PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION THEORY (PA 401)
Fall 2017
Thursdays, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Burnham Hall (BH) 208
Dr. Elisabeth
Muhlenberg
Email: TA: Xiaoheng Wang
Office Hours: AEH 2105 Email:
Mondays 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Office Hours by appointment
Course overview and learning goals: PA 401 introduces beginning MPA students to the
political, managerial and behavioral theories that are applicable to every level and type of
government work and applies them to cases in order to demonstrate how and why
government entities or their officials can succeed or fail. The theories and concepts
presented are focused on a broad range of topics that practitioners need to be familiar
with in today’s complex environment: the foundation of ethics, bureaucracy, federalism,
administrative power, controls and constraints as well as the management competencies
planning, decision-making, team-work and communication. The course ends with a
discussion of the dilemma between bureaucracy and public interest, a conundrum which
public administrators face on a daily basis.
The goals of this course are twofold: First, the course is designed to foster each student’s
analytical and logical capacities with respect to understanding ubiquitous organizational
phenomena and acquiring managerial skills. Second, the course seeks to familiarize
students with the process of analyzing, comparing and applying theories to cases, many
of them familiar to domestic students. These cases represent tough "real world"
problems with which public administrator have been faced. To hone students’ skills at
applying diverse theoretical concepts to current events, the textbook context will be
enriched with recent news stories or videos. Finally, several guest speakers from
different areas of public administration contribute their broad experience toward
enhancing students’ awareness of the complexities of working as a public administrator.
In short, by closely linking theory and practice the course guides students not only toward
mastery of Public Administration competencies, it also trains them to ground a work-
related argument in the theories that dominate the field.
Textbook:
Richard J. Stillman II, Public Administration: Concepts and Cases, 9th ed., Wadsworth
Cengage Learning, Boston, MA, 2010.
Blackboard: Blackboard provides the repository for class announcements, weekly
lessons, assignments, discussions, quizzes, tests as well as documents such as the
syllabus, readings, and general information. If you are not yet familiar with Blackboard,
please familiarize yourself with it as soon as possible. Check Blackboard daily for
updates.
1
,Course structure and format
This introductory course is challenging for new graduate students, because it covers a
broad spectrum of theoretical information in a relatively short time frame. To provide for
accountability (yours and mine) and enhance your ability to succeed in this course
multiple opportunities for performance measurement (aka grading) have been built in.
Overall there are seven components:
1. Critical Assessments (a total of 1) – 10%
2. Discussion Questions/answers - 20%
3. Oral presentation - 10%
4. Midterm exam - 20%
5. Final exam - 20%
6. Participation - 10%
7. Quizzes - 10%
1. ONE Critical Assessment (10% of the course grade) uploaded to
Blackboard on or before the due date.
a. Your choice of article/excerpt, selected from the Extra Readings listed on
the syllabus for each session. The signup sheet is available online and
includes due dates.
b. To help you with critically assessing the article and me with grading it, I
have posted a mandatory template with four items on Blackboard under
the GENERAL INFORMATION tab.
i. Bibliographical citation
ii. Main part of the critical assessment consisting of the
claim/argument the author is making, a description of the
evidence supporting the claim and the conclusion the author
draws.
iii. A ONE sentence nutshell statement
iv. Relevance: The last point on the form refers to your understanding
of the relevance of the reading to Public Administration. Be
prepared, when called upon, to restate the author’s claim,
evidence and conclusion, speak to the relevance of the article for
Public Administration practice, and be prepared to respond to
questions and comments.
2. Online Discussion (20% of the course grade)
Each week I provide at least five discussion questions for online answers. Each
student responds to two discussion questions and to at least two of your
classmates’ comments online. The total number of points available each week
is 10 points, with 5 points allocated to contents and 5 points allocated to language
(grammar, spelling etc.). It is important to post thoughtful, substantive
comments in paragraph form (i.e. at least six sentences per comment and three
sentences per response). The Discussion Board becomes unavailable at midnight
the day before class.
This class is also geared toward answering YOUR questions! Each student is
responsible for posting one question each week.
2
, 3. A 5 minute oral presentation on the article which you assessed critically:
(10% of the course grade)
a. In a 5 minute oral presentation in front of the class you will be asked to
answer the questions: “What idea(s) does the author discuss? What are
substantive reasons to recommend this article to your classmates and
what are reasons NOT to recommend it?”
b. There are specific oral presentation guidelines available on Blackboard
under the GENERAL INFORMATION tab
4. Take Home Midterm Exam (20% of the course grade)
Available online in Blackboard at the end of the 7th class session and due the
following week at the beginning of class.
5. Take Home Final Exam: (20% of the course grade).
Available online via Blackboard at the end of class, December 7; due one week
later on December 14, 2017.
The two take-home exams include definitions of important concepts and two
essays on questions that relate to our required readings. The exams provide a
limited degree of choice re concepts to be defined and topics to be written about.
To give you an example of a take-home exam, both the midterm and the final
exam from Fall 2016 are available under the “General Information” tab on
Blackboard.
6. Course Participation: (10% of the course grade)
The primary form of participation will be your substantive contribution in class,
e.g. your participation in discussing the weekly discussion questions, questions
you ask, or comments on the session topic. A secondary component of Course
Participation is your attendance record. Missing more than 3 classes will result
in a lowering of your participation grade.
Specifically, the course participation grade is calculated as follows:
60% of the participation grade is based on in-class participation
40% of the participation grade is based on attendance, i.e. no more than 3
absences
7. Quizzes: (10% of course grade)
For each session of the semester I have developed a 10-question quiz that covers
the ideas expressed in that week’s theoretical reading. The quiz is meant to be
taken after you have completed a thorough reading of the theoretical article. The
online quiz is due prior to the beginning of the session in which we discuss the
material. Late submissions are graded 0.
Please note: the quiz questions focus exclusively on the theoretical reading(s)
specified for the quiz. The quizzes will contain answers that may well be
correct in another context. Be aware that the correct answer comes from
the reading alone!
3
Fall 2017
Thursdays, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Burnham Hall (BH) 208
Dr. Elisabeth
Muhlenberg
Email: TA: Xiaoheng Wang
Office Hours: AEH 2105 Email:
Mondays 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Office Hours by appointment
Course overview and learning goals: PA 401 introduces beginning MPA students to the
political, managerial and behavioral theories that are applicable to every level and type of
government work and applies them to cases in order to demonstrate how and why
government entities or their officials can succeed or fail. The theories and concepts
presented are focused on a broad range of topics that practitioners need to be familiar
with in today’s complex environment: the foundation of ethics, bureaucracy, federalism,
administrative power, controls and constraints as well as the management competencies
planning, decision-making, team-work and communication. The course ends with a
discussion of the dilemma between bureaucracy and public interest, a conundrum which
public administrators face on a daily basis.
The goals of this course are twofold: First, the course is designed to foster each student’s
analytical and logical capacities with respect to understanding ubiquitous organizational
phenomena and acquiring managerial skills. Second, the course seeks to familiarize
students with the process of analyzing, comparing and applying theories to cases, many
of them familiar to domestic students. These cases represent tough "real world"
problems with which public administrator have been faced. To hone students’ skills at
applying diverse theoretical concepts to current events, the textbook context will be
enriched with recent news stories or videos. Finally, several guest speakers from
different areas of public administration contribute their broad experience toward
enhancing students’ awareness of the complexities of working as a public administrator.
In short, by closely linking theory and practice the course guides students not only toward
mastery of Public Administration competencies, it also trains them to ground a work-
related argument in the theories that dominate the field.
Textbook:
Richard J. Stillman II, Public Administration: Concepts and Cases, 9th ed., Wadsworth
Cengage Learning, Boston, MA, 2010.
Blackboard: Blackboard provides the repository for class announcements, weekly
lessons, assignments, discussions, quizzes, tests as well as documents such as the
syllabus, readings, and general information. If you are not yet familiar with Blackboard,
please familiarize yourself with it as soon as possible. Check Blackboard daily for
updates.
1
,Course structure and format
This introductory course is challenging for new graduate students, because it covers a
broad spectrum of theoretical information in a relatively short time frame. To provide for
accountability (yours and mine) and enhance your ability to succeed in this course
multiple opportunities for performance measurement (aka grading) have been built in.
Overall there are seven components:
1. Critical Assessments (a total of 1) – 10%
2. Discussion Questions/answers - 20%
3. Oral presentation - 10%
4. Midterm exam - 20%
5. Final exam - 20%
6. Participation - 10%
7. Quizzes - 10%
1. ONE Critical Assessment (10% of the course grade) uploaded to
Blackboard on or before the due date.
a. Your choice of article/excerpt, selected from the Extra Readings listed on
the syllabus for each session. The signup sheet is available online and
includes due dates.
b. To help you with critically assessing the article and me with grading it, I
have posted a mandatory template with four items on Blackboard under
the GENERAL INFORMATION tab.
i. Bibliographical citation
ii. Main part of the critical assessment consisting of the
claim/argument the author is making, a description of the
evidence supporting the claim and the conclusion the author
draws.
iii. A ONE sentence nutshell statement
iv. Relevance: The last point on the form refers to your understanding
of the relevance of the reading to Public Administration. Be
prepared, when called upon, to restate the author’s claim,
evidence and conclusion, speak to the relevance of the article for
Public Administration practice, and be prepared to respond to
questions and comments.
2. Online Discussion (20% of the course grade)
Each week I provide at least five discussion questions for online answers. Each
student responds to two discussion questions and to at least two of your
classmates’ comments online. The total number of points available each week
is 10 points, with 5 points allocated to contents and 5 points allocated to language
(grammar, spelling etc.). It is important to post thoughtful, substantive
comments in paragraph form (i.e. at least six sentences per comment and three
sentences per response). The Discussion Board becomes unavailable at midnight
the day before class.
This class is also geared toward answering YOUR questions! Each student is
responsible for posting one question each week.
2
, 3. A 5 minute oral presentation on the article which you assessed critically:
(10% of the course grade)
a. In a 5 minute oral presentation in front of the class you will be asked to
answer the questions: “What idea(s) does the author discuss? What are
substantive reasons to recommend this article to your classmates and
what are reasons NOT to recommend it?”
b. There are specific oral presentation guidelines available on Blackboard
under the GENERAL INFORMATION tab
4. Take Home Midterm Exam (20% of the course grade)
Available online in Blackboard at the end of the 7th class session and due the
following week at the beginning of class.
5. Take Home Final Exam: (20% of the course grade).
Available online via Blackboard at the end of class, December 7; due one week
later on December 14, 2017.
The two take-home exams include definitions of important concepts and two
essays on questions that relate to our required readings. The exams provide a
limited degree of choice re concepts to be defined and topics to be written about.
To give you an example of a take-home exam, both the midterm and the final
exam from Fall 2016 are available under the “General Information” tab on
Blackboard.
6. Course Participation: (10% of the course grade)
The primary form of participation will be your substantive contribution in class,
e.g. your participation in discussing the weekly discussion questions, questions
you ask, or comments on the session topic. A secondary component of Course
Participation is your attendance record. Missing more than 3 classes will result
in a lowering of your participation grade.
Specifically, the course participation grade is calculated as follows:
60% of the participation grade is based on in-class participation
40% of the participation grade is based on attendance, i.e. no more than 3
absences
7. Quizzes: (10% of course grade)
For each session of the semester I have developed a 10-question quiz that covers
the ideas expressed in that week’s theoretical reading. The quiz is meant to be
taken after you have completed a thorough reading of the theoretical article. The
online quiz is due prior to the beginning of the session in which we discuss the
material. Late submissions are graded 0.
Please note: the quiz questions focus exclusively on the theoretical reading(s)
specified for the quiz. The quizzes will contain answers that may well be
correct in another context. Be aware that the correct answer comes from
the reading alone!
3
