Democracy and Administration

This chapter explores the historical origins of American democracy and the implications for public administration. The chapter starts with a summary of the English roots of American democracy. We capture the core democratic principles of this experience and carry these forward in our discussion of the debates during the Constitutional Convention in 1787. These debates produced five concerns that needed to be addressed in constructing a new constitution: representing citizen views, ensuring competent governance, protecting minority rights, securing vibrant local community governance, and flexibility to accommodate unknown future conditions. Taken together, we argue that these core values create a Democratic Balancewheel role for public administration, which is a central theme forward in subsequent chapters of the book.