An Assessment of Recent Authors and Authorship Patterns in Taiwan's Public Administration Research

The public administration (PA) field in Taiwan has undergone a period of rapid transformation over the past two decades. The purpose of this study is to provide a more recent assessment of Taiwanese PA research. To that end, this study examines the characteristics of contemporary PA authors who published articles in five core PA journals in Taiwan between 1996 and 2007, assesses the journals' co-authorship/collaboration trends over the period, and identifies the publication and funding patterns of the 20 most-frequently published scholars. Implications of the study and suggestions for future research are discussed in the paper.     

The adaptation of Taiwan's administrative organizations to its economic development

Since moving its seat to Taiwan in 1949, the government of the Republic of China has been able to resume its efforts towards national reconstruction on this island at an accelerated speed. Because of rapid political, economic, and social developments in recent decades, Taiwan's political environment is quite different from what it was previously. In changing from continental to island, national to local, and agricultural to industrial, the public's demands have changed significantly. Under Taiwan's current political and economic situation, what course of development should Taiwan's administrative organizations follow? What kind of self- adaptation to this changing environment should Taiwan's administrative system take? This article describes Taiwan's current administrative environment and operation from a physical and cultural setting. Its ways of adaptation are examined as well must be reasonable and rational. Restated, measures to change the quality of governmental services, governmental expense, the taxes the citizens pay, and the services citizens receive should be taken rationally (¹).     

Public administrators and policy implementation--a social work perspective

Professional social workers in both macro and micro settings are vitally concerned with public policy, particularly that of social welfare policy, and its implementation. They are keenly aware of the quality and quantity of services and other end products of policy implementation. Social workers serve as public administrators and staff many public and private agencies that form the delivery system network. They are also concerned with social problem-solving as is the public administrator, and see themselves as behavior change agents. Their generalized value perspective addresses the political conflicts arising from the nature and causes of poverty and inequality, the role of government in society, and the nature and methodology of the decision-making process. Organization and administration become means to ends, not ends in themselves.

The conclusions arise that public administrators will have to assume more governmental responsibility, rather than less. This is seen as a natural evolutionary outgrowth of the need to regulate increased conflict fueled by growing interdependence and rapid societal change. While public agencies are continuing results of governmental intervention, they are condemned to operate in the midst of paradox.     

Public contracting,policy preferences and minority business enterprises

About three years ago a Special Issue of the International Journal of Public Administration focused on the topic “Government Set-Asides, Minority Business Development, and Publi Contracting.”^(l) Much of the discussion in the issue addressed race conscious government set-aside programs in the aftermath of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in City of Richmond v. J. A. Croson Co. ⁽²⁾ The decision declared unconstitutional a local government minority business set-aside provision designed to help minority business enterprises (MBEs) obtain government contracts. At the time, the decision was applicable only to state and local governmental jurisdictions.⁽³⁾ Government set-asides involve the practice of providing minority contractors and subcontracting a certain percentage of a public jurisdiction's contract dollars.

In 1995 the Supreme Court in Adarand v. Pena ⁽⁴⁾ extended the Croson ruling to include set-aside programs in federal agencies. This Special Issues examines and discusses the Adarand decision and the developments that have followed. The first article by Mitchell F. Rice, “Federal Set-Asides Policy and Minority Business Contracting: Understanding the Adarand Decision,” reviews the Adarand decision and discusses the implications of the decision for minority business development. The next article by Audrey L. Mathews and Mitchell F. Rice, “Adarand v. Pena: Turning Challenges Into Opportunities,” uses a case study of two public preference programs to suggest how Adarand requirements may be successfully utilized to maintain set-aside preference programs.

The third article by Shelton Rhodes, “Mirmative Action Review ‘Report’ to the Presidents: Implications of Military Affirmative Actions Programs to Current and New Millennium Affirmative Action Programs,” reviews the Affirmative Action Review: Report to the President which was ordered by President Clinton soon after the Adarand decision. Rhodes considers the implications of the possible applicability of the successes of affirmative action and equal opportunity in the military, which is highlighted in the Report, to other public and private organizations. The final article by Wilbur C., Rich, “Presidents and Minority Set-Aside Policy: Race, Gender and Small Opportunities,” analyzes the impact of presidential leadership on minority set-asides policy and shows how politicians use set-asides to facilitate exchanges and cooperation with the business elites.     

Public administrators and policy analysis: beyond political science

This article proposes using an analytical techniques approach to teaching policy analysis in public administration programs. It is organized using questions raised by journalists: who, what, why, where, when, and how. Although most attention is devoted to the content of such an approach, the initial portion of the article provides a rationale for taking that approach. The initial portion of the article concludes with a rejoinder to those who might be tempted to dismiss the argument out of hand because the proposed view of policy analysis is not a political science one.

It is desirable to go beyond a political science view of policy analysis in teaching public policy in public administration programs to a broader conception of policy analysis. Then, public policy can be fully integrated into public administration programs.

The antithesis is heard in required statistics and research methods courses where students complain that the material is irrelevant to their degree programs and career goals when the uses of statistics and research methods are not related to the practice of public administration. Integrating public policy into a public administration curriculum is most feasible in the area of policy analysis. Presentation of this argument follows the categories journalists use to ask questions and write stories: who, what, why, where, when, and how. Most attention is directed toward what.     

Social policy for inclusive development in Africa

The paper revisits the discourse on development in Africa, following in the footsteps of leading development thinkers and focusing on social policy. Some of the thinkers and scholars have specifically and directly discussed development discourse in Africa. Others have made insightful points regarding inclusive development in Africa even though not directly engaging with development discourse. The paper also acknowledges earlier thinking regarding development in Africa, including perspectives that deal with underdevelopment. The paper concerns itself with the critical role that social policy can play in ensuring inclusive development in Africa. The interface between economic and social policy is emphasised. Although Africa faces many intractable challenges, most of which are externally imposed, robust social policies will go a long way in bringing about effective social and economic development. In the main, though, Africa needs a comprehensive socio-economic development approach that can ensure lasting inclusive development. Social policies are critical for any development endeavour in African countries. Another main point that the paper makes is that economic transformation is not enough to fully advance wellbeing in Africa (and probably the world at large). By restructuring economies in Africa, not much would be achieved though some gains would be made.     

National development policy and external dependence in Latin America

Many of Latin America's Roman Catholic leaders—clerical and lay—have moved away from previously dominant conservative political positions, as a result both of doctrinal changes decreed by Rome (Pope John and the Council) and of the widespread failure of meaningful development in their, societies. But in most places the position of the hierarchy is only marginally different from that of the government in power (save on issues of basic human rights where these are systematically denied) and the impact of the radical minority is small. Though the church wishes its voice to be heard, it is doubtful whether its views will make much difference: secularization has gone far among decision‐makers, and those who still listen to the clergy are mostly conservative middle‐class women and an uneducated peasantry, still caught up in traditional folk beliefs.     

Regional and local economic development issues in the united states

The purpose of this symposium is to address several policy and managerial issues related to regional and local economic development in the United States. This symposium introduction first reviews the background information of regional and local economic development and then provides a summary of key issues or findings reported in the symposium articles. The issues and findings identified include: the development of state economic development strategies, the problem of local and regional development strategies, the relationship between government regulation and economic development, the use of strategic management in local economic development, the issue of neighborhood challenges to economic development, and the support of community-based development organizations.     

Participation and accountability in development management

This article critically reviews the role of participatory theory in managing development projects and programmes in poor countries. Participation has emerged in response to global demands for greater individual and social control over the activities of state and private agencies, and especially to the manifest failures of traditional ‘top-down’ management systems in LDCs. Claims made on behalf of these participatory methodologies are critically reviewed and a distinction is drawn between strong and weak versions of the theory. Empirical evidence is then considered to evaluate the effectiveness of these methodologies, using long-standing insights of social science theory to show that participation can succeed for specific kinds of projects and programmes in favourable circumstances, but is unsuitable for many others. It commonly fails in contexts where local conditions make co-operative and collective action very difficult, or where it is manipulated by implementing agencies to justify their own actions or poor performance.     

Health care policy: lessons from the past and issues of the future

Liberal distributional values, the increasingly powerful capacity of medicine to provide more and better care, and concern about the health hazards of an industrial society fueled the vast expansion of the health care sector during the last 20 years. That growth was facilitated by a growing economy. The current health policy debate at one level reexamines the distributional bases of entitlement programs, and at another seeks alternative resource allocation mechanisms to reduce the cost of health care. This article has two themes. First, distributional and allocational policies are shown to be intrinsically related, so that the health policy debate is fundamentally a clash between liberal and libertarian values. Second, the inexorable social forces driving the health care system are shown to be the aging of the population and the rapid expansion of technology. The resulting dynamics imply the further growth of the health sector, now in the environment of a sluggish economy. Future policies will have to struggle with how to ration scarce health resources and how to reorient the health care sector to the problems of the aged.     

Migration and development: Implications and recommendations for policy

"The conventional wisdom on the relationship between migration and development in the Caribbean Basin can be summarized in two propositions: that migration from the region to the United States is an 'escape valve,' benefitting the sending countries; and that development reduces the pressures for migration. This article examines both propositions and concludes they are misleading or inaccurate. Emigration costs the sending countries in serious ways and often impedes development. Secondly, development does not stem migration; in the short-term, rapid development is more likely to exacerbate the pressures of migration than to reduce those pressures. Besides analyzing the relationship between migration and development in the Caribbean Basin, this article offers development proposals to reduce pressures leading to migration and enhance the positive effects of migration on development."