Development Administration and Public Management
Development administration
Development administration concerns the machinery of the state in promoting socioeconomic change. Learn its features: goal orientation, change orientation, client orientation, commitment, and innovation; and its debates: administration of development vs administrative development. Know Riggs' prismatic framework and the sala model for transitional societies. Understand capacity building, institution building, public-private partnership, and aid effectiveness principles (ownership, alignment, harmonisation, results, mutual accountability).
Public management
New public management introduces markets, contracting out, performance agreements, and citizen-as-customer. Contrast with traditional public administration (rule-based, process-oriented) and with new public service (serve citizens, not customers; value public interest).
Traps
- Development administration is not merely administration in a developing country; it is change-directed administration.
- Capacity is not only money; it includes institutions, skills, systems and legitimacy.
- NPM is not a cure-all; it can fragment accountability and create contract-management risks.
- PPP is not privatisation; risks and roles are shared under contract.
Worked example
A rural road programme stalls. Apply a capacity lens: mandate and policy clarity (institutional), engineering skills (human), procurement and maintenance funds (financial), and coordination across ministries (systemic). The best answer diagnoses the weakest capacity dimension rather than defaulting to "lack of funds."