Reclaiming Our Past: Linking Theory and Practice Beryl A. Radin, Georgetown University ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. A s others have done before me, I am honored to receive the APSA John Gaus Award. As I prepared this lecture, I realized that the Gaus award has been given by APSA 26 times; mine is the 27th. The first was awarded to Herbert Kaufman whose work set a very high standard for this honor. Reviewing the list of the other Gaus award recipients provides a picture of the devel- opment of our field. It includes a variety of individuals who rep- resent different approaches to the intersection of public administration and political science. Among the recipients are seven individuals who had a major and personal influence on my work: Aaron Wildavsky, Frank Rourke, George Frederickson, Martha Derthick, Lou Gawthrop, Larry Lynn, and David Rosen- bloom. Others are people who have been important to my own intellectual development. The aggregate of the work of these 26 individuals illustrates the range of interests, methodologies, and issues that document the public administration field and its place in the political science com- munity (see appendix). The recipients include economists, sociol- ogists, and political scientists, as well as people trained in public administration. The variety of backgrounds and methodologies within our field is clearly illustrated by the past lectures, most of which are available through APSA (www.apsanet.org). This collection of individuals also indicates patterns and biases within this community that have influenced its development. Two are particularly relevant to me: First, I am only the third woman to receive this award. I am proud to follow Martha Der- thick and Patricia Ingraham and hope that other women will join me soon. Second, few of the awardees have been selected because of work they did that has been cited, acknowledged, or is seen to have influenced the practice of public administration, public manage- ment, or public policy during the past 26 years. Clearly, public administration research, even the best and most influential of its kind, rarely has a place at the decision-making table. It is not clear whether this is a problem of supply or of demand. Should we focus on those who ask for research or those who produce it? And it is likely that both supply and demand issues explain this pat- tern. Few of the Gaus award recipients actually had careers that included personal experience in the practice of public administra- tion. Therefore, they were not present in decision-making forums, even as observers, especially those held at the national govern- ment level. While many of the awardees have focused on issues that are relevant to practitioners, very few of them have had real experience or access to practitioners. Larry Lynn is one of the few awardees who spent time inside the public sector throughout his career. He and some others have continued the career patterns of the founders of our field. Their career development reflected a commitment to link theory and practice. Brownlow, Gulick, Lilienthal, Merriam, Redford, and White all spent time inside the world of practice either before, during, or after their academic careers. Their writings and rela- tionship to the field reflected that experience. For many of these individuals the New Deal and World War II experiences provided them with a perspective that gave them the ability to use their personal experience not only to look outside the walls of academe but also to bring the insights gained by practice to the field. Although many tend to look at the worlds of practice and theory as two separate cultures that are destined to maintain their dis- tance, a field such as public administration—an applied field— cannot survive without finding ways to bring the insights of both cultures together. Public administration encompasses both cul- tures. Clearly real differences exist between the two worlds. Prac- titioners focus on application of knowledge, look to define and solve problems, and emphasize the uniqueness of the situation before them. 1 They operate in a short-term framework; acknowl- edge conflicts of values, goals, purposes, and interests; focus on uncertainty, disorder, and indeterminacy; and emphasize com- plexity. Researchers seek to build theory, generate knowledge, gen- eralize patterns, simplify, work in the long term, and try to minimize uncertainty, disorder, and indeterminacy. Both of these roles and all of these elements are legitimate. To acknowledge that legitimacy and to find ways that allow the two approaches to complement one another, however, is difficult and challenging. But this challenge is important and worth pursuing. Because of their personal experience as practitioners, the found- ers of our field drew on the insights of both cultures and mini- mized their often conflicting demands. Indeed, this combination brought forth the outlines of an exciting and important field. Today, however, the worlds have parted, and we seem to be oper- ating in parallel universes. Beryl A. Radin joined the Georgetown University, Georgetown Public Policy Institute in January 2012. Prior to that she was a scholar in residence in the Department of Public Administration and Policy at American University. She is a fellow of the National Acad- emy of Public Administration and the editor of the book series Public Management and Change at Georgetown University Press. Her government service included an assign- ment as a special advisor to the assistant secretary for management and budget of the US Department of Health and Human Services. She calls herself a “pracademic” because she has moved back and forth between the world of the practitioner and that of the aca- demic. Professor Radin can be reached at bradin@ix.netcom.com. ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. THE 2012 JOHN GAUS LECTURE ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. doi:10.1017/S1049096512001230 PS • January 2013 1