Shrinking the administrative state: new public management before and after 9/1

Summary

The New Public Management (NPM) is a worldwide administrative phenomenon that is well–exemplified in the United States experience. Nurtured in the Reagan years with “get government off our backs” rhetoric, it matured under President Clinton’s National Performance Review and the subsequent Republican approach under President Bush. Both the Democratic and Republican leadership provided a vision of business–like government that is less intrusive yet responsive to citizens. The rate of growth of government programs was to be curtailed. However, the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon gave rise to a “War on Terror” that changed priorities. Traditional public administration values of centralized control, coordination, and inter–governmental cooperation were emphasized. Shrinking of the administrative state was limited to non–Defense, non–Homeland Security arenas.