POLITICS/ADMINISTRATION DICHOTOMY: The belief, growing out of the early
administrative reform movement and its reaction against the spoils system, which held that political
interference in administration would erode the opportunity for administrative efficiency, that the
policy making activities of government ought to be wholly separated from the administrative
functions, and that administrators had to have an explicit assignment of objectives before they could
begin to develop an efficient administrative system.
POLITICS OF THE BUDGETARY PROCESS: The requirement that administrators act as
advocates for their own programs during the appropriation process by soliciting outside support,
protecting their budgetary base, and inching ahead with new programs; a budgetary system that
deals with complex problems by relying upon incremental methods of decision making, information
drawn from past experience rather than analysis, and satisfactory rather than optimal standards of
quality.
POSITION CLASSIFICATION: Analyzing and organizing jobs on the basis of duties,
responsibilities, and the knowledge and skills required to perform them.
PREEMPTION: Federal government efforts to preempt an area traditionally associated with state
government.
PRIVATIZATION: Use of nongovernmental agencies to provide goods and services previously
provided by government, also known as "contracting out."
PROGRESSIVE TAX: One that taxes those with higher incomes at a higher rate.
PROPORTIONAL TAX: One that taxes everyone at the same rate.
PROPRIETARY FUNDS: Used to account for government activities hat more closely resemble
private business.
PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION: The management and administration of public programs.
PUBLIC-CHOICE ECONOMICS: An approach to public administration based on micro-economic
theory which views the citizen as a consumer of government goods and services and would attempt
to maximize administrative responsiveness to citizen demand by creating a market system for
governmental activities in which public agencies would compete to provide citizens with goods and
services. This would replace the current system under which administrative agencies in effect act as
monopolies under the influence of organized pressure groups which, the public-choice economists
argue, are institutionally incapable of representing the demands of individual citizens.
PUBLIC MANAGEMENT: A field of practice and study central to public administration,
emphasizing internal operations of public agencies, focuses on managerial concerns related to
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control and direction, such as planning, organizational maintenance, information systems, personnel
management, and performance evaluation.