Abstract

This paper examines the status of Public Administration discipline in the context of India’s development strategies and public institutions, particularly in the unfolding context of globalization. The development models have undergone changes from planned economy to market economy. The government, since 1991, has been either downsizing/abolishing or launching new institutions to suit the market economy. These changes not only impacted the economy and socioeconomic conditions of the people but also reduced social science knowledge to a monochromatic form drifting from their epistemological agenda and relative autonomous positions. The fundamental challenge of the discipline is to understand the neoliberal policy of the state and its institutions and analyze their implications—causes and effects--to people, particularly common man. Public administration scholars hardly recognize these changes-both in teaching and research; and also not adequately equipped with the theoretical frameworks, research methodology and tools for understanding and analyze the changes and their consequences to the administrative systems and the people at large; thus, the relevance of the discipline to the society is under question. The paper argues that, despite these concerns, there are opportunities for the discipline to grow by identifying challenges of PA in the Indian context, attracting the appropriate talented personnel, developing teaching and research competence, organizing seminars on real life concerns and cross-cultural context studies, exchange of faculty between the universities and government officials, etc.

Keywords: Administrative thinkers, Development models, Globalization, Downsizing, Real life concerns and cross-cultural studies.