Social Change Perspective for Development Administration Curriculum

Abstract

For the purpose of this paper, it is assumed that the graduate student working for Master degree in public administration is being prepared through systematic formal education to become a future change agent in the government bureaucracy of his country. The change agent whom we may also designate as a development administrator needs specific orientations and traits in order to be able to contribute effectively to the development of his country. The curriculum used at the graduate institute of public administration is conceived as a major means through which these qualities needed for a successful development administrator can be cultivated and nourished in the student's values, attitudes and behaviors. It is true that the student at this level brings with him at the time of joining the school certain fixed ways of perceiving the word around him including his future role as an administrator in the government. In spite of the difficulties due to these fixed perceptions and personality due to prior socialization process, curriculum is still a major means of transmitting the knowledge by a formal educational institute.