Public administration theorists, such as Dwight Waldo,37 Vincent Ostrom,38 Nicholas
Henry,39 and Howard McCurdy,40 have described the pattern of development within public
administration within public administration after the First World War as a period of orthodoxy.
The tenets of this orthodox ideology held that “true democracy and true efficiency are
synonymous, or at least reconcilable,”41 that the work of government could be neatly divided
into decision making and execution, and that administration was a science with discoverable
principles. The initial imprint of the scientific management movement, the progressive reform
political movement, and the politics-administration dichotomy became central focuses for public
administration as both a profession and a field of study.