Canadian Public Administration in the 21st Century

233 Pages·2013·3.49 MB·English

by  Charles Conteh

Government R
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The demands associated with good governance and good public management are at an erte
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all-time high. Yet the discipline of Canadian public administration is in flux, and the e
time is ripe for an open and frank analysis of its state and possibilities. Canadian Public
PUBLIC
Administration in the 21st Century brings together emerging voices in Canadian C
public administration to consider current and future prospects in the discipline. A A
new wave of scholars has brought new energy, ambition, and perspectives to the field. N
In this book, they take stock and build on established traditions and current trends, A
ADMINISTRATION
focusing on emerging, or reemerging, issues and challenges. D
I
A
The book identifies and analyzes the emergent research agenda in public administra-
N
tion, focusing on Canada to illustrate key concepts, frameworks, and issues. It con-
IN THE
sists of three thematically organized sections, exploring processes, structures, and P
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principles of Canadian public administration. It addresses the broad, emergent trend
B
in processes of service delivery or policy implementation generally referred to as the L
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new public governance. It then critically examines the structural and institutional C
21st CENTURY
dimensions of Canadian public administration in light of recent directions in the field.
A
A complete exploration of new principles, methods, values, and ethics in Canadian
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public administration research and practice rounds out the coverage.
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Features N
• Considers and analyzes recurring, new, and emerging trends in public IS
administration, with a focus on Canada T
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• Brings together a new generation of scholars who will shape the field A
for years to come T
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• Uses traditional as well as critical and innovative theoretical and
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methodological approaches

• Bridges the Anglophone and Francophone academic traditions I
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• Presents a comprehensive research agenda on which to build
T
H
E
Bringing together emerging scholars, the book bridges the gap between established

analytical traditions and novel theoretical and methodological approaches in the field. 2
1
It proposes a new, more interdisciplinary public administration increasingly focused
s
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on governance and not solely on management.
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Edited by
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ISBN: 978-1-4665-9171-4 R
Charles Conteh
90000 Y
www.crcpress.com
9 781466 591714 Ian Roberge
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K20527 cvr mech.indd 1 7/10/13 7:52 AM

CANADIAN
PUBLIC
ADMINISTRATION
IN THE
21st CENTURY

CANADIAN
PUBLIC
ADMINISTRATION
IN THE
21st CENTURY
Edited by
Charles Conteh
Ian Roberge
CRC Press
Taylor & Francis Group
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Boca Raton, FL 33487-2742
© 2014 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
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Version Date: 20130417
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Contents
Prologue ................................................................................................vii
Acknowledgments ..............................................................................xiii
About the Editors .................................................................................xv
Contributors ........................................................................................xvii
Chapter 1 Introduction to Canadian Public Administration
in the Twenty-First Century ..............................................1
Charles Conteh
Chapter 2 New Public Governance: The Changing Landscape
of Canadian Public Administration ...............................21
Frank L. K. Ohemeng
Chapter 3 Policy Advice and New Political Governance:
Revisiting the Orthodox ..................................................41
Jonathan Craft
Chapter 4 Deep and Wide: Citizen Engagement in the Era
of Social Media .................................................................61
Rachel Laforest
Chapter 5 Is There a Canadian Model of Public
Administration? Lessons from a Cross-
Canada Comparison of Budget Management
and Performance. .............................................................79
Benoît Rigaud, Paul-Émile Arsenault, and Louis Côté
Chapter 6 First Nations Public Administration ..............................99
Christa Scholtz
© 2010 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC v
vi  •  Contents
Chapter 7 Environmental Governance, Public Action Tools,
and Public Participation: The Bureau d’audiences
publiques sur l’environnement and the Régie de
l’énergie (Québec) .......................................................... 117
Louis Simard
Chapter 8 Reengaging with Our Roots: The Critical Past
(and Future) of Public Administration .........................141
Jonathan Paquette
Chapter 9 Governmental Priorities and Administrative
Rhetoric: The Case of Briefing Notes ...........................157
Jean-François Savard and Christiane Melançon
Chapter 10 Public Policy Analysis and Management at the
Crossroads: An Epistemological Investigation
of Ethics and Public Action ...........................................173
Magaly Brodeur
Chapter 11 Foresight: Constructing Futures in
Public Administration ...................................................189
Ian Roberge and Bethan Dinning
Chapter 12 Concluding Thoughts on Canadian Public
Administration in the Twenty-First Century. ..............207
Charles Conteh and Ian Roberge (Editors)
© 2010 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
Prologue
THE ORIGINS OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION
IN CANADA: IN SEARCH OF LEGITIMACY
Ken Rasmussen
Public administration has long been accused of being methodologically
and theoretically impoverished. This, however, is a lingering mischarac-
terization, which may stem from its close connection to political science.
A question, then, is whether public administration will disassociate itself
from political science. Most political scientists would not miss the depar-
ture of public administration, and we have witnessed some new institu-
tional space opening up in the graduate schools of public administration
and public policy emerging across Canada. Yet, even here public adminis-
tration is not at the core of the curriculum. This is due not only to the fact
that public administration, because of its practical turn, is suspect in some
academic quarters but also because there is less interest in domestic issues
among political scientists more broadly. Evidence of this trend is visible in
the absence of urban politics in most political science departments and in
the neglect of offerings in Canadian government and provincial politics.
This neglect of public administration comes at a time, ironically, when
public administration has made tremendous progress as an academic
discipline and when the demands associated with good governance and
good public management are at an all-time high in Canada and around
the world. So, how did public administration get to this point, and what
are its future prospects? To answer this question, we need to do a brief
recognizance and point out where the discipline came from and how this
might have an impact on its future trajectory. Three claims are advanced.
One is that Canadian public administration as a discipline was established
by public servants and only in the mid-20th century did academics take
up the challenge. The second is that public administration began with
strong reformist tendencies and still regards administrative reform as one
of the key aspects of its mandate, its self-definition, and its relevance to
broader social values. Third, the discipline has always been hostile to our
© 2010 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC vii
viii  •  Prologue
political institutions, seeing them as unable, by themselves, of producing
truly democratic outcomes.
The first claim is that public administration was originally something
that only public servants gave serious attention to and was not, as in the
United States, something that traced its origins to the activity of highly
influential political actors. American public administration is often linked
to the federalist papers, particularly to Alexander Hamilton and James
Madison, or later to Woodrow Wilson’s seminal 1887 article. In Canada,
our conceptions of public administration were initially articulated, appro-
priately enough, by middle class, mostly anonymous, public servants and
only later became part of the academic discipline of political science. It
was low key in its orientation and was preoccupied with finding space for
public servants to exercise influence in the political life of Canada.
This was true prior to Confederation but was even more so in the post-
Confederation era that witnessed the clearest articulation of this theme.
The individuals espousing early Canadian public administration ideas fol-
lowed on the heels of colonial administrators like Lord Durham and were
neither politicians nor scholars but were practicing public administrators.
They were also part of a new, broad-based reform movement motivated by
both public spiritedness and personal self-interest. They wanted to see the
nascent Canadian state functioning on a more rational, universal basis as
opposed to the patronage-based politics that had dominated colonial and
postcolonial Canada. Typically, they held negative views of political par-
ties and tended to see dispassionate civil servants as better able to recog-
nize the broader interests of the nation. The state needed some intellectual
guidance as there was a feeling among these men that neither politicians
nor the majority of voters were really able to judge good policies and the
details of good public administration.
Senior civil servants wanted to create a bureaucracy that would act as
a professional interest group, building a structure of professional rights
guaranteeing tenure and autonomy, while limiting their accountability to
outsiders. This belief helps to explain the desire of civil servants in the late
19th and early 20th century to promote reforms that would increase their
control of conditions of appointment, working conditions, salary, and ten-
ure. They also promoted a professional ethic centered on the primary obli-
gation to serve society as a whole rather than any particular group within
it. For the senior civil servants at the center of administrative reform at
the time, the major goal was to see the civil service become a profession
dedicated to efficient, effective, and “business-like” public administration.
© 2010 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC