New Public Management and Traditional Public Management

Development of the classical model of administrative owes much the articulation of the principles of bureaucracy by Max Weber. The development of modern bureaucracies made x industrial revolution and the breakthroughs of modern economies possible. At the end of the 20th century classical model of public administration was challenged by what has been called the “new public management.” In this work, we will characterize the traditional and the new public management approaches to public administration and then compare them on three fundamental questions that every theory of public administration must answer: 1, what shall be done, i.e. policy direction; 2, who shall do it, i.e. personnel management; and 3, how to enforce compliance, i.e. accountability. Finally we will examine the tension between accountability and efficiency in traditional public administration and the new public management in answering the three fundamental questions above.