The Oxford Handbook of American Bureaucracy

ISBN-13: 9780199238958 / Twarda / 2010 / 888 str.

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Opis

One of the major dilemmas facing the administrative state in the United States today is discerning how best to harness for public purposes the dynamism of markets, the passion and commitment of nonprofit and volunteer organizations, and the public-interest-oriented expertise of the career civil service. Researchers across a variety of disciplines, fields, and subfields have independently investigated aspects of the formidable challenges, choices, and opportunities this dilemma poses for governance, democratic constitutionalism, and theory building. This literature is vast, affords multiple and conflicting perspectives, is methodologically diverse, and is fragmented. The Oxford Handbook of American Bureaucracy affords readers an uncommon overview and integration of this eclectic body of knowledge as adduced by many of its most respected researchers. Each of the chapters identifies major issues and trends, critically takes stock of the state of knowledge, and ponders where future research is most promising. Unprecedented in scope, methodological diversity, scholarly viewpoint, and substantive integration, this volume is invaluable for assessing where the study of American bureaucracy stands at the end of the first decade of the 21st century, and where leading scholars think it should go in the future.
The Oxford Handbooks of American Politics is a set of reference books offering authoritative and engaging critical overviews of the state of scholarship on American politics. Each volume focuses on a particular aspect of the field. The project is under the General Editorship of George C. Edwards III, and distinguished specialists in their respective fields edit each volume. The Handbooks aim not just to report on the discipline, but also to shape it as scholars critically assess the scholarship on a topic and propose directions in which it needs to move. The series is an indispensable reference for anyone working in American politics.
General Editor for The Oxford Handbooks of American Politics George C. Edwards III

Recenzje

The Oxford Handbook of the American Bureaucracy is an indispensable reference work for scholars of public administration and for graduate students. The essays cover the state of the art on a wide variety of topics including, among others, the historical development of the bureaucracy in the US, street level delegation, the paradoxes of performance measurement, public-NGO collaboration, statistical methods for discerning multi-level effects, controversies about appropriate models for understanding how bureaucracy actually works in a context demanding both accountability and problem-solving, and the various meanings of representative bureaucracy. The essays do not merely cover the extant literature. They bring fundamental controversies to the surface and clarify them analytically. The editor, Robert Durant, has organized this Handbook superbly and has written a broad-gauged and compelling introductory essay for it.

O autorze

Robert F. Durant is Professor of Public Administration and Policy in the School of Public Affairs at American University, where is also Chair of the Department of Public Administration and Policy. He has authored or co-authored national award-winning articles and books in the fields of Public Administration, Public Policy, Public Management, the Presidency, and Environmental and Natural Resources Policy. He has received the Charles H. Levine Award for Outstanding Contributions to Public Administration research, teaching, and service. He is an elected Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration.