Revisiting the academic–practitioner divide: Evidence from computational social science and corpus linguistics

• Published date: 01 November 2023
• Author: Richard M. Walker,Jiasheng Zhang,Yanto Chandra,Binzizi Dong,Yao Wang
• Date: 01 November 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13724

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Revisiting the academic–practitioner divide: Evidence from

computational social science and corpus linguistics

Richard M. Walker

1

| Jiasheng Zhang

2

| Yanto Chandra

1

| Binzizi Dong

1

|

Yao Wang

1

1

Laboratory for Public Management and Policy,

Department of Public and International Affairs,

City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon Tong,

Hong Kong

2

Department of Government and Public

Administration, Humanities and Social Sciences

Building (E21B), University of Macau, Taipa,

Macau, China

Correspondence

Richard M. Walker, Laboratory for Public

Management and Policy, Department of Public

and International Affairs, City University of Hong

Kong, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong.

Email: rmwalker@cityu.edu.hk

Funding information

University Grant Committee, Research Grants

Council of Hong Kong, Grant/Award Number:

11601218

Abstract

As a design science, public administration is focused on addressing real-world

problems. However, within public administration argument and evidence on the

relevance of academic research to practice agendas is equivocal. We investigate

the “academic–practitioner divide”using computational social science techniques

to identify the topics of “academic,”“academic–practitioner,”and practitioner cor-

pora over a 25-year period. Topic modeling results of the 50 topics identified in

each of these corpora suggest that the topics of academics and practitioners have

more differences than similarities: nearly seven-tenths of the identified topics dif-

fer between the practice corpus and the academic and academic–practice corpora.

Corpus linguistics analysis is applied to contrast the keyness of topics over time,

and the results confirm the largely different agendas of the corpora albeit with

some convergence on governance and outcomes. Corpora examined in this article

is largely suggestive of a lack of relevance of academic research to practice

agendas.

Evidence for practice

•We present evidence on the topics that academics and practitioners write about

over a quarter-century that raises ongoing concerns about the relevance of aca-

demic research for the practice of public administration.

•Contrary to expectations, we do not uncover evidence of a growing divide

between the topics of academics and practitioners over time, as differences

between the groups’topical foci differed from the beginning of the studied

period.

•The focus of both academics and practitioners moved in a similar direction from

narrowly defined topics at the beginning of the study period (1991–1995) to

more complex topics, for example governance, in the later period (2012–2016).

INTRODUCTION

Public administration has been characterized as a design

science focused on solving real-world problems that are

complex, human-related, and involve value judgments

(Shangraw Jr. & Crow, 1989; Simon, 1996). Accordingly,

the design science of public administration is expected to

connect theory with practice, thus linking administrations,

management, and organizations with practice of the

delivery of public services and policies. It has long been

argued that these design science goals are not attained

and that there is an academic–practitioner divide because

public administration scholarship is not relevant to

practice, and that the divide has increased over time

(Newland, 2000; Pollitt, 2017; Roberts, 2018).

However, the evidence brought to bear on the scope

and duration of the divide is equivocal. It has been

argued that the reasons for this divide, and estimation of

its changing magnitude, are because of differences

between the practice of public administration and aca-

demic research (Newland, 2000; Pollitt, 2017; Roberts,

2018). Conversely, several case studies have empirically

demonstrated that academic research is utilized in

practice (Jennings Jr. & Hall, 2012; Newman et al., 2016).

However, content analysis of public administration

scholarship and practice literature provide mixed results

Received: 21 December 2022 Revised: 11 August 2023 Accepted: 28 August 2023

DOI: 10.1111/puar.13724

Public Admin Rev. 2023;83:1599–1617. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/puar © 2023 American Society for Public Administration. 1599

(Gibson & Deadrick, 2010; Kaufmann & Haans, 2021). In

this article, we synthesize large corpora of academic liter-

ature and contrast it with practitioner literature to exam-

ine the extent and magnitude of the divide. We ask: are

the topics of public administration scholarship relevant to

practitioners? And within and between academia and

practice have the topics changed over time?

Our contribution to this debate is twofold. First, we

apply computational social science methodology

(Hollibaugh Jr., 2019), namely topic modeling, to induc-

tively identify the focal topics of public administration

research and practice over a 25-year period. Our academic

corpus is taken from the Public Administration section of

the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) published by Clarivate

Analytics. We divide the academic corpus into two corpora,

one we refer to as “academic”because these journals do

not refer to practice in their aims and scope and a second

of group of journals labeled “academic–practice”that

explicitly refer to practice. Our practitioner corpus is

derived from the Public Affairs Information Service (PAIS).

We identify 50 topics in each of these corpora and com-

pare their occurrences, ranks, and weights. To the best of

our knowledge, this analysis is the first systematic attempt

to examine international corpora of academic and practi-

tioner literature in public administration.

Second, we examine the evolution of these topics

over time to identify changes and visualize topics graphi-

cally before using corpus linguistics methods to contrast

the keyness of each identified topic in the early and late

periods of the corpora. This contribution is important

because it addresses the presumption of a growing divide

between research and practice over time (e.g., New-

land, 2000; Pollitt, 2017).

THE ACADEMIC–PRACTITIONER DIVIDE

Public administration is an interdisciplinary form of design

science (Simon, 1996). An interdisciplinary enquiry

involves the intersection of theories, methods, and knowl-

edge from two or more disciplines. Interdisciplinary char-

acteristics include problem orientation, contextuality,

multiple methods, and an overriding concern for human

values (Brewer Garry, 1999). The concerns of public

administration for solving problems of administration,

policy, and the delivery of public values signal interdisci-

plinarity. Design science is focused on solving real-world

problems that are complex, human-related, and involve

value judgments (Shangraw Jr. & Crow, 1989; Simon,

1996). Accordingly, the interdisciplinary design science of

public administration is expected to connect theory with

practice, thus linking administrations, management, and

organizations in the delivery of public policies

(Raadschelders, 2011).

However, scholars have long noted that public admin-

istration has not realized its design science mission and

that related academic research is irrelevant and neglects

to address the big questions in the field (Argyris, 1991;

Dahl, 1947; Gibson & Deadrick, 2010; Roberts, 2018). Lead-

ing public administration scholars have argued that the

focus of the discipline is now on abstract concepts, highly

specific relationships, and sophisticated research methods

that offer few insights relevant to policy and practice

(e.g., Moynihan, 2017; Newland, 2000; Raadschelders &

Lee, 2011; Roberts, 2018). Pollitt (2017, 9) suggested that

the consequence of this shift has resulted in the demise

of well-rounded professors who publish on multiple

topics across the whole field of public administration,

such that these changing practices “increasingly …dis-

tance the academic community from the immediate con-

cerns of most practitioners.”In short, public administration

research is seen as not relevant to practice, and its

concerns of context and real life-specific problems

(Armstrong & Alsop, 2010; Buick et al., 2015).

1

Pollitt (2017) attributed the lack of practice relevance

to the “managerialization”of higher education since the

1980s. Managerialization led to academics being profes-

sionalized and extensively measured resulting in a focus

on faculty productivity and the extent to which journal

articles are cited by other academics. Comparisons of pro-

ductivity between faculty (see for example Corley &

Sabharwal, 2010; Metz & Jackle, 2017), disciplines, and

institutions are abundant (e.g., the various university

and subject rankings run by Academic Ranking of World

Universities, QS, Times Higher Education, and US News

and World Report), and the resulting competition rein-

forces the importance of measurement. The pressures

arising from measurement and professionalization have

resulted in the specialization of theories, topics, and

methods and a “publish or perish”culture. As such “man-

agerialization”is reinforced as scholars publish literature

on novel topics, using increasingly sophisticated research

designs with the aim of increasing citation (within acade-

mia) (Van Wittleloostuijn, 2016) rather than speaking to

the wider concerns of practice. Roberts (2018) echoes

these sentiments, citing the disincentives of exploring

broad questions within public administration, particularly

for early career scholars. Research supports these views:

Neely and Coggburn (2017) concluded that practice-

based research was considered among the least impor-

tant factors influencing faculty tenure and promotion cri-

teria (Neely & Coggburn, 2017). Seeking to redress the

lack of relevance of academic research to practice,

scholars have published case studies of coproduction

partnerships to provide effective solutions to the

academic–practitioner divide (Buick et al., 2015; Orr &

Bennett, 2012)

While academic reviews of the changing field of

higher education in public administration describe a lack

of relevance, evidence on the utilization of academic

research by practitioners provides a somewhat mixed per-

spective. Howlett and Newman (2010) painted a picture

of a growing divide between the two communities, not-

ing that practitioners do not use or value academic

1600 REVISITING THE ACADEMIC–PRACTITIONER DIVIDE