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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 September 2013
The battleground of administrative theory has witnessed the rise of functional-institutionalism, under the banners of Gulick and others, and the yielding, in part, of its “principles” to the hordes of the iconoclastic “pragmatic revolt” (or the cult of “administrationism” as Waldo labeled it). But just as legal realism has been interpreted by some observers as law's acid bath, so, too, this new “administrative realism” is considered by many a catharsis, not a cure.
Some present-day theorists have attempted to throw normative life-lines to the administrator. Appleby has written of the socio-political role of the administrative process. Barnard and Friedrich have called upon the administrator to act under the rubric of his moral responsibility. Others on the organizational level—Stene for example—have attempted to derive a “pure theory of organization,” not based upon all-embracing, clearly predictive rules, but rather in the form of theories of “administrative statics” (another Waldoism) which may be cast over a framework of the concrete purposes of any specific administrative situation. The underlying continuum supporting both the social norms of Appleby, Barnard and Friedrich, and the organizational theoretics of Stene, is purpose. Indeed, defined purpose alone could make sensible Stene's axiom that “The degree to which any given organization approaches the full realization of its objectives tends to vary directly with the coordination of individual effort.” If the objectives are discoverable only by hindsight, a query may well be raised: Does coordination exist because the purpose was realized, or is the purpose realized because coordination existed? Clearly, a well-grounded theory of public administration must be based on a predictively refined approach to the concept of purpose.
1 Stene, Edwin O., “An Approach to a Science of Administration,” American Political Science Review, Vol. 34, pp. 1127–1137 (Dec. 1940)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Also see Waldo, Dwight, The Administrative State (New York, 1948), p. 185Google Scholar. In Chapter 9 Waldo says, in effect, that purpose is the basic concept of an administrative science.
2 The use of the label “power” is only for sake of convenience. The institutional label of the peculiar situation would dictate the suitable designatum. In law, “decision” or “authority” might be used. In ethics, “responsibility” or “morality” might be employed.
3 (New York, 1947), Ch. 3.
4 Ayer, Alfred J., Language, Truth and Logic (2nd ed., London, 1950), pp. 38, 102–110Google Scholar. Also see Simon, op. cit., pp. 45–46.
5 The word “verifiable” means not only truth (“veri”), but its definition through action (“fiable”).
6 A conventional syntactical shorthand employed by the logical positivists serves to emphasize this point. This is the “if-then” chain of linked propositions. If one rephrases the above proposition to read “If one wants to boil water, then steps ‘a,’ ‘b,’ ‘c,’ are requisite,” the “if” clause indicates the element of choice, and the “then” clause denotes the verified consequence.
7 Op. cit., p. 46.
8 See, for example, Carnap, Rudolf, Logical Foundations of Probability (Chicago, 1950), pp. 37–42Google Scholar.
9 Simon, op. cit., p. 45.
10 Ibid., p. 52.
11 See Part I, Prediction and Power.
12 See Part I, Purpose.
13 Op. cit., p. 48.
14 Idem.
15 Waldo's discussion of the “naturalistic fallacy” is apposite here. The fallacy lies in the belief that any “ought” for human conduct may be derived from an array of “is's”—or the belief that any value statement may be derived from any number of facts (op. cit., p. 82). But the above discussion demonstrates that a factual statement is meaningful in the pragmatic sense only if it at some time becomes subject to choice. All facts thereby become instrumentalities. They are then meaningful only as “oughts.” The only fact independent of choice lies in the context of determinism. It then becomes evident that no “is” (i.e., determinism) can ever be deduced from any array of “oughts.”
16 “Notes on the Theory of Organization,” Papers on the Science of Organization (New York, 1937), pp. 1–47Google Scholar.
17 Op. cit., p. 32.
18 Loc. cit.
19 One might query that if this is the test of a process system, why is not the function of typing departmentalized? The reason is that typing lies so far toward the “process” end of the predictability continuum that its “interference” with purpose and coordination is manifestly nil. In addition, the functional factors of prestige and skill development are not paramount.
20 (University, Alabama, 1949), pp. 15–22.
21 Ibid., pp. 8, 10.
22 Ibid., p. 8.
23 Ibid., p. 20.
24 “Value judgment, hence policy-making takes place in the administrative process” (ibid., p. 17).
25 For a treatment of the philosophy of “process-thinking,” written from the perspective of a physicist, see Whyte, Launcelot Law, The Next Development in Man (New York, 1948)Google Scholar.
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