Combining epistemology & scope in public organization and administration study: toward defining a methodological paradigm

Abstract

This article attempts to define a methodological paradigm for public administration study by combining epistemology in social sciences and the scope of public administration. The paper first examines the positivist social science approach, which has been a central methodology in the effort to make the study of P.A scientific and objective. It then probes and criticizes the limitation of the positive science manifested in the study of P.A and suggests ways to construct a synthesized mode of inquiry incorporating useful epistemologies beyond positivism into P.A study. While evaluating the positivist approach, examining additional research modes, and suggesting a broader scope of P.A research, this paper consistently joins the paradigmatic dimensions and contexts of P.A to the modes of research. Here, it is suggested that an epistemology should fit the substantive core of a field as it tends to shape or define conceptually the essence and scope of the field. In this article, the scope of P.A is defined by four dimensions : (1) selves and values dimension, (2) political process dimension, (3) programs and administrative/organizational systems dimension, and (4) operations dimension. It appeared that, while the positivist approach tends to fit better the third and fourth dimensions, the interpretive approach is more appropriate for the first and second dimensions. On the other hand, the critical approach may deal with relations between the first dimension and the other dimensions more effectively.