Donald F Kettl
Biographic Data
| ID | 1007340 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Donald F Kettl |
| GIVEN NAMES | Donald F |
| FAMILY NAME | Kettl |
| SIGNATURE | KETTL D F |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Wisconsin–Madison |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4031-0615 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 57 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 256 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 57 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1979 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 8 |
The Government Performance and Results Act at 30: Looking Forward from the Foundation of the Past
This special issue examines the contributions--and challenges-that surround the thirty years of the movement launched by the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993
How much damage can a politicized public service do? Lessons from Australia
Public administration and political science: Can this marriage be saved
There is a profound irony in how public administration and political science splintered at the very pinnacle of their interconnection, intellectual power, and practical impact. Much of public administration has gradually separated from political science. Then public administration broke into pieces, with public administration and public management going in different directions. The central question is this: Are these tensions the product of diver…
A Tribute to H. George Fredrickson
During his 50-year career, H. George Frederickson contributed on multiple fronts: to better government, to a more thoughtful and rigorous public administration field, to better scholarship, to a network of scholars, and to collaborative interaction among practitioners and scholars. He was the founding Editor of the Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory as well as the Journal of Public Administration Education. He was one of the fou…
Weberian Bureaucracy and Contemporary Governance
Max Weber’s role as a founder of the study of administration is often in much dispute, but he is important for two things: he captured the essence of bureaucracy and he connected it to the role of business in the economy. Weber points us toward the argument that businesses seek profits, that the key to maximizing their profits is certainty in their environment, and that the “iron cage” of bureaucracy plays an important role in reducing uncertaint…
The Divided States of America: Why Federalism Doesn't Work
States Divided: The Implications of American Federalism for Covid‐19
The explosion of the coronavirus onto the global stage has posed unprecedented challenges for governance. In the United States, the question of how best to respond to these challenges has fractured along intergovernmental lines. The federal government left most of the decisions to the states, and the states went in very different directions. Some of those decisions naturally flowed from the disease's emerging patterns. But to a surprising degree,…
Peaceable Assembly and Association: Donald F. Kettl
I like to think that, if Benjamin Franklin was alive today, no one would be a bigger fan of the internet. In fact, given his incredible collection of brainchildren, he might well have been one of t
From Policy to Practice: From Ideas to Results, From Results to Trust
Few areas of public administration have been more discouraging, over a longer period of time, than the struggle to build public trust in government's work. However, new research suggests that public administrators can build trust by improving the results they produce for citizens. Practical, practicable steps can produce big improvements: improving government's focus on citizens' needs; engaging employees; focusing on fairness; and, especially, c…
The Clumsy War against the “Administrative State”
Politics of the Administrative Process
Is Public Management Neglecting the State
Public management is a domain of research that is now roughly three decades old. Researchers in this area have made important advances in understanding about the performance of public organizations. But questions have been raised about the scope and methods of public management research (PMR). Does it neglect important questions about the development of major institutions of the modern state? Has it focused unduly on problems of the advanced demo…
Making Data Speak: Lessons for Using Numbers for Solving Public Policy Puzzles
There is a vast increase in the production of policy analysis in government, but behind the rising volume is a deep paradox: We are generating information faster than we are devising strategies for hearing what it tells us and helping policymakers act on it. There are 10 big issues in using numbers for solving policy problems, and they lead to important lessons: Analysts need to speak in a language that policymakers can understand, capture the in…
The Job of Government: Interweaving Public Functions and Private Hands
Lively and sometimes raucous debate about the job of government has increasingly engulfed American politics. Much of that debate has swirled around government's size, with conservatives arguing the case for shrinking government and liberals fighting to grow it. In reality, however, neither of these debates engages the critical underlying trend: the increasing interweaving of governmental functions deeply into every fiber of the nongovernmental se…
Water Flowing Uphill: National Implications of State Civil Service Movements
The Merit Principle in Crisis
Public Bureaucracies
This article looks at public bureaucracies, which are considered to be the locus of government action. It examines three key puzzles. The first is that bureaucratic actions are the locus of governmental power. The second is that much of the work of bureaucracy happens through the coordination of complex activities. The third puzzle shows that such power is important for democratic government, both to protect it from forces that try to destroy it …
Administrative Accountability and the Rule of Law: The 2008 John Gaus Lecture
In June 2008, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration rocked the food industry—and food lovers—with its warning about tainted tomatoes. Consumers in New Mexico and Texas were contracting a rare, sometimes fatal strain of salmonella and the FDA feared that salmonella contamination from tomatoes was the cause. In the weeks that followed, a major outbreak spread across the country and worried consumers abandoned tomatoes. Fourth of July cookouts were …
Government performance: Why management matters; Government matters: Welfare reform in Wisconsin; How management matters: Street‐level bureaucrats and welfare reform
Modernising Government: The Way Forward—a comment
Is the Worst Yet to Come
Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, public officials pledged that the nation would rise to the challenge and ensure that the country would not suffer such a disaster again. Almost exactly four years later, however, Hurricane Katrina inflicted a devastating blow on the Gulf Coast. Many of the problems that surfaced during 9/11 returned yet again to plague the Katrina recovery efforts. Moreover, as bad as the problems w…
Managing Boundaries in American Administration: The Collaboration Imperative
Boundaries have long played a central role in American public administration. In part, this is because boundaries are central to the administrative process, as they define what organizations are responsible for doing and what powers and functions lie elsewhere. It is also because of the nation’s political culture and unusual system of federalism, in which boundaries have always been the focus of conflict. Five boundaries have historically been im…
Contingent Coordination: Practical and Theoretical Puzzles for Homeland Security
The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks stunned Americans. They also created new and unprecedented challenges for public administration, in theory and practice. A careful look at these challenges, however, reveals a familiar core: At its foundation, homeland security is about one of public administration's oldest puzzles—coordination. Although the field has a great deal to say about solving this puzzle, homeland security introduces new and espe…
Building the Virtual State: Information Technology and Institutional Change
Journal Article Building the Virtual State: Information Technology and Institutional Change Get access Building the Virtual State: Information Technology and Institutional Change by Jane E. Fountain. Washington, DC, Brookings Institution Press, 2001. 251 pp. Cloth, $44.95; paper, $18.95. Donald F. Kettl Donald F. Kettl University of Wisconsin—Madison Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Political Science Quarte…
What Government Can Do: Dealing with Poverty and Inequality . Benjamin I. Page , James R. Simmons
Public Administration at the Millennium: The State of the Field
In 1993, the author analyzed the state of public administration for the American Political Science Association's book, Political Science: The State of the Field. This article reviews the state of public administration at the start of the new millennium: the field's big theoretical questions, enduring theoretical ideas, and its unanswered theoretical puzzles. In the middle of the twentieth century, public administration found itself under attack b…
Contingent Coordination: Practical and Theoretical Puzzles for Homeland Security
The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks stunned Americans. They also created new and unprecedented challenges for public administration, in theory and practice. A careful look at these challenges, however, reveals a familiar core: At its foundation, homeland security is about one of public administration's oldest puzzles—coordination. Although the field has a great deal to say about solving this puzzle, homeland security introduces new and espe…
Is Public Management Neglecting the State
Public management is a domain of research that is now roughly three decades old. Researchers in this area have made important advances in understanding about the performance of public organizations. But questions have been raised about the scope and methods of public management research (PMR). Does it neglect important questions about the development of major institutions of the modern state? Has it focused unduly on problems of the advanced demo…
The Agenda: Inside the Clinton White House, by Bob Woodward
Journal Article The Agenda: Inside the Clinton White House, by Bob Woodward Get access The Agenda: Inside the Clinton White House by Bob Woodward. New York, Simon & Schuster, 1994. 352 pp. $24.00. Donald F. Kettl Donald F. Kettl University of Wisconsin-Madison, The Brookings Institution Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Political Science Quarterly, Volume 110, Issue 1, Spring 1995, Pages 126–127, https://doi…
Is the Worst Yet to Come
Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, public officials pledged that the nation would rise to the challenge and ensure that the country would not suffer such a disaster again. Almost exactly four years later, however, Hurricane Katrina inflicted a devastating blow on the Gulf Coast. Many of the problems that surfaced during 9/11 returned yet again to plague the Katrina recovery efforts. Moreover, as bad as the problems w…
Building the Virtual State: Information Technology and Institutional Change
Journal Article Building the Virtual State: Information Technology and Institutional Change Get access Building the Virtual State: Information Technology and Institutional Change by Jane E. Fountain. Washington, DC, Brookings Institution Press, 2001. 251 pp. Cloth, $44.95; paper, $18.95. Donald F. Kettl Donald F. Kettl University of Wisconsin—Madison Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Political Science Quarte…
Modernising Government: The Way Forward—a comment
Making Data Speak: Lessons for Using Numbers for Solving Public Policy Puzzles
There is a vast increase in the production of policy analysis in government, but behind the rising volume is a deep paradox: We are generating information faster than we are devising strategies for hearing what it tells us and helping policymakers act on it. There are 10 big issues in using numbers for solving policy problems, and they lead to important lessons: Analysts need to speak in a language that policymakers can understand, capture the in…
Public administration and political science: Can this marriage be saved
There is a profound irony in how public administration and political science splintered at the very pinnacle of their interconnection, intellectual power, and practical impact. Much of public administration has gradually separated from political science. Then public administration broke into pieces, with public administration and public management going in different directions. The central question is this: Are these tensions the product of diver…
Going Private: The International Experience with Transport Privatization
Performance and Accountability: The Challenge of Government by Proxy for Public Administration
Conventional approaches to public administration are subtly being undermined by the steady expansion of "government by proxy": the provision of government goods and services through proxies such as contractors, grantees, and recipients of government tax breaks and guaranteed loans. Privatization advocates claim that such government by proxy improves the effectiveness and responsiveness of public programs, but a closer look reveals that the issue …
Administrative Reform-American Style
Weberian Bureaucracy and Contemporary Governance
Max Weber’s role as a founder of the study of administration is often in much dispute, but he is important for two things: he captured the essence of bureaucracy and he connected it to the role of business in the economy. Weber points us toward the argument that businesses seek profits, that the key to maximizing their profits is certainty in their environment, and that the “iron cage” of bureaucracy plays an important role in reducing uncertaint…
The Clumsy War against the “Administrative State”
The Merit Principle in Crisis
Administrative Accountability and the Rule of Law: The 2008 John Gaus Lecture
In June 2008, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration rocked the food industry—and food lovers—with its warning about tainted tomatoes. Consumers in New Mexico and Texas were contracting a rare, sometimes fatal strain of salmonella and the FDA feared that salmonella contamination from tomatoes was the cause. In the weeks that followed, a major outbreak spread across the country and worried consumers abandoned tomatoes. Fourth of July cookouts were …
Can the Cities be Trusted? The Community Development Experience
Journal Article Can the Cities be Trusted? The Community Development Experience Get access Donald F. Kettl Donald F. Kettl DONALD F. KETTL is assistant professor of government and foreign affairs at the University of Virginia. He is the author of the forthcoming book, Managing Community Development in the New Federalism. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Political Science Quarterly, Volume 94, Issue 3, Fall …
Government by Proxy and the Public Service
Government performance: Why management matters; Government matters: Welfare reform in Wisconsin; How management matters: Street‐level bureaucrats and welfare reform
In Search of Commensurability: Writings in Public Management in an Era of Governmental Reform
T Vhe 1990s have been challenging years for theory builders in the public administration and public policy communities. The politically charged U.S. reforms made under the auspices of the National Performance Review and the sweeping governmental reform in democratic nations around the globe are nothing less than a sea change. Amid this change, two central themes have emerged: managerialism and governance. This essay highlights two key works on pu…
Beyond the Rhetoric of Reinvention: Driving Themes of the Clinton Administration's Management Reforms
Approaching Public Policy Analysis: An Introduction to Policy and Program Research
The Regulation of American Federalism
Can the Cities be Trusted? The Community Development Experience
Journal Article Can the Cities be Trusted? The Community Development Experience Get access Donald F. Kettl Donald F. Kettl DONALD F. KETTL is assistant professor of government and foreign affairs at the University of Virginia. He is the author of the forthcoming book, Managing Community Development in the New Federalism. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Political Science Quarterly, Volume 94, Issue 3, Fall …
Regulating the Cities
Regulating the Cities Get access Donald F. Kettl Donald F. Kettl University of Virginia Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Publius: The Journal of Federalism, Volume 11, Issue 2, Spring 1981, Pages 111–126, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.pubjof.a037355 Published: 01 January 1981
The Fourth Face of Federalism
T he 1970s brought a face to federalism, a collection of private and semi-public groups and agencies that moved into a full partnership with the national, state, and local governments in administering federal policy. This fourth face of federalism emerged from the decade's breed of intergovernmental grant programs. Richard Nixon promised a New Federalism of guaranteed grants, fewer federal rules, and more discretion for state and local government…
The Regulation of American Federalism
Leadership at the Fed
Approaching Public Policy Analysis: An Introduction to Policy and Program Research
Leadership at the Fed
Journal Article Leadership at the Fed. By Donald F. Kettl. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986. xiii + 218 pp. $22.50.) Get access Edward Montgomery Edward Montgomery Michigan State University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Journal of American History, Volume 74, Issue 1, June 1987, Page 150, https://doi.org/10.2307/1908523 Published: 01 June 1987
Old Federalism/New Federalism
Performance and Accountability: The Challenge of Government by Proxy for Public Administration
Conventional approaches to public administration are subtly being undermined by the steady expansion of "government by proxy": the provision of government goods and services through proxies such as contractors, grantees, and recipients of government tax breaks and guaranteed loans. Privatization advocates claim that such government by proxy improves the effectiveness and responsiveness of public programs, but a closer look reveals that the issue …
Government by Proxy and the Public Service
Theory and Practice in Public Management
Balanced Budgets and American Politics. James D. Savage
Expansion and Protection in the Budgetary Process
In 1940, V.O. Key asked the classic question of budgeting: On what basis shall it be decided to allocate X dollars to activity A instead of activity B?1 Budgeting theory since then has struggled to develop an answer. For a generation, the most persuasive solution was Aaron Wildavsky's formulation of incrementalism.2 Even Wildavsky's work has evolved away from the theory,3 but the central thrust of Wildavsky's argument endures: that budgeting is p…
Contracting out
The Perils-And Prospects-Of Public Administration
Every discipline periodically goes through a period of sometimes wrenching reassessment. For public administration, this reassessment has been nearly constant. Americans have always been distrustful of governmental power and, especially, administrative power. They have long believed that public administration is more inefficient and corrupt than private administration. Woodrow Wilson's memorable call to study the importance of running a constitut…
The Savings-and-Loan Bailout: The Mismatch Between the Headlines and the Issues
In the twentieth century, the savings-and-loan crisis rivals only the bank failures of the Great Depression and the hyperinflation of the 1970s in threatening Americans' confidence in their financial institutions. The costs promise to be truly astronomical. The U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) estimates that at least $325 billion, probably much more, and at worst perhaps $500 billion, will be needed over the next thirty years to fund the bail…
Public Administration and Governance
A Guide to the Rediscovery of Public Administration
"The Perils of "Proxy
To Market, to Market-And Back
Beyond the Rhetoric of Reinvention: Driving Themes of the Clinton Administration's Management Reforms
Going Private: The International Experience with Transport Privatization
Public Service Status Review: The Excellence Agenda
Administrative Reform-American Style
What Will New Governance Mean for the Federal Government
Across the country, there is wide interest in new ways of doing the public's business. Most of the activity so far, chronicled in books like Osborne and Gaebler's (1992) Reinventing Government and Barzelay and Armajani's Breaking Through Bureaucracy (1992), has been in state and local government. (See also Frederickson, 1992; Roselle, 1992; and Walters, 1992). President Clinton is a member of the movement for new governance, so the new ideas will…
Political science (51 works) · Law (34 works) · Public Administration (31 works) · Law (30 works) · Public Administration (29 works) · Public Policy and Administration Research (26 works) · Sociology (23 works) · Politics (20 works) · Business (19 works) · Computer Science (18 works)