ABSTRACT

This chapter describes the administration's involvement in the economic reality via economic policy indeed means moving away from managerial models in favour of a less market-based public management model. The economic interests of a country represent national interests to the extent that the nation is a vehicle for certain values recognised by Weber as universal and worthy of protection, such as thrift, diligence and business integrity, discussed later in his Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. In Max Weber's view, the reference to a community of values constitutes a moral justification for the state pursuing a national economic policy. Market-oriented reforms in the neo-liberal spirit characteristic of the 1990s met a growing public resistance in the subsequent decade. Market mechanisms in the provision of public services did not always yield the desired results; moreover, a deeper look at how the administration actually operated no longer warranted such one-sided criticism as that levelled by the proponents of public choice theory.