This new six- volume collection brings together a number of the major statements in the literature surrounding public administration and its role in government. Public administration is essential to the effective functioning of governments, as it involves not only implementing public policies but also providing policy advice to political leaders. While the recent emphasis on public management in the academic literature, as well as in the "real world" of governing, has tended to de-emphasize the significance of public administration, this collection examines the vital importance of the public bureaucracy in producing public services and in serving the public. Efficiency is not the only important value for public administration. Service, effectiveness, responsiveness, probity and accountability are equally as crucial.
The readings in this major work cover the wide array of topics in public administration, blending classics in the field with more recent scholarship. Comparative in its approach, this collection is designed for both academics and practitioners across the world.
Volume One: Fundamental Issues in Public Administration
Volume Two: People In Public Administration
Volume Three: The Political Role of Public Administration
Volume Four: Implementation and Service Provision
Volume Five: Bureaucracy in Particular Settings.
Volume Six: Accountability and Control
B. Guy Peters is Maurice Falk Professor of American Government at the Department of Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh. His teaching and research focus on comparative public policy and administration as well as U.S. public administration. A selection of his recent and forthcoming publications includes Debating Institutionalism (Manchester University Press, 2008), co-edited with Jon Pierre and Gerry Stoker; and Mixes, Matches and Mistakes: New Public Management in the States of the Former Soviet Union (Budapest: LGI, 2009). His books The Politics of Bureaucracy (6th edition, Routledge, 2009) and The Future of Governing (2nd ed. University Press of Kansas) have been major works in the study of comparative public administration. He is also the founding co-editor of two journals, European Political Science Review and Governance: An International Journal of Political Administration and co-editor of a book series Political Analysis, in addition to serving on numerous editorial boards pertaining to public policy and administration.
Jon Pierre is a research professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Gothenburg and professor of public governance, Melbourne School of Government, University of Melbourne. His main research is in the fields of public administration, governance theory and institutional analysis. He is co-editor (with Guy Peters and Gerry Stoker) of Debating Institutionalism (Manchester University Press, 2008), author of The Politics of Urban Governance (Palgrave, 2011), co-editor (with Jean-Marie Eymeri-Douzans) of Administrative Reform and Democratic Governance (Routledge, 2011) co-author (with Jacob Torfing, Guy Peters and Eva Sörensen) of Interactive Governance (Oxford University Press, 2012), and author of Globalization and Governance (Edward Elgar, 2013).
