Gregory Streib’s research while affiliated with Georgia State University and other places

“Perhaps there is no single problem in public administration of moment equal to the reconciliation of the increasing dependence upon experts with an enduring democratic reality.”–Paul Appleby

Given local, regional, national, and global events of the last few years and the ever-increasing service roles and expectations of county governments, American counties warrant greater scholarly attention. To guide researchers, the research agenda published in this journal 15 years ago has been refined and expanded. This 11-point agenda includes fiscal capacity and responsibility; the role of structure, politics, and political participation; intergovernmental relations and networking; professionalism; service delivery; environmental issues; population changes; managing conflict and promoting integration; terrorism and security; information technology; and economic development. In addition, five database concerns and needs that pose significant challenges to researchers are identified and presented for consideration.

Collaboration is a necessary foundation for dealing with both natural and technological hazards and disasters and the consequences of terrorism. This analysis describes the structure of the American emergency management system, the charts development of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and identifies conflicts arising from the creation of the Department of Homeland Security and the attempt to impose a command and control system on a very collaborative organizational culture in a very collaborative sociopolitical and legal context. The importance of collaboration is stressed, and recommendations are offered on how to improve the amount and value of collaborative activities. New leadership strategies are recommended that derive their power from effective strategies and the transformational power of a compelling vision, rather than from hierarchy, rank, or standard operating procedures.

The possible benefits of e-government are currently generating far more interest than the limitations. The dominant view is that the Internet offers almost unlimited potential and that governments are not fully exploiting this opportunity. The authors' findings question this conclusion. They find a strong preference for in-person and telephone communication, even when these methods might actually be less convenient. The authors focus on a single public agency, but the circumstances they address are common in public organizations.

Few doubt that the Internet is changing citizen interactions with government. To assess those changes, the authors analyze data from a telephone survey on how Georgia residents connect with government via the Internet. They find that citizens visit government Web sites for many reasons, which can be divided into three categories: e-democracy, e-commerce, and e-research. E-democracy is the least common activity, and it alone resembles traditional political behavior by being more prevalent among respondents interested in politics and government. The authors discuss the implications of these findings for future citizen engagement with e-governance and for the role of government in facilitating that engagement.

The Internet has become an important way for individuals, private companies, and governments to get information, to communicate, and to do business. Research shows that local governments have been slow to respond to these developments. In this article we examine the ability of local governments to implement the changes needed to become cyber-governments. We develop a model that examines the strengths and weaknesses that need to be considered before embarking on E-governance reforms. We also examine the hurdles that local governments will need to cross in order to achieve success.

This article focuses on the use of strategic planning and management processes in municipal governments with populations over 25,000. Strategic planning has been used in municipalities for 20 years now, but little is known about how it is used and the results obtained. In particular, we explore whether municipal governments tie other components of the overall strategic management process to their strategic plans. Findings do not show a dramatic expansion in the use of strategic planning, but there is some evidence of growing sophistication, as demonstrated by links to other management and decision-making activities. Managers were enthusiastic about their experiences with strategic planning and largely satisfied with their achievement of goals and objectives. Overall, we find a raising of the bar as far as strategic planning is concerned, but the use of comprehensive strategic management is only beginning to develop in a small number of leading-edge municipalities.

Since the early days of the field, public administration research has been a work in progress. Many authors have struggled to find the proper role of research in the field. Interest in the topic intensified over the last couple of decades, as a perception developed that the quality and usefulness of work had fallen decidedly behind other academic disciplines. While a rich literature has developed debating the merits of public administration research, the resulting product does not provide a clear direction for reform-minded researchers to follow. In this article, we seek to organize this material in ways that will make it more useful. Our analysis identifies hard and soft barriers preventing progress and examines three dilemmas facing public administration researchers: theoretical versus conceptual research, academically sophisticated methods versus widely accessible methods, and an academic versus a practitioner focus. Through our discussion of these dilemmas, we seek to clarify the issues facing researchers and help them make more informed choices.

Recent research has questioned both the rigor and theoretical development of public administration research. The proposed solutions have generally endorsed a more academically oriented research agenda. Authors have discussed practitioner needs, but the focus has been on the appropriateness of different research methods rather than the types of knowledge needed. We seek to contribute to this ongoing debate by comparing the knowledge needs identified by members of the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) with 15 years of research in Public Administration Review . We found much published research matching the needs of ICMA members, but it focused on a relatively narrow range of topics. We recommend incorporating a concern for relevance into efforts to improve public administration research. This will help to ensure that we build a knowledge base that makes a substantial contribution to practice.