PUB4871 2025 ASSIGNMENT 5 2025 PUB4871 2025
DISCLAIMER
THE DOCUMENT PRESENTED IS A DEMOSTRATION ON HOW STUDENTS CAN
APPROACH THE ASSIGNMENT FOR PUB4871. IT IS BASED ON PRESCRIBED
MATERIAL AND EXTERNAL RESEARCH. THE DOCUMENT CONTAINS BOTH SHORT
NOTES AND A RESPONSE EXAMPLE FOR EACH QUESTION. STUDENTS ARE
THEREFORE ADVISED NOT TO COPY AND PASTE BUT USE THE DOCUMENT AS A
RESEARCH GUIDE THAT WOULD HELP THEM DRAFT THEIR OWN FINAL COPIES.
, PUB4871 2025 ASSIGNMENT 5 2025 PUB4871 2025
QUESTION 1
You have to write a three (3)-page letter to Mr Woodrow Wilson. In this letter you
need to explain to Mr Wilson what leading methodologies are currently being
used in Public Administration.
06/10/2025
Mr. Woodrow Wilson
Subject: Methodological Strategies Currently Employed in Public
Administration Research
Dear Mr. Wilson,
I am addressing you today from one hundred and fifty years in the future, following the
publication of your seminal essay, "The Study of Administration" (1887), which so
profoundly impacted the study of government. You rightly identified that the purpose
of administrative study is to detail what the government can accomplish and how it can
execute these functions with utmost efficiency at least cost. While the broad goal of
efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability remains paramount, the scholarly view of
Public Administration (PA) has changed dramatically (Mataywa & Makhasi, 2023). We
have lived through prolonged periods of time when the nerve of contention was
constitutional principle, but now we languish badly with practices of concrete
implementation, or, as you phrase it, how law needs to be administered with wisdom,
with justice, with speed, and without resistance.
PA today is not merely regarded as a science of management, but an elaborate human
science. This elaborate discipline necessitates a wide array of methodologies, or
"methodological strategies, chosen specifically to best suit the problem of inquiry in
question. Such strategies span empirical and non-empirical domains.0717513144
Non-Empirical and Textual Strategies
Modern inquiry into Public Administration often begins with methods that do not rely
on generating new factual data, but rather on philosophical scrutiny and interpretation
(Mataywa & Makhasi, 2023). The strategy of Philosophizing and Conceptual
Analysis remains crucial. In this field, researchers employ philosophical skills to
analyse complicated concepts, criticize specific ideologies, and examine the starting
points and interpretations underlying public policy. Philosophizing is considered a non-
DISCLAIMER
THE DOCUMENT PRESENTED IS A DEMOSTRATION ON HOW STUDENTS CAN
APPROACH THE ASSIGNMENT FOR PUB4871. IT IS BASED ON PRESCRIBED
MATERIAL AND EXTERNAL RESEARCH. THE DOCUMENT CONTAINS BOTH SHORT
NOTES AND A RESPONSE EXAMPLE FOR EACH QUESTION. STUDENTS ARE
THEREFORE ADVISED NOT TO COPY AND PASTE BUT USE THE DOCUMENT AS A
RESEARCH GUIDE THAT WOULD HELP THEM DRAFT THEIR OWN FINAL COPIES.
, PUB4871 2025 ASSIGNMENT 5 2025 PUB4871 2025
QUESTION 1
You have to write a three (3)-page letter to Mr Woodrow Wilson. In this letter you
need to explain to Mr Wilson what leading methodologies are currently being
used in Public Administration.
06/10/2025
Mr. Woodrow Wilson
Subject: Methodological Strategies Currently Employed in Public
Administration Research
Dear Mr. Wilson,
I am addressing you today from one hundred and fifty years in the future, following the
publication of your seminal essay, "The Study of Administration" (1887), which so
profoundly impacted the study of government. You rightly identified that the purpose
of administrative study is to detail what the government can accomplish and how it can
execute these functions with utmost efficiency at least cost. While the broad goal of
efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability remains paramount, the scholarly view of
Public Administration (PA) has changed dramatically (Mataywa & Makhasi, 2023). We
have lived through prolonged periods of time when the nerve of contention was
constitutional principle, but now we languish badly with practices of concrete
implementation, or, as you phrase it, how law needs to be administered with wisdom,
with justice, with speed, and without resistance.
PA today is not merely regarded as a science of management, but an elaborate human
science. This elaborate discipline necessitates a wide array of methodologies, or
"methodological strategies, chosen specifically to best suit the problem of inquiry in
question. Such strategies span empirical and non-empirical domains.0717513144
Non-Empirical and Textual Strategies
Modern inquiry into Public Administration often begins with methods that do not rely
on generating new factual data, but rather on philosophical scrutiny and interpretation
(Mataywa & Makhasi, 2023). The strategy of Philosophizing and Conceptual
Analysis remains crucial. In this field, researchers employ philosophical skills to
analyse complicated concepts, criticize specific ideologies, and examine the starting
points and interpretations underlying public policy. Philosophizing is considered a non-
