as public administration struggled to establish its identity, it was aided greatly by the progressive reform movement that sought to raise the standards of honesty in government and to enlarge the level of public service provided to citizens, especially in american cities. while the term has its origins in religious concepts that argued for the infinite improvability of the human condition, rather than ordained class distinctions, by the end of the nineteenth century it had come to mean a responsibility of classes for one another and a willingness to use all government and social institutions to give that responsibility legal effect.