Book Review: Ethics for contemporary bureaucrats: Navigating constitutional crossroads

• Author: David H. Rosenbloom
• DOI: 10.1177/02750740211001130
• Published date: 01 July 2021
• Date: 01 July 2021
• Subject Matter: Book Review

American Review of Public Administration

2021, Vol. 51(5) 406 –407

© The Author(s) 2021

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Book Review

Ethics for Contemporary Bureaucrats: Navigating Consti-

tutional Crossroads is an excellent addition to the extant lit-

erature and conceptual development of public administrative

ethics. Its mission is to expound upon, expand, and apply the

framework developed by John A. Rohr on “regime values”

as a basis for administrative ethics. The book honors and cel-

ebrates Rohr’s work on the 30th anniversary of publication

of his Ethics for Bureaucrats: An Essay on Law and Values

(second edition, 1989). Its publication is propitious as it

arrives while hyperpolitical partisanship presents public

administrators with extraordinarily complex ethical chal-

lenges. Editors Nicole Elias and Amanda Olejarski have

fashioned an outstanding contribution to the “constitutional

school” of U.S. public administration that will commendably

fulfill their objective to “educate students, scholars, and pub-

lic servants on constitutional values and legal precedent as a

basis for understanding ethics in the public sector” (p. 195).

The “constitutional school” denotes a loosely connected

group of public administration scholars and reflective practi-

tioners whose work is informed by a recognition that consti-

tutions, and the U.S. Constitution in particular, matter to how

public administration is organized, what it does, and how it

does it. That constitutions matter to bureaucrats’ and bureau-

cracies’ work may strike many as obvious. However, when

public administration was emerging as a field of study in the

1920s and 1930s, it was widely believed that administration

is a single process, wherever practiced, and largely separate

from constitutional questions.

Contending to the contrary, the constitutional school

owes much of its identity to the academic work of Professor

Herbert Storing at the University of Chicago in the 1960s

and 1970s. Rohr was among the many UChicago doctoral

students in political science upon whom Storing had a pro-

found impact. Rohr, in turn, further developed knowledge

of how constitutions matter to public administration in a

variety of ways, including ethics, through his research,

teaching, and writing at Virginia Tech. He was central to the

movement of the fledgling constitutional school from

Chicago to Blacksburg, where the “constitutions matter”

mantle was further developed by several faculty in

Refounding Public Administration (1990), also known as

the “Blacksburg Manifesto.” With strong connections to the

Center for Public Administration and Policy at Virginia

Tech, the editors and contributors to Ethics for Contemporary

Bureaucrats admirably carry the constitutional school and

“Manifesto” forward.

“Regime values” are “values of [a] political entity that

was brought into being by the ratification of the Constitution

that created the present American republic” and “beliefs,

passions, and principles that have been held for several gen-

erations by the overwhelming majority of the American peo-

ple” (p. 131). They are found in political speeches, literature,

art, law, public actions, and myriad other activities and well-

springs that define the U.S. national ethos. Most precisely,

perhaps, regime values are articulated and analyzed in major

Supreme Court decisions dealing with fundamental ques-

tions of U.S. constitutional law. Regime values define ethics

for bureaucrats because public administrators are bound by

oath to support the Constitution.

Regime values are sometimes crystal clear and precise in

their application. However, they may be in tension with one

another, subject to multiple interpretations, and provide

only general guides for ethical administrative behavior.

Consequently, regime value analysis in not intended to

“make all bureaucrats march in lockstep” because “there is

no one ‘authoritative’ interpretation of the American experi-

ence that all bureaucrats must adopt” (p. 54). Rather, regime

values provide a strong basis for bureaucrats to engage in

informed and enlightened constitutional thinking and dis-

course before taking public action. They provide “enough

structure to guide public servants” while also leaving room

for “administrative discretion” in “striking a balance between

the responsibility to make the right decision and maintaining

moral character in achieving the public good” (p. 199).

Rohr’s analysis of regime values tended to be at a broad,

abstract level that is somewhat removed from the kind of

specific questions and decisions bureaucrats confront in their

day-to-day work lives. Ethics for Contemporary Bureaucrats

complements Rohr’s approach by astutely analyzing how

regime values apply to a variety of concrete public admin-

istrative activities and situations. Specifically, the book is

divided into three parts focusing on the regime values of

1001130ARPXXX10.1177/02750740211001130The American Review of Public AdministrationBook Review

book-review2021

Book Review

Elias, Nicole M., & Olejarski, Amanda M. (Eds.). (2020). Ethics for contemporary bureaucrats: Navigating constitutional crossroads.

New York and London: Routledge. 230 pp. $44.95 (paperback); $160 (Hardback); $40.45 (eBook). ISBN 9780367861902.

Reviewed by: David H. Rosenbloom, American University, Washington, DC, USA

DOI: 10.1177/02750740211001130