Intellectual Paradigms in Public Administration: Why So Many and How to Bridge Them?

The notion of paradigm has become ubiquitous since its inception by Thomas Kuhn as a way to understand the history of science. Paradigms, Kuhn writes, are “universally recognized scientific achievements that for a time provide model problems and solutions to a community of practitioners" (I 97ob, p. viii).Within a specific paradigm, Cutting further explains. there is “an acceptanc that is so strong it eliminates the need for further discussion of foundational questions about the subject-matter and methodology of the disciplined and enables the discipline to devote most of its energy to puzzle-solving" (1980, p.13). The history of scientific development, according to Kuhn, is thus largely characterized by a succession of diiTerent paradigms. or paradigm shifts. Actually, Kuhn used the concept of paradigm mostly within the domain of natural sciences and was hesitant to expand it to the social sciences, which he believed were characterized by a “tradition of claims, counterclaims, and debates over fundamentals" (197oa, p. 6). Indeed, in most social sciences, paradigm shift is rare. Rather more frequent is “paradigm parallel." the coexistence of several competing paradigms. Public administration is no exception.l After the collapse of the orthodoxy, a consensus on big questions in public administration has never been achieved (e.g.. Box, 1992; Waldo. 1968; White. 1986), such as what public administration is, how to acquire knowledge. what type of knowledge (scientific or interpretative) to pursue. and the relationships between public administration and other disciplines, such as political science and business management. As a result, competing paradigms have emerged to provide their own answers about the nature and assumptions of public administration, with no one of them ever able to dominate. Henry (2010) argues that public administration theory has. since its inception. gone through a succession of six paradigms: the politics/administration dichotomy (1900-1926), principles of public administration (1927-1937), public administration as political science (1950-1970), public administration as management (1950-1970), public administration as public administration (I 970-present).