioners. Training objectives in public administration are generally ill served by programmes the rationale for which is academic and educational.

The force of this point should not be misunderstood. There may be occasion on which the academic can have an input beyond the parameters of the university, perhaps on short non-qualification courses. And there is much of value that practitioners can bring to the traditional undergraduate or postgraduate programme, probably in the guise of guest speaker, or similar role. But the former will be seen to best advantage when making an academic input, while what the latter can offer is the complement of the experiential perspective.

Administration is not something that can be taught by instruction in the classroom. The seasoned administrator or indeed the good manager will have honed his or her craft by experience in the public service. Formal programmes of study are no substitute for that experience, though the opportunities offered by sandwich modules, community schemes and the like have often provided a valuable entree. What programmes of study in public administration provide is something different, including knowledge, understanding and the development of personal qualities. Reference was made earlier to the importance of personal qualities and of the public service ethos. It is a moot point as to whether ethics or an ethos can be taught in the classroom as a transferrable skill. Probably not; there is no ‘silver bullet’ with which students can be equipped. But, as Dwivedi (1993: 347) shows, students can be made aware of the implications of the exercise of power, the ethical dimensions thereby entailed and the choices available in the discharge of their functions. This is an essentially theoretical undertaking – a good example of an intellectual approach with a vocational implication.