THEMES OF CONTEMPORARY PUBLIC MANAGEMENT

Public management is ensconced in the intellectued tradition of public administration. [1] The brief century-long history of American public adminstration [2] has produced relatively few fundamental changes in its intellectual and paradigmatic structures, but is replete with nimierous conceptualizations and competing orientations. [3] The earliest formulation of American public administration is most often cheiracterized as "scientific management " with POSDCORB providing the principal and most successful organizing framework. (Gulick, 1937) Dwight Waldo (1955:55) has outlined a philosophy of early public administration in which "proper analysis of governmental functions divides administration off from politics; the sphere of administration is one to which science can Euid should be applied; and application of scientific methods of inqiiiry leads to discovery of principles of organization and management; an