Masters in Public Administration - MPA / The ideal and practice of administrative neutrality has been problematic in the public services of liberal democracies since the middle of the 19th century. Either the ideal was interpreted very narrowly to exclude public administration from political processes, or it has been too broadly incorporated to render its meaning practically useless. However, both literature and practice continue to emphasize the importance of the ideal. This study has attempted to clarify the meaning of the concept by examining its evolution and applicability in various liberal democratic states. Additionally, the study has developed a model of administrative neutrality for the post- apartheid South African public service. The study was guided by three broad assumptions: and these were: i) that the concept of administrative neutrality was not an antonym of politicization, and that whenever such meaning was imputed its applicability was bound to be compromised if not misguided; ii) that the applicability of administrative neutrality depended, among other things, on the constitutional experience and context of a given country; and that iii) administrative neutrality tended to emphasize those elements that are topical at a given time in a given country. Comparative experiences of older liberal democracies examined in the study lent support to these broad assumptions: thus, the British version of administrative neutrality has been conditioned by its political and administrative traditions in which the evolution of democratic political institutions dictated the subjection of administrative institutions to elected political leadership. By contrast, the French experience has reflected that country's administrative history in which public administration evolved much earlier than liberal democracy, and practices like permitting civil servants to seek political office without having to resign their posts was perceived as posing no danger to the ideal of neutrality. Similarly, the American model in which the top layer of public administrators are political appointees has been a product of its history which has had a heavy dosage of partisan patronage. However, despite the differences in terms of models and applicability of the concept the public services in all older liberal democracies examined showed a clear commitment to administrative neutrality in the form of a professionally appointed and managed public service. All the three older democracies examined here has clearly done away with the concept of patronage in the professional section of their public services. Based on the analysis of the three older democracies, a model has been developed for post-apartheid South Africa. First, it was observed that current practices of administrative neutrality in South Africa have been heavily influenced by both apartheid and British or Whitehall traditions. However, the 1996 constitution prescribes a public service that is nonpartisan and impartial, with the public service commission as the watchdog for its implementation. The study has noted that a few problems exist in the current practice of administrative neutrality. First, the practice of involving the minister in the department or premier in the province in matters of appointing permanent staff was regarded as anomalous. Second, that there was lack of specification of involvement by level of civil servants in partisan activities. Third, that the present arrangements do not make adequate checks and balances between ministerial responsibility for personnel and the role of the public service commission, and between the minister and the director- general. Fourth and finally, the absence of the head of the civil service who could cultivate, promote and defend the ethic of civil service neutrality. The proposed model addresses these issues and includes the following elements: commitment to national goals as a recognition of the fact that administrative neutrality does not mean avoidance of national political ideals and goals; merit as the basis for appointment and promotion to ensure against the spoils system; partisan neutrality in which civil servants at all levels do not participate in any partisan activities, but that this provision could be reviewed from time to time as the country's administrative culture evolves; institutional checks and balances in which the public service commission, the head of the civil service , and the re-designing of the office and even title of the director-general. At the moment there are no really checks and balances vis-a-vis ministerial role in the civil service. Finally, the model recommends general fairness and impartiality of the civil service as part of the neutrality concept. The model might meet some resistance due to entrenched traditions of the past or misconstruing of the ideal of neutrality itself by current practitioners. The study concludes by posing a few questions: what is the relationship between neutrality and civil service effectiveness? How does the policy of representative bureaucracy (i.e.: affirmative action) impact upon the merit principle? These and other questions have not been addressed in the study due to limitation of time and resources. Nonetheless, the ideal of administrative neutrality holds out the hope for a civil service that is emerging from the scars of apartheid politicization.

An entire body of administrative law exists to guide the administrative discretion of public administrators. Although an increasing share of public services is being outsourced to the private sector, much of administrative law is not applicable to governments’ contracted agents. Alternatively, contracting agencies use the contract instrument to guide and constrain contractors’ exercise of delegated administrative discretion. This essay reports on a study of selected Florida local governments’ contracts for residential trash collection services. Although minimal discretion was placed in contractors’ hands, it still presented opportunities for abuse. The local governments used a variety of ways to manage the administrative discretion, including the imposition of public service ethics and transparency requirements. Upon analysis of contractual grants of and constraints upon administrative discretion, some suggestions are offered for enhancing contractual management of delegated administrative discretion.

The U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Agency provides Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funding to state and local governments, giving them broad flexibility to design and implement community projects. The CDBG program emphasizes that public hearings are a requirement to obtain federal funding at the state and local levels. Also, HUD lists several other public participation methods that can be used in addition to public hearings. Further, the extant literature on public participation emphasizes the prevalent use of one method, public hearings, compared to the use of other more engaging techniques. Despite the availability of different methods that may be more engaging, administrators continue to engage the public through the use of public hearings. This study explores the motivation and identity of public administrators in local government, implementing public participation programs. Using a multi-site case study based on fifteen interviews with officials from various localities across the Commonwealth of Virginia, I found that administrators held onto their identity as public servants but might have had difficulty staying motivated to do public engagement work when they perceived that there were impediments in the work environment. Another interesting finding is that these obstacles created tensions between the public servants and their respective organization, leading to fewer performance outcomes among the administrators. Further, the administrators' characteristics (identity) such as job tenure, rank, education, age, and gender, along with their public service motivation, might have impacted their actions and behavior in the public sector environment. I also found that administrators who wanted to do more, commonly reported they were situated in a work environment that limited their ability to do more. I found that the work environment and the identity (personal characteristics and public service motivation) could influence the public service behavioral outcomes of administrators. The interview data pointed out a complex picture of the tensions existing between the institution and the individual. The research revealed that public administrators often adhered to their role as public servants but were faced with dynamics that interacted with their performances. From these findings, administrators must look pass those informal and formal influences that prevent them from staying engaged with their roles as public servants and find ways to give citizens meaningful opportunities to have input into the government decision-making process. / Doctor of Philosophy / This research sought to discover the public administrators' identities and their motivation for engaging in public participation, along with understanding their roles as public servants. To examine this further, the researcher captured how administrators have engaged the public and how they have documented this engagement in their citizen participation plans. The findings showed that public administrators were committed to their identities as public servants and continued to perform in this capacity despite some of the barriers that may have prevented them from having meaningful engagement opportunities with the public.

Public administration scholars accept that public service values guide administrators’ behavior. This guidance also derives from social and cultural values that motivate administrators’ individual attitudes. A part of the field recognizes that public servants play an active role during the implementation process through their daily use of discretion. Nevertheless, public administrators’ values and attitudes are rarely linked to policy implementation and organizational performance. In consequence, public policy evaluation seldom considers the role of values and attitudes of those implementing policy. This study examines how public administrators’ values and attitudes towards citizens shape policy implementation and influence organizational and program performance. The implementation and results of Section 8 HCV Program serve as case study to address the linkage between public service values and performance. The Section 8 HCV is the federal government's major program that assists low-income families, elderly and disabled people to afford decent, safe, and sanitary housing in the private market. The Program allows participants to choose any housing that meets its requirements. This research hypothesizes that environmental and organizational factors impose a toll on organizational and policy performance and that public administrators’ values and attitudes towards recipients buffer some of these effects. The study employs a quantitative methods approach to examine and combine demographic characteristics of the communities that surround Public Housing Authorities -where the Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher Program is implemented-, statistic indicators of the local housing market, Section 8 HCV structural factors of operation, levels of poverty and race desegregation in vouchers recipient, and the quality of their neighborhoods, to establish a correlation between Public Housing Authorities’ poor performance and less advantageous environmental factors, and vice versa. I conducted semi-structured interviews among Section 8 HCV Program’s case managers, directors and front-line practitioners in Public Housing Authorities in the states of Florida and California to identify the Public Service Values-based strategies that influence program’s implementation, and both, organizational and program’s performance. The quantitative evidence collected and analyzed in this dissertation indicates that environmental and organizational factors impose a toll on Public Housing Authorities and Section 8 HCV program’s performance. Meanwhile, the qualitative portion of the study suggests that public administrators’ values and attitudes towards recipients permeate the implementation process and influence Section 8 HCV program’s results.

Submitted by Marcio Lemos (marciolemos@globo.com) on 2013-05-08T04:16:35Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Márcio Lemos - Publicação.pdf: 949249 bytes, checksum: 6ecd430f3e427e95566f5e303e34978c (MD5) / Rejected by ÁUREA CORRÊA DA FONSECA CORRÊA DA FONSECA (aurea.fonseca@fgv.br), reason: A submissão foi rejeitada porque está embargada para sempre. As Defesas dos Mestrado da FGV deverão ficar disponíveis na Biblioteca Digital para consulta"sem embargo", a menos que o aluno envie um documento explicando o motivo para que seja anexado ao impresso. OBS.: FAVOR SUBMETER NOVAMENTE SEM O EMBARGO. ÁUREA SRA on 2013-05-09T13:31:18Z (GMT) / Submitted by Marcio Lemos (marciolemos@globo.com) on 2013-05-09T15:21:16Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Márcio Lemos - Publicação.pdf: 949249 bytes, checksum: 6ecd430f3e427e95566f5e303e34978c (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by ÁUREA CORRÊA DA FONSECA CORRÊA DA FONSECA (aurea.fonseca@fgv.br) on 2013-05-10T12:46:56Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Márcio Lemos - Publicação.pdf: 949249 bytes, checksum: 6ecd430f3e427e95566f5e303e34978c (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marcia Bacha (marcia.bacha@fgv.br) on 2013-05-15T12:46:54Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Márcio Lemos - Publicação.pdf: 949249 bytes, checksum: 6ecd430f3e427e95566f5e303e34978c (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2013-05-15T12:47:05Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação Márcio Lemos - Publicação.pdf: 949249 bytes, checksum: 6ecd430f3e427e95566f5e303e34978c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-12-27 / This research aims to contribute to understand the bonds of loyalty that guide the actions of the Brazilian civil servants. Following the literature review, interviews were conducted to collect and analyze the perceptions of professionals. The study focused on public safety employees of Brazilian Federal District, as forensics experts, police chiefs and officers, including those working on the front lines, as well as leaders. Adapted the theoretical reference from Maynard-Moody and Musheno (2003), and from De Graaf (2010), about the loyalty of civil servants, the study tried to gather narratives that illustrate everyday situations in which decisions are taken and discretion is exercised. Accordingly, we sought to investigate instances the most representative of responsibility, as well as potential tensions and conflicts, especially in a scenario where governance and accountability are in evidence. Regulations are always strictly observed? Or is there a judgment of moral evaluation that considers other facets and interests? Answered these questions, we proceeded to the comparison between the results and those from the research references. Finally, also sought to engage in topics that can be implemented as a development of this research. / Esta pesquisa tem por objetivo contribuir para compreensão dos vínculos de lealdade que orientam a atuação dos servidores públicos brasileiros. Após a revisão bibliográfica, foram realizadas entrevistas a fim de coletar e analisar as percepções dos profissionais. O estudo focou em funcionários da segurança pública do DF, como peritos criminais, delegados e policiais, abrangendo aqueles que atuam na linha de frente, assim como chefes e dirigentes. Adaptou-se o referencial teórico de Maynard-Moody e Musheno (2003), assim como o de De Graaf (2010), acerca da lealdade dos servidores públicos e buscou-se reunir narrativas que ilustrassem situações cotidianas em que as decisões são tomadas e a discricionariedade é exercida. Nesse sentido, procurou-se investigar as instâncias de reponsabilidade mais representativas, assim como possíveis tensões e conflitos, sobretudo em um panorama em que governança e accountability estão em evidência. Os regulamentos são sempre rigorosamente cumpridos? Ou haveria um juízo de ponderação moral abrangendo outras facetas e interesses? Respondidas estas questões, procedeu-se o cotejo entre os resultados obtidos e aqueles oriundos das pesquisas referenciais. Por fim, também se procurou entabular tópicos que possam ser desenvolvidos como desdobramentos desta pesquisa.