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ASPA's 2023 Annual Conference Features All-Star Line-Up
ASPA's 2023 Annual Conference will feature some of the most influential names in the profession providing keynotes and lectures across the seven plenaries being planned for the event. Taking place online March 20-24, these headline speakers will ensure your conference experience is both professionally fulfilling and insightful.
From some of today's most thought-provoking philosophers to ground-breaking innovators to world-renowned journalists and commentators, these sessions will be packed with insights you need to continue the important work of cementing democracy around the world now and well into the future.
Just some of the speakers will include:
Opening Keynote: Anne Applebaum
Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, journalist and commentator Anne Applebaum examines the challenges and opportunities of global political and economic change through the lenses of world history and the contemporary political landscape. Having written a biweekly foreign affairs column for The Washington Post, she is staff writer at The Atlantic and most recently authored Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism, in which she outlines eloquently why elites in democracies around the world are turning toward nationalism and authoritarianism. The book became an immediate New York Times best-seller. Applebaum has been named one of “The Top 50 Thinkers of the COVID-19 Age” by Prospect magazine and Barack Obama listed her book as one of his favorite reads of 2020. Informed by her expertise in Europe and her years of international reporting, she is widely known and respected for her perspectives on—and the far-reaching implications of—today’s volatile world events. Find more information about her on our conference website.
Donald C. Stone Lecture: Francis Fukuyama
Francis Fukuyama is the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) and also a faculty member of FSI's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law. He also is director of Stanford's Ford Dorsey Master's in International Policy program and a professor (by courtesy) of political science. He has written widely on issues in development and international politics. His 1992 book, The End of History and the Last Man, has appeared in more than 20 foreign editions. His book, Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment, was published in September 2018. His latest book, Liberalism and Its Discontents, was published in May 2022. Fukuyama received his BA from Cornell University and PhD from Harvard in political science. He holds honorary doctorates from Connecticut College, Doane College, Doshisha University (Japan), Kansai University (Japan), Aarhus University (Denmark) and the Pardee RAND Graduate School. Read his full biography on our conference website.
Elliot Richardson Lecture: EAC Commissioner Thomas Hicks
Thomas Hicks was nominated by President Barack H. Obama and confirmed by unanimous consent of the United States Senate on December 16, 2014, to serve on the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC). He has focused his efforts at the EAC on voter access. Under his leadership, the EAC developed a pocket-sized voter card that serves as a guide on voting rights for voters with disabilities. In addition, he has addressed the difficulties overseas voters have when requesting and returning their ballots, such as dealing with foreign IP addresses and issues with timely ballot delivery. Hicks received his BA from Clark University and his JD from the Catholic University of America, Columbus School of Law. He studied at the University of London (London, England) and studied law at the University of Adelaide (Adelaide, Australia). Find more information about him online here.
More announcements are on their way soon including details about the more than 200 concurrent sessions taking place throughout the conference. Keep checking our website for updates and remember to register! Not only will you gain access to the conference as it happens March 20-24, but also you'll be able to view all recordings for up to two months after the conference concludes. We look forward to seeing you online with us this March!
Continue to follow #ASPA2023 on Twitter for updates; contact ASPA staff with questions.
E-Learning at Your Fingertips
ASPA staff work tirelessly to keep your skills up to date and the information flowing all year long through our e-learning program. Visit our website to see more details about upcoming KeepingCurrent, BookTalk and Student and New Professional series programming.
BookTalk: How Do You Like Them Apples?
February 9 | 1 p.m. EST
Presenters:
Brint Milward, Professor, University of Arizona
Branda Nowell, Professor, North Carolina State University
Why should public administrators care about Branda Nowell and Brint Milward’s recent Cambridge University book, Apples to Apples: A Taxonomy for Understanding Networks in Public Management and Policy? A taxonomy provides empirically observable and measurable characteristics to tell one class of network from another. Nowell and Milward argue that their network classes—structural-, system- and purpose-oriented—are taxonomic in nature; subject to empirical verification; and independent of any label used to name the network. They argue that without knowing what kind of network you want to create, implement or evaluate, you are in danger of comparing apples to oranges and making the wrong assumptions about how to govern or evaluate the network. Each class of network in their typology has different assumptions for its use. The explosion of terminology that refers to network “types” like disaster relief, health care or service implementation network adds more confusion than clarity. Without a taxonomy, network entities that are quite similar are called by different names while dissimilar entities are called by the same name.
As we schedule webinars for the coming weeks and months, you can expect to see topics including:
- Agile government
- Views from law enforcement
- January 6 reactions and responses
- Fighting for democracy
- Building opportunity and equity in the workforce
- Equity in higher education
If you...
- have a topic you'd like to present via our webinar program...
- are a Chapter or Section leader and would like to work with us to sponsor an event...
- have published a book you'd like us to feature within our BookTalk series...
... contact us and we'll be happy to work with you to schedule an event in 2023! We're looking forward to a full and exciting year of programming. Look for more news in the coming weeks!
From the Archives
BookTalk: What Should We Do?
People who want to improve the world must ask the fundamental civic question: “What should we do?” Although specific challenges and topics are diverse, they often encounter problems of collective action (how to get many individuals to act in concert), discourse (how to talk and think well about contentious matters) and exclusion. To get things done, they must form or join and sustain functional groups, and through them, develop skills and virtues that help them to be effective and responsible civic actors. Good civic action requires insights from three traditions of theory and practice and synthesis of all of them that also addresses the challenge of scale: how to preserve intentional, ethical, collective action when millions or billions of people are involved? This webinar looked at this important topic.
ASPA President's Committee on International Scholarly Engagement Releases Report
ASPA President Allan Rosenbaum created a committee to study international scholarly engagement early last year. After a year of work and exploration, the President's Committee on International Scholarly Engagement (PCISE) has published its final report providing guidance for how organizations can engage internationally while respecting academic freedom, human rights and other core values.
In this report, PCISE recommends that organizations make clear the core values that guide their international engagement, take steps to embed those values in decisionmaking processes and develop processes for addressing concerns about engagement that are evidence-based, fair and transparent. In addition, the committee describes seven examples of core values that scholarly organizations might consider as a first step in developing their approach to international engagement.
ASPA's National Council will review this report in the coming weeks and discuss ways to incorporate the recommendations into ASPA's operations. More information about these actions will be circulated as they are adopted.
President Allan Rosenbaum, the National Council and staff wish to thank the committee for its efforts, and especially co-chairs Alasdair Roberts and Mary Lee Rhodes for their leadership on this important topic.
JSEPA Releases Issue One, Volume One
The first issue of the Journal of Social Equity and Public Administration (JSEPA) was released earlier this month. As Susan Gooden, Richard Johnson III, Sean McCandless and RaJade Berry-James note in the first article, "The Journal of Social Equity and Public Administration: From Vision to Victory", JSEPA is the byproduct of years of hard work from members of ASPA's Section on Democracy and Social Justice, its founding sponsors and, of course, the founding editorial board.
This first publication is a victory borne by a community of scholars and practitioners; a community dedicated to the idea that public administration can and will embrace social equity as a guiding principle in its research and practice. The editorial board is thrilled to share Issue One and grateful for the work everyone has accomplished to make JSEPA a reality.
Some Background About the Debt Limit
Late last week, the United States hit its debt limit—the amount it is allowed to borrow. With Congress being slow to enact legislation to raise the ceiling, the Department of Treasury now is using "extraordinary measures" to ensure the country can pay its bills for as long as possible before it defaults on its debts.
The Peter G. Peterson Foundation released a blog post defining "extraordinary measures," describing exactly what actions the Treasury has at its disposal to curb fiscal uncertainty and how much impact those measures will have.
The Peterson Foundation also provides insight regarding the underlying problem forcing this challenge: "While the federal debt needs to be placed on a sustainable path, putting our nation’s fiscal and economic future at risk over the debt limit is not an effective way to govern. Rather than risking the full faith and credit of the United States, lawmakers should focus on the underlying reason we keep hitting the debt limit in the first place: the structural imbalance between spending and revenues."
Public Administration Today Highlight
Public Administration Today features white papers, research and blogs from across the profession. This edition's highlight looks at city planning! If you're interested in more—especially your own curated news feed in your inbox every week—visit the website, create an account and check off your interest areas so you can stay up to date about the latest research being released!
How to Develop a Community Engagement Action Plan
Major issues like the climate emergency and inequality are challenging our existing democratic systems with the need for a transformative response. That’s why it’s so important that we know how to develop a robust action plan for community engagement that harnesses digital innovation. With the right action plan in place, we can ensure we are connecting with our community on an appropriate level to enhance public decisionmaking.
PAR Symposium Call for Papers: Reviews to Reimagine and Rejuvenate Theorizing
Although reviews of scholarly literature can play an important role in reimagining and rejuvenating scholarship and pedagogy, reviews also can serve to reinforce existing understanding, thereby blocking avenues of progress. From a metascience perspective, reviews should indeed provide a synthesis on a subject but should also be critical of how we as researchers “do” research to encourage continuous development of our scientific repertoire—both in terms of theory development and methodological rigor. Breslin and Gatrell (2020) use the miner-prospector metaphor to distinguish creative and original review approaches from the standard systematic review. Increasingly, there have been calls over the last few years to reorient reviews to question taken-for-granted scholarly understanding and use reviews to reimagine and rejuvenate extant understanding and break disciplinary boundaries.
PAR’s pages have featured many creative and original review articles and the goal of this symposium is to add to this corpus of high-impact reviews. As a discipline, we need reviews to systematize existing knowledge in order to understand this knowledge better and create new ideas. To stand on the shoulders of giants does not necessarily prevent progress, but it takes some courage to go beyond summarizing what others have found and even more courage to suggest a fundamentally different organizing principle.
Public Administration Review invites manuscripts that survey scholarly literatures and promote new insights. Manuscripts will be subject to an editorial evaluation followed by PAR’s peer-review process. Manuscripts will be assessed according to review scope goals, and execution—of broad interest to public administration scholars and practitioners; clear articulation and execution of review goals; review methodology—replicable and transparent review methodology; and review contribution—contribution to reimagining and rejuvenating extant understanding. Manuscripts should be submitted online, choosing “Symposium Article” as the article type at the time of submission. In the comments to the editor, please note that the article is intended for the “PAR Review Symposium 2023.” All proposals are due by February 15, 2023. Click here to view the full Call for Papers.
National Civic League All American City Competition Open
The National Civic League is accepting applications for the 2023 All-America City Award. Since 1949, the All-America City Award has recognized communities that leverage civic engagement, collaboration, inclusiveness and innovation to successfully address local challenges.
The 2023 All-America City Award will recognize 10 communities that are working to improve the health and well-being of young people, with particular attention to efforts that engage young people in this work. Democracy thrives when all residents are active and engaged in the policies and decisions that shape their lives. In 2023, the National Civic League is seeking to identify communities that are breaking down barriers to meaningful youth participation and enacting programs that will improve quality of life for youth, and all residents, by extension.
Applications are due February 15, 2023. Twenty finalists will be named in March 2023 and invited to assemble a community team to present their work at the All-America City Award event in Denver, CO, June 9-11, 2023.
For additional information, watch this informational webinar and download the 2023 application.
NISPAcee Announces 2023 Conference in Belgrade, Serbia
NISPAcee has announced its 2023 conference will take place May 25-27 in Belgrade, Serbia, with the theme, "The Future of Public Administration Enabled through Emerging Technologies."
Contemporary public administration is tackling the challenges of globalization, social and demographic changes, migration and climate change. Layered and complex reform trajectories and instruments are needed to modernize public administration, improve the efficiency and effectiveness of service delivery and achieve high standards of reliability and accountability. All sectors of society, including public administration, will have to play a role in the effort toward a green transformation. Faced with rapid and accelerating socio-economic change, public administration needs to take into account the opportunities offered by new technologies, as well as develop new services aimed at openness, transparency and citizen participation accordingly. The conference will pay particular attention to the topic of the digital transformation of public administration. The issues to be taken into consideration are: the role of the public sector in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, as well as the challenges of implementing new technologies in the transformation of public administration. Moreover, in the knowledge society, the capacity to innovate and ability to implement innovations are very important for the public administration of the future.
The call for papers is open to all topics and all methods and approaches relevant for the theme, from conceptual and theoretical papers to case studies and policy and applied level assessments, from "large n” quantitative analysis to in-depth qualitative investigations. The conference will provide a forum for an open exchange of theoretical ideas and applied level experiences. Special attention will be given to the NISPAcee region but the conference will aim to integrate and connect the experience and perspectives emerging from countries of the NISPAcee region to the current global experience and perspectives regarding the described main theme of the conference. All paper submissions are due by April 10, 2023. Click here for more information.
Tips and Resources
Remote Work Has Made Developing Relationships with Colleagues Harder—Here’s What Workers and Bosses Need Now
Hybrid and remote-heavy work setups have fundamentally changed how people interact at "the office." What do workers and managers want out of the workplace now?
Sitting All Day Is Terrible for Your Health—Now, a New Study Finds a Relatively Easy Way to Counteract It
Short, frequent walks throughout the day are key to helping prevent the harmful effects of a sedentary lifestyle.
Meditation and Mindfulness Offer an Abundance of Health Benefits and May Be as Effective as Medication for Treating Certain Conditions
Mindfulness, one of the most common forms of meditation, is a skill that must be cultivated and practiced. With some training and discipline, it can help anyone live more fully in the moment.
Do You Use These Words When You Apologize? It's Time to Stop, Researchers Say
There's something very powerful about receiving or giving a heartfelt, genuine apology. Bad apologies, on the other hand, can be disastrous and lead to more hurt.
In the News
Today's headlines contain plenty of news coverage of some of our nation's most pressing public administration challenges. ASPA has curated some of the most important stories from recent weeks. If you have not seen these yet, make sure you read them now!
Infrastructure
Public Finance
Public Service
Social Equity
Members in the News
College of Charleston Announces Partnership to Identify Pathways to Park Equity
ASPA Immediate Past President Kendra Stewart is leading one of the teams deeply engaged in this important work.
When the Infrastructure Boom Meets the Workforce Crash
By Katherine Barrett and Richard Greene
AI Is Here. How Will Government Use It—and Regulate It?
By Don Kettl
Boiling the Frog: How Civil Servants Are Being Politicized Before Our Eyes
By incoming National Council District Representative Ron Sanders
Tell Me Something Good...
Need some good news in your world? Check this out:
AI-Enabled Robots May Increase Recycling, Workplace Safety
Automating the recycling sorting process can increase waste management efficiency and play a valuable role in reducing environmental contamination.
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Around Public Administration
Here are the most recent updates from across the profession. Did we miss you? Send us your news and we'll include it in the next round!
Upcoming Events:
Calls for proposals and other updates:
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Public Money and Management Special Issue on Global Responses to Human-Made Disasters
The interconnectedness of international economic, financial, societal and ecological systems has reached its apogee, as individual, organizational or national disasters increasingly hit our global world. As the war escalates on the European continent, PMM has decided to publish a theme on responding to human-made disasters. The theme will reflect on the role, choices of different strategies and responses made by international organizations and leading democracies when facing human-made emergencies and subsequent disasters. These discussions will enrich knowledge on crisis management and resilience from an international perspective, allowing academics, practitioners, and politicians to enhance their understanding of emergency responses to human-made and subsequent disasters—to learn from the past and inform decisions in this new era of crises. All articles are due by January 31. Click here for more information.
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Call for Nominations: Arthur S. Flemming Awards
Established in 1948, the Flemming Awards honor outstanding federal employees. Recognized by the president of the United States, agency heads and the private sector, the winners are selected from all areas of the federal service. The George Washington University and the Arthur S. Flemming Awards Commission present a total of 12 awards annually in five categories: leadership and/or management; legal achievement; social science, clinical trials and translational research; applied science and engineering; and basic science. Agencies are encouraged to nominate outstanding public servants with three to 15 years of experience in the federal government. All nominations are due by January 31. Click here for more information.
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Call for Nominations: SPALR Annual Awards Program
ASPA's Section on Personnel Administration and Labor Relations (SPALR) is accepting nominations for its annual awards: Outstanding Practitioner Award, Jonathan West Outstanding Scholar Award, Dissertation Award, Steven E. Condrey Service to the Section Award and Outstanding Book Award. Certificates will be provided during the Section's business meeting, taking place later this spring. Contact Section Chair Salta Liebert with any questions or to submit a nomination. All nominations are due by February 3.
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Call for Papers: NAPA Social Equity Leadership Conference
NAPA's Panel on Social Equity in Governance is partnering with the University of Kansas and the Mid-America Regional Council to hold the 2023 Social Equity Leadership Conference (SELC) June 12-14 in Kansas City, Missouri, a region that has a long history of both perpetuating inequities as well as overcoming them through coalition building, deliberative and inclusive practices, and persistent commitment to action. This year's SELC will help public administration practitioners advance social equity in policy and practice. We will try to find out “what works?” and, equally important, “why?” We may also learn from challenges, failures and stunted performances as well by finding out “what doesn’t work” and “why not?” Social equity academics are encouraged to submit current studies, theoretical considerations or “emerging challenges or opportunities” for social equity scholarship and education. Practitioners are encouraged to submit case studies or “emerging challenges or opportunities” from their region that highlights successful or unsuccessful attempts at building more diverse, equitable, inclusive, just and belonging communities, services and/or public goods. These efforts are very often designed to address needs in some very specific policy domains including policing; health outcomes; educational attainment/workforce skills; housing; and environmental and social justice governance. All proposals are due by February 6. Click here for more information.
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Institute for Peace and Dialogue Call for Participants
The Institute for Peace and Dialogue has issued a newly launched three-month executive diploma program, with special modules of instruction and experienced trainers to give participants field-based education, wide professional experience and fruitful networking, appropriate for a variety of positions. This program targets titles including manager, program coordinator, human resources officer, case manager, mediator, public relations manager, mentor, coacher, arbitrator and more. Modules are "Leadership, HR Management, Coaching and Project Management" and "Peacebuilding, Alternative Dispute Resolution Mediation, Conflict Management, International Security and Law." Participants may join either module. Applications are due beginning February 10, depending on your module of choice. Scholarships are available. Click here for more information.
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SECM Opens William Petak Award Call for Nominations
The Section on Emergency and Crisis Management (SECM) has opened its solicitation of papers for the William Petak Award, given each year to the best paper on emergency management delivered at the ASPA Annual Conference. The award honors William Petak, a founder of the Section and a seminal scholar in emergency management. The winner will receive a $100 cash prize. Submissions should be sent to Jason Rivera no later than February 15 at 11:59 p.m. EST. Contact Jason Rivera for more information.
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National Forum for Black Public Administrators’ Student Scholarships
The NFBPA is continuing its prestigious scholarship program in 2023. This program recognizes African American or other minority students who are currently enrolled full-time at an accredited, traditional four-year college or university, preferably at an HBCU, and show outstanding scholarship and leadership, particularly as related to public service. NFBPA provides several scholarships to undergraduate and graduate students through its partnerships with corporate supporters, public sector organizations and individual contributors. The scholarship program is an integral part of NFBPA’s goal of lending support to African American and other minority students interested in leadership roles in public service. Applicants may apply for multiple scholarships or other NFBPA financial awards. If selected, the applicant can receive only one award. All applications are due February 27. Click here for more information.
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National Forum for Black Public Administrators’ Student Research Poster Contest
The NFBPA Student Research Poster Contest will be held on Thursday, April 27, 2023 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in conjunction with NFBPA's FORUM 2023. The competition recognizes research conducted by the students at all undergraduate, masters and doctorate levels. All students are encouraged to submit for this competition. In order to be eligible for the poster contest, all applicants must be currently enrolled in a traditional four-year college or university with at least one academic semester remaining after April 2023. All payments will be made to the university. The deadline to submit a poster abstract is February 28. Click here for more information.
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National Capital Area Chapter Issues Student Essay Contest
The National Capital Area Chapter (NCAC) has established a student essay contest to encourage new thinking and thoughts to advance the practice of public administration and public policy. This essay contest also was established to help advance the development of future public administrators. The essays should focus on one of the following topics: social equity, intergovernmental relations, the future of government workforce, public engagement, community collaboration, new technologies and community resiliency. All entries are due by March 17; only NCAC student members are eligible to enter. Contact NCAC for full submission guidelines and other details.
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Public Money and Management Special Issue on "Hyper-Lean" Post Managerialism
This PMM theme will concentrate on understanding the short- and long-term impact on economies, organizations and public sector and not-for-profit employees if the present priorities, funding and management models persist in terms of equity, fairness and the wellbeing of societies. Organizations need to do more than examine their efficiency, effectiveness and flexibility, they need to examine the sustainability of the "hyper lean" post-managerialism logic. We welcome articles that challenge the present entrenched paradigm and instead propose new funding and management logics. All articles are due by July 31, 2023. Click here for more information.
PA TIMES Online
Here's a selection of current pieces on PA TIMES Online, covering a range of issues within the profession. We accept individual articles on a rolling basis; if you have a piece you think would fit our publication, submit it to [email protected] for consideration. (Please review our submission guidelines in advance!)
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