Future of the Concepts of Public Interest and Administrative Responsibility

Public administration is one of the constructs upon which every government functions. It incorporates the concepts of administrative responsibility and public interest upon which the idea of ethical obligation and the dilemma brought about by the privatization of government functions ride. Anytime the electorate cast their votes and express their preference for one candidate over another, they do so in the expectation that the candidate will work towards satisfying the public's interests, rather than their own, and that they will use their positions to help people, rather than dominate them. This expectation is, however, not often given the significance it deserves, despite the fact that it advances from the party that stands to either benefit or lose directly from a public administrator's actions.

The Concept of Public Interest

Although it is difficult to give an explicit definition of the constituents of public interest, experts have repeatedly referred to it as public goodwill. Public administration requires that public interest take center stage in the designing of public policies (Starling, 2007). This is, however, not usually the case. Public administrators often place self-interests above public interests, and merely formulate policies that would allow them to maneuver and somewhat maximize their personal gains. This explains why most desired changes are either usually left pending for unnecessarily long periods of time, inadequately-realized or are never realized at all (Stillman, 2009).

The public votes to choose the leader they feel has their interests at heart, and would work towards improving their lives (Starling, 2007). They base their vote on the leader's campaign manifesto and morality record. However, even those with the fairest of records and the most fulfilling of manifestos often end up disappointing the public. In order to mitigate against such, countries routinely develop codes of ethics aimed at governing the actions of public administrators within their jurisdictions. In the U.S., public administrators are guided the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) Code of Ethics, whose first principle is "serve the public beyond serving oneself - ASPA members are committed to exercise discretionary authority to promote the public interest" (Starling, 2007, p. 183).

Administrative Responsibility

The concept of administrative responsibility goes beyond just what the public expects an administrator to do. It takes the concept of public interest a notch higher, and allows the public to judge an administrator as either responsible or irresponsible by comparing his actual behavior to that which the public expects him to portray (Stillman, 2009).

It is this idea of administrative responsibility that gives rise to the question of ethical responsibility (Starling, 2007). The public, in assessing the responsibility or irresponsibility of an administrator, bases its judgment on the expected values of responsiveness, competence, accountability, honesty, flexibility and fairness (Starling, 2007). A public officer is considered ethically responsible if their observed behavior is reasonably close to these, and irresponsible, if it deviates from the same, in certain ways (CAPAM Report, 2010).

Former Illinois Senator Paul Douglas is known for his tough stand on the concepts of ethical and administrative responsibility. He asserted that pubic officials ought to display utmost decency in their actions because the public would not be satisfied with 'just moderate decency', and would react to even the smallest scale of misbehavior (CAPAM Report, 2010). A number of aspects on one's personal life, including finances and health impropriety, and sexual misconduct, come out in the open once they enter the public realm. The tendency to deceive the public so as to hide such improprieties comes into play here (Starling, 2007). Public officials lie either to hide underperformance and incompetence, or out of the mere feeling of superiority (Starling, 2007). Acts such as these, which are aimed at avoiding negative publicity, would be viewed by the public as being unethical. Public officials are expected to make public any conflicts of interest and be ready to deal with the challenges in the public eye (Starling, 2007).

The First Lady Mitchell Obama's healthy living initiative, in which she seeks to get American youth as healthy as her family clears the path for healthy eating and increased physical activity and gives the public the image of a public officer who seeks to fulfill her ethical obligations, especially now that obesity is recording alarming prevalence rates in the U.S.

Sexual misconduct brings about a whole new idea of dilemmas of contemporary public administration. Former President Bill Clinton's scandal perfectly illustrates the 'utmost decency' concept advanced by former Senator Paul Douglas, and demonstrates the extent to which the concept of ethical responsibility shapes the public's decisions, and a public officer's career.

The Privatization of Government Functions and the Public Interest Dilemma It Poses

Nowadays, the government-private sector relationship is in a state of flux; more government functions are being delegated to the hands of the private sector, and the federal civilian bureaucracy is shrinking at substantially high rates (Holland, et al., 2007). The number of private contractors carrying out government functions today exceeds, by far, that of federal employees supervising them (Holland, et al., 2007). Both the deregulation and privatization movements come into play here.