The European Public Servant: A Shared Administrative Identity? by Patrick Overeem & Fritz Sager

Author:Patrick Overeem & Fritz Sager [Overeem, Patrick & Sager, Fritz]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Political Science, General
ISBN: 9781785522338
Google: eQT0jwEACAAJ
Amazon: 1785522337
Publisher: ECPR Press
Published: 2016-03-14T09:01:53+00:00

Hegelian political philosophy as an answer to challenges of the progressive era

One of the most important conditions for appreciating German state theory in the United States was the rapid convergence of the social landscapes of industrial capitalism on both sides of the Atlantic (Rodgers 1998: 33–51). During the late nineteenth century, the processes of industrialisation, urbanisation and democratisation led to increasing social tensions. Not only in Germany, but also in the United States, the calls for a more visible hand of the government grew ever louder. In comparison to Germany, the hand of the American government became not only more visible, but also more corrupt. Even if it remains unclear today whether corruption was bad for the growth of the American economy (Menes 2006: 67), it is important to note that around the turn of the twentieth century, progressive intellectuals believed that the corrupt relations between businessmen, politicians and public servants had harmful effects on the economy and society.

Goodnow (2003 [1990]: 192) and Wilson (Link 1968b: 363) regretted that favouritism in personnel recruitment had fostered an inefficient, incompetent and ultimately corrupt administration. As a remedy against the corruption of the spoils system, they hoped to insulate public administration from partisan politics. Using Goodnow’s (2003 [1990]: 87) words to speak for both of them, legislators and high executive officers, ‘to whom is entrusted the general execution of the law’, should be kept accountable by voting them out of office. Well-educated, professional and tenured public servants, on the other hand, were supposed to guarantee the efficient implementation of public policy and safeguard the common good.

More generally, the Hegelian account pictured the state as the embodiment of ethical life and social responsibility and thus endorsed the possibility of positive liberty. It also endorsed the conviction that an enhanced capacity in the executive and public administration would serve as a remedy to the challenges of an industrialising society. By strengthening the executive in general and public administration in particular, progressive intellectuals sought a more interventionist government role. Furthermore, they considered it a historical necessity, i.e. a natural result of the state’s organic development, that an influential administration be installed. They believed that an expansive administration would save the people from the bad influence of egoistic individualism, which was considered to be prevalent in the American laissez-faire economy. In his respect the Hegelian line of thought offered American progressives an alternative to the intellectual tradition of natural law and social contract theories.

Rohr’s (2003: xxii) verdict about Goodnow seems to apply to Wilson as well: their work was grounded in the Hegelian philosophy of the state. Unlike Hegel, however, progressive intellectuals in the United States wanted to solve the dilemma of reconciling enhanced government capacity with democratic control of public action (Lynn 2001: 148). We should therefore be careful in drawing too close an intellectual connection between Hegel, Wilson and Goodnow. Obviously, Hegelian philosophy was only a part of their intellectual mix of political and administrative ideas – a part that had to be stripped of its authoritarian traces in order to be blended into a larger progressive agenda.

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