Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Teaching public management to undergraduate students is challenging. This paper examines one such attempt: to explain public management to undergraduate political science students enrolled in an introductory public administration course. In recent decades, much has been written about managing the public sector more like a business and less like a government. Government management is generally termed wasteful and paper focuses less on how to teach public management in the public interest to undergraduates and more on what should be taught about public management in the public interest. In order to accomplish this goal the paper does three things: 1) it defines public management, 2) describes several competing theories of public management, 3) explains how the New Public Service is applied to various public management situations and realities, and 4) offers conclusions and implications for teaching and research in public management.