PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

 M.A PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION NOTE(STUDY MATERIALS)

Prepared By Bhagyaraj.V.B

INTRODUCTION

The society as an association of human beings has historically evolved its own rules and regulations in the interest of maintenance of social order and avoidance of conflicts and disorder. In this sense, ‘government’ and ‘society’ are twins. Emergence of formal government as a regular and professional arm of the State took a long time in history. When, in the course of social evolution, State emerged as the sovereign public authority superseding and overseeing all other social formations (family, church, guilds etc.), formal government appeared as the State’s enforcing agency. What is now known as `bureaucracy’ –– usually a group of civil servants recruited on merit and serving under contract with stipulated conditions of service –– is a late arrival in social history? The bureaucratic State came to regulate and even ‘dominate’ society. With the emergence of democracy later in history, social freedom and bureaucratic regulation grew up in an uneasy association with each other. There has always been an undercurrent of tension between the democratic impulses of a society and the rule imposing functioning of bureaucracy as a social regulator. It is well known that 'government' is the action arm of the State. Government in action is public administration. 

Society affects and is affected by what the government does or 1 does not do. This Unit will focus on the basic notions of society, State, and administration. The purpose is to introduce you to the basic concepts of ‘society’, ‘State’, and ‘public administration’, and help you to understand thei