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Policy Formulation and the Administrative Process

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Fritz Morstein Marx
Affiliation:
Harvard University

Extract

It is no mere coincidence that greater reliance on government for social stewardship in a decade of economic stress has been accompanied by a reconsideration of public personnel problems. Foremost in the new orientation of thought is a deeper appreciation of administrative leadership within the civil service. As a result, considerable emphasis is being placed upon the demand for “upward extension” of the merit principle. In reality, the term “extension” appears to be a misnomer. If the leading staff positions in the administrative hierarchy are to be filled on a basis of competency and permanency, far-reaching questions of recruitment, promotion, and general grouping present themselves which can be answered only in relation to a revised conception of the entire service.

Type
Public Administration
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1939

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References

1 Commission of Inquiry on Public Service Personnel, Better Government Personnel (New York, 1935)Google Scholar; President's Committee on Administrative Management, Report, with Special Studies (Washington, 1937)Google Scholar; White, L. D., Government Career Service (Chicago, 1935)Google Scholar; Herring, E. P., Public Administration and the Public Interest (New York, 1936)Google Scholar.

2 The relevance of local government material is sometimes overlooked; see Ridley, C. E. and Nolting, O. F., The City Manager Profession (Chicago, 1934)Google Scholar; Hoan, D. W., City Government (New York, 1936)Google Scholar; Hill, L., The Local Government Officer (London, 1938)Google Scholar.

3 Such as Lord Hewart of Bury, The New Despotism (London, 1929)Google Scholar.

4 Recent British cases in point: the promotion of Sir Robert Vansittart from permanent under-secretary of the Foreign Office to the especially created post of chief diplomatic adviser to the Foreign Secretary; the transfer of Sir Maurice Hankey from permanent secretary to the cabinet to a directorship on the Suez Canal Company Board.

5 Cf. Wiesiger, K. F., Beantwortung der Fragen: Was ist Wucher? Ist es gut ihn zu hemmen? Und wodurch kann er gehemmt werden? (Berlin, 1790)Google Scholar.

6 For supporting data, see Finer, H., The British Civil Service (2d ed., London, 1937)Google Scholar; Stout, H. M., Public Service in Great Britain (Chapel Hill, 1938)Google Scholar.

7 Gaus, J. M., Minutes of Evidence, Commission of Inquiry on Public Service Personnel (New York, 1935), p. 304Google Scholar.

8 Cf. Marx, F. Morstein, “Germany's New Civil Service Act,” in this Review, Vol. 31, pp. 878 ff. (1937)Google Scholar; Pollock, J. K. and Boerner, A. V., The German Civil Service Act (Chicago, 1938)Google Scholar.

9 Illuminating in this respect are Gulick, L. and Urwick, L., Papers on the Science of Administration (New York, 1937)Google Scholar; Gaus, J. M., Dimock, M. E., and White, L. D., The Frontiers of Public Administration (Chicago, 1936)Google Scholar.

10 The demand for a higher administrative service in the United States can be met effectively only by providing for a recruitment basis broad enough to make this service quasi-representative in terms of the social stratification. The implications for the educational system are obvious.

11 “A weak chairman of a village soviet tries to do everything through adminisstrative orders; and the weaker he is, the more frequently does he resort to this method.” Kalinin, M. I., in Moscow Daily News, Sept. 22, 1933Google Scholar.

12 For a relevant factual comment, cf. Millett, J. D., The Works Progress Administration in New York City (Chicago, 1938), pp. 7071Google Scholar.

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