David H. Rosenbloom (born 1943) is a scholar in the field of Public Administration. He is the Distinguished Professor of Public Administration at the School of Public Affairs at American University in Washington, D.C. An authority on issues related to administrative law and constitutional aspects of public sector personnel policies, Rosenbloom is known for his approach emphasizing understanding American public administration from the three perspectives associated with the constitutional separation of powers: law, politics and management. He advocates establishing "constitutional competence" as a basic standard for public service professionals.
Education
Rosenbloom earned a BA in political science at Marietta College in 1964. He holds a Master of Arts (1966) and in PhD (1969) in political science, both at the University of Chicago. His Ph.D. dissertation, "The Relationship Between the Citizen and the State In Public Employment in America,” was the basis for his first book, Federal Service and the Constitution: The Development of the Public Employment Relationship (1971). He received an honorary doctorate of law in 1994 from Marietta College.
Career
Rosenbloom was an assistant professor in political science at the University of Kansas from 1969 to 1971. From 1971 to 1973, he visited Tel Aviv University, where he was a senior lecturer in political science. From 1973 to 1978, he was an assistant and associate professor of political science at the University of Vermont. From 1978 to 1990, he was a faculty member at The Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. He was professor of public administration from 1979 to 1988, and professor of political science from 1987 to 1990. He was also an adjunct professor of law from 1985 to 1989. At the Maxwell School he was distinguished professor of public administration from 1988 to 1990. Presently, in addition to being a distinguished professor at American University, he is the chair professor of public management in the Department of Public and Social Administration, at the City University of Hong Kong (visiting). In 2014, he served as book series editor for the American Society for Public Administration indicating that the disability fields do not constitute a categorical system of state agencies and services in the US.
Research
Rosenbloom contends that contemporary public administration is based primarily on three approaches: management, politics/policy, and law.
Managerial- The Managerial foundation is used to manage the performance of organizations. Key areas include administrative decision-making, managerial techniques, leaders, and employee contributions. By these elements working together, organizations can operate successfully. Political/Policy- The Political approach discusses how political officials oversee the different administrative decisions. Politicians have the final say on the laws that public administrators are tasked with executing. Within Rosenbloom's editorial "Have an Administrative Rx? Don't Forget the Politics!" he writes about the Politics/Administration Dichotomy – a principle developed by the Civil Service Reforms of the 1870s and the 1880s stating that politics and administration should remain separate in the public sector. That is a strange idea according to this article, in which he argues that if politics and public administration were separate, this approach would not work, emphasizing their inevitable interconnection. Legal- The most crucial, according to Rosenbloom. The Rule of Law involves orderliness and comprehension, and spells out when and how tasks will be completed. Rosenbloom argues that in order to carry out their tasks, public administrators must be competent in their legal and constitutional obligations and restrictions.
Rosenbloom's argument is that to understand public administration, it is not sufficient to use just one approach, but to think of all three at the same time. Rosenbloom documents that in 1946, by making major reforms, Congress became the central authority in how public administration operated in the federal government, incorporating all three approaches. Rosenbloom argues that public administration at other levels should operate in the same way.