409566
American Review of Public Administration
ARPXXX10.1177/0275074011409566GoodsellThe
Mission Mystique: Strength
at the Institutional Center
American Review of Public Administration
XX(X) 1­–20
© The Author(s) 2011
Reprints and permission: http://www.
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DOI: 10.1177/0275074011409566
http://arp.sagepub.com
Charles T. Goodsell
Abstract
Despite discussion in the literature of “new governance,” the self-standing government agency
continues to constitute the institutional center of American public administration. Drawing on
his volume Mission Mystique, the author proposes that the book’s concept of mystique and its
template of institution-strengthening characteristics be used to reaffirm this point, buttress
agencies against defunding, and enable them better to oversee devolved activities.
Keywords
government agencies, institutional vitality, mission, bureaucracy
In his book On Thinking Institutionally, Hugh Heclo (2008) explains why institutions are fundamental to human society. Whether one is talking about marriage, law, or baseball, they are social
repositories of past precedent and ways of doing things. Institutions can bequeath to successive
generations stable referents that give lives meaning beyond self-interest calculation and the latest
trend. They also become points of access for successive generations to reshape the social fabric
when institutional habits become rigid, corrupt, or repressive.
This article is on the institution of bureaucracy. Viewed as a sociological abstraction or as
individual examples, bureaucracy is often denounced unhesitatingly. Yet, as with other classes
of institution, it can provide opportunities to each generation. To that end, the pages that follow
outline a vision of bureaucracy intended to maximize its institutional contribution to governance.
It bears what is called the quality of mission mystique and is submitted for consideration as a
means of strengthening public administration’s institutional center.
The Public Agency
For well over a century, the administrative agency has been and remains the centerpiece of
American public administration. It is the only public organizational vehicle available that possesses, at the same time, the following characteristics:
• Has been granted a statutory mandate to perform a public duty;
• Has specialized knowledge, skills and resources to perform that duty;
• Is staffed by career civil servants acting under constitutional oath;
1
Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Corresponding Author:
Charles T. Goodsell, Virginia Polytechnic Institute, 509 College View Drive, Blacksburg, VA 24060, USA
Email: [email protected]
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• Is financed by taxpayer-provided funds for which it is held accountable;
• Is ultimately responsible in operations and policy to elected officials;
• Is subject to unlimited external check by multiple authorities.
It is because of this unique triad of assets—authority, resources, and accountability—that
thousands of administrative agencies exist at all levels of government. In most governmental
jurisdictions, numerous agencies exist, performing an array of duties. In small localities, the
duties are also numerous, but the governing entity itself is like one institution.
By translating what citizens and their elected representatives want into concrete reality,
administrative agencies make possible the functioning of our modern democratic republic. At the
same time, a prime objective of our professional field of public administration is never to be satisfied with the existing quality of governance. The institutions through which we act must be
steadily improved. Certainly this is true with direct administration by agencies of their own programs, which has traditionally constituted most of their activity. In recent years, for a number of
reasons, agencies have been devolving public functions to nongovernmental actors, such as signatories to government contracts, recipients of government grants and transfers, private entities
to which are delegated public authority, and nonprofit organizations that carry out public functions in partnership with government.
This proliferation of devolved public activity has of late dominated the field’s literature to the
extent it is referred to as the “new governance,” even though the old governance by single agencies has by no means disappeared (Lynn, 2010; McGuire & Agranoff, 2010). Indeed, their importance is now even greater because of responsibilities this devolution confers on agencies for the
actions of institutions other than themselves. Private, nonprofit, and hybrid organizations performing public duties with public funds must meet the constitutional requirements of public law
and representative government. This makes it increasingly necessary that agencies be informed
and capable overseers of contractors, grantees, collaborators, and partners with respect to due
process of law, equal protection of the laws, fiduciary accountability, and the avoidance of specialinterest privilege. Whereas public tasks can be farmed out, public accountability cannot be.
Along with oversight responsibilities due to devolution, government agencies must bear the
adverse consequences of another trend, threats of defunding government. Large federal budget
deficits caused by the financial meltdown, the recession, low taxes, entitlement programs, and
costly wars have created a turn to the right in electoral politics. The federal government’s debt has
become the means by which antigovernment conservatives rally popular opinion that supports, at
least for the moment, a massive downsizing of the civilian bureaucracy. Leaders in both political
parties are demanding extensive federal budget cuts and salary freezes or dismissal of public
employees. Cries are also in the air for rolling back longstanding regulations and eliminating entire
agencies.
This situation creates a second major challenge to the government agency of our time. This is
to save from dissolution vital government competencies that give the nation security and prosperity and allow communities to seek a high quality of life for all. Specialized civil and military
workforces that have been developed over the decades, and the physical projects of infrastructure
that have been the objects of billions in public expenditure cannot be allowed to be deteriorated.
Complicating the situation further is the likelihood that as appropriated dollars disappear and
staff morale drops, additional steps in the direction of devolution will probably be taken. This
makes the task of adequate third-party oversight even larger—and yet agencies will have fewer
resources for this purpose. The institutional center of public administration has no choice but to
gird its loins, protect that for which it is responsible, and maintain its inner spirit. How might this
be possible?
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Meeting Three Needs
It is helpful as a first step to define more explicitly what now is needed in public agencies as a
result of devolution and defunding, along with filling the gaps in in-house capability that have
always existed in government bureaucracy. There are three such areas: (a) mission articulation,
(b) workforce continuity, and (c) capacity for change.
Mission articulation. One need is to be sufficiently committed to a crystal-clear expression of the
agency’s mission so that it can be articulated ardently and persuasively. Bland mission statements
written by committee that include all activities must be limited to strategic management boilerplate. The time for cavalier assumption of the agency’s justifiability is also at an end; its purpose
must be emphatically stated and be unmistakably linked to the contribution it makes to an existing
public need. With respect to external actor oversight, this step is necessary to show third parties
what values are at the heart of the institution’s work. As for warding off defunding threats, crisp
mission articulation explains to legislators, the media, and the public precisely what the mission
does for the collective good. By implication, this makes clear the adverse affects that would be felt
across the country and within the community if the agency’s programs are curtailed.
Workforce continuity. A second need is to maintain within the agency sufficient workforce
continuity and institutional memory for the agency to carry its distinctive competence into the
future. This will require an unusually robust organizational culture that is able to retain and
recruit personnel based on attractions other than compensation or the opportunities for advancement afforded by mission growth. For external actor oversight, sufficient in-house technical
knowledge and experience must be maintained to be able to monitor and evaluate successfully
the work of those to whom responsibilities are delegated. The unhappy situation often experienced of being wholly dependent on contractors for decisions on contract renewal must be
avoided if possible. Unfortunately, funding cutbacks can lead to fast attrition in the agency’s best
talent, thus worsening this situation. Moreover, retention of at least the base of a knowledgeable
and motivated workforce is essential for maintaining a good reputation despite substantial
defunding and will be critical to the rebuilding process once appropriations are restored.
Capacity for change. The third need is that the agency show it is not wedded to a gloried past
but is facing the future with confidence, creativity, and an innovative spirit. This avoids the
stigma of a has-been bureaucracy and asserts the profile of an eager comer in a changing world.
Such an image must, however, be backed by actual evidence of having an open culture that is
receptive to new ideas and a record of actual experimentation with program improvements. With
respect to the oversight function, forward-looking behavior allows the agency to address its dispersed actors and collaborators not as a rigid naysayer that insists on conformity to rules but as
a dynamic partner in innovation. In counteracting fiscal hard times, an innovative reputation
allows the agency to stand for adoption of new technologies in the search for greater productivity. This places the organization in the position of a self-confident institution that is ready to
regroup following the easing of cutbacks.
The Concept of Mission Mystique
We now examine mission mystique as a model for elevating the public agency to its highest potential generally as well as meeting these mentioned needs. It is an ideal of institutional robustness
that the author developed inductively from a study of six premier government agencies conducted
between 2005 and 2010 (Goodsell, 2011).
The mission mystique agency is endowed with an aura of positive institutional charisma that
is derived from the nature of its mission and how well it is carried out—hence the term mission
mystique. It is felt both within and without the organization. To career employees, the mystique
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American Review of Public Administration XX(X)
fosters a personal commitment to advancement of the mission. To attentive outsiders, it generates admiration and respect.
Mission mystique differs from the more common normative approaches to public administration. It by no means excludes but goes beyond the usual production criteria of sheer efficiency or
the attainment of performance targets. Likewise, while recognizing the need for strong leadership at particular moments, it differs from the corporate model whereby the key to success is a
“great man” that forces the organization culture to adopt what he sees as essential. Rather,
mission mystique is institutional in nature, following Philip Selznick’s definition of “institution”
as an organization that moves beyond a rationally designed system for meeting predetermined
goals to an organic, evolving entity that accumulates the ways, values, and symbols of its culture
over time (Selznick, 1957). As such, the agency becomes not merely an instrumental agent obeying
a “principal’s” instructions but an ongoing enterprise that takes on a constitutive value of its own.
Political scientists in particular worry about bureaucratic power and the difficulty of controlling
the bureau’s policy influence and delegated powers. In my normative model, the mission mystique
agency can innovate freely within bounds but must respect the overtly expressed policy preferences
of legislative bodies and political administrations. If it does not, it no longer belongs to my category. Contrary to the impressions of many, research on U.S. bureaucracies shows that typically
they seek to follow the wishes of new administrations that come to power (Goodsell, 2004).
Related views of others. The contours of mission mystique can be clarified further by comparing it with related ideas of other authors. The organizational-frame model of Bolman and Deal
parallels many of the normative, relational, and ceremonial features of mission mystique. However, instead of integrating these into one prescriptive construct as done here, they present them
as separate frames from which to choose (Bolman & Deal, 1997).
James Perry’s concept of public service motivation seeks dedicated commitment to government service, as does the mystique concept. Yet the unit of analysis is the attitudes of individual
public servants, not the culture of the agency in which they work (Perry & Hondeghem, 2008).
The purpose of Todd La Porte’s high-reliability organization is to provide the closest thing possible to perfect operational certainty under hazardous conditions. Thus constancy is the prime consideration, which differs from the attribute of continuous renewal in mission mystique (La Porte &
Keller, 1996).
With respect to observed best practices, in their well-known book In Search of Excellence,
Peters and Waterman define excellence in terms of intensity of purpose, energized culture, and
capacity to change, much as I do interestingly enough. However, the measures by which they
select companies to study are quantitative rather than qualitative and moreover corporate in
nature, that is, high return on investment and greater market share (Peters & Waterman, 1982).
Adoption of public values are at the heart of Mark Moore’s approach to public management,
but they are defined by the manager and not the agency mission and culture (Moore, 1995). The
“agential” perspective of Gary Wamsley and his colleagues at Virginia Tech (including this
author) is similar to mission mystique in that it notes the importance of the agency’s institutional
knowledge and definition of the public interest. Yet normatively it is based on the Constitution
and not the agency’s culture (Wamsley et al., 1990). Larry Terry’s concept of administrative
conservatorship calls for preserving and updating the agency’s mission values—essential to mission mystique as well—yet lodges this responsibility in the organization’s leader, not the institution as a whole (Terry, 2003).
The Mission Mystique Belief System
Underlying the overall attribute of mission mystique is a belief system—a coherent web of
emotive and cognitive elements that together make possible the mystique aura. At its core is a
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mission cause that becomes immersed in a mobilizing and supportive culture that produces a
shared sense of identity and pride. Over time, the belief system grows and evolves with experience and thereby passes the mystique on to successive generations.
The term belief may seem too ecclesiastic for students of such a secular subject as bureaucracy.
Yet our field is already full of beliefs, for example, in the efficacy of performance management or
the desirability of human capital development. Unlike tenets of religion, however, these beliefs
and those embedded in mission mystique agencies are not unquestioned doctrines but shared
mental models that are amenable to varied interpretation. Drawing on the work of Stephen White’s
concept of “weak ontologies,” Louis Howe refers to them as normative affirmations that are
strongly held but not to the extent they cannot be questioned (Howe, 2006; White, 2000).
No doubt, postmodernists will have trouble accepting even this amount of “foundational”
certainty. Catlaw and Jordan, who draw from the psychoanalytic theory of Jacques Lecan, argue
that no presumption of a superordinate “Good” can remain uncontested because human language
deploys only vague verbal signifiers, for example, “justice.” They nonetheless conclude that if
individuals talk sufficiently together about their personal meanings of such a term, at least common ground can emerge (Catlaw & Jordan, 2009). Such dialogue is contemplated under mission
mystique on a continuing basis.
Method of study. The mission mystique framework was developed from the study of six premier government agencies at all three levels of American government. This empirical work was
not used to test a theory but rather develop one. Indeed, elements of the framework emerged slowly,
over several years as I interviewed or consulted 105 individuals in the course of 24 fieldtrips. The
outcome was a “template” matrix of nine cells, each of which states a key institutional attribute of the mission mystique agency. It is shown in Figure 1.
In selecting the exemplar agencies, a range of policy domains and levels of government was
deliberately covered. Four choices from the federal government possess a national fame that
I did not need to verify. These were the National Park Service (NPS), National Weather Service
(NWS), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and Peace Corps. A state agency,
the Virginia State Police, was chosen after consulting a knowledgeable observer of the Richmond
scene, the executive director of the Commonwealth’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review
Commission. Local government was represented by the Department of Social Services (DSS) of
Mecklenburg County (Charlotte), North Carolina. It was chosen on the recommendation of a
national consultant in the public welfare field.
The Mission Mystique Template
We turn now to the template of the mission mystique belief system. In keeping with its “system”
nature of interrelated parts, I first analyze the columns, which differentiate three segments of the
system and second its rows, which point to three functions.
The column headed Direction Aspects consists of components that determine the trajectory bearings of a particular agency’s mission mystique. They are, from top to bottom, the central mission
purpose, as expressed in actual practice (cell 1). Next are the motivating effects of mission belief that
animate individual members of the mission (cell 4). At the bottom are aired disagreements over
interpretation of the mission that keep its content continuously under consideration (cell 7).
Environment Aspects are contextual features that affect movement within the mission trajectory. The societal context of the mission is the perceived need for it to be carried on (cell 2). The
cultural context is the array of shared values and ideals within the agency that have been institutionalized around the mission (cell 5). The autonomy available for innovative mission policy
making—“qualified” by the limits set by legislative, executive, or judicial authority—constitutes
the political environment of policy decisions (cell 8).
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Direction
Aspects
Charged with Purpose
Charged with Energy
Charged with Vitality
Environment
Aspects
Time
Aspects
1 A Central Mission 2 The Societal
Purpose Permeates Need Met is Seen
the Agency
as Urgent
3 Distinctive
Reputation Based
on Achievement
4 Personnel Are
Intrinsically
Motivated
5 The Culture
Institutionalizes
the Belief System
6 Agency History Is
Known and
Celebrated
7 Beliefs Are Open
to Contestation
and Opposition
8 Qualiied Policy
Autonomy to
Permit Innovation
9 Agency Renewal
and Learning are
Ongoing
Figure 1. The mission mystique belief system: A template
As for Time Aspects, these elements of the template relate to factors that impinge on mystique
over the span of time of the institution’s existence. The recent past provides the record of mission
achievement on which the agency’s present-day reputation rests (cell 3). Celebration of an honored historical past builds organizational pride and contributes to the formation of its identity
(cell 6). Ongoing organizational learning and renewal foster a readiness within the agency to
adjust to what lies in the future (cell 9).
It is in the rows of attributes that the template’s dynamic emerges. Starting with the top row
and using an electric charge metaphor, this uppermost trio of cells “charges” the institution with
a sense of purpose. The agency has been created to carry out a central objective that is stated in
familiar language and which establishes the institution’s raison d’être (cell 1). Accomplishment
of the mission fills an important societal void and thereby reveals the significance and legitimacy
of the agency’s work (cell 2). The institution’s past record of achievement in this regard reinforces this legitimacy by showing it has been competent in performing the task (cell 3).
The template’s middle row mobilizes the internal energy necessary for the agency to continue
to act forcefully in behalf of the public in this way. Personnel are sufficiently committed to the
mission’s importance in that they are motivated by intrinsic interest in the agency’s work and not
just material compensation or personal recognition (cell 4). A strong organizational culture built
around fulfillment of the mission supports and unites employees around their common work
purpose (cell 5). This dedication is periodically renewed by stories and ceremonies that recount
the agency’s founding and notable moments in its history (cell 6).
The bottom row maintains cultural and policy vitality over time so as to avoid the onset of
institutional decay. Dissent regarding mission implementation stimulates open dialogue and
keeps doctrines from becoming entrenched and unquestioned (cell 7). A strategy of active policy
experimentation is made possible by carved-out political space in which to innovate (cell 8).
Continuous learning of the single, double, and triple loop varieties habituate the institution to
self-renewal and change-readiness (cell 9).
Interestingly, on checking at the end of my research on how each agency measured up to this
matrix, I found that none of the six conformed totally to all nine attributes. In short, the characteristics that emerged were derived from analysis of the group of organizations as a whole, rather
than any individual case. Another way of saying this is that the sample yielded an ideal type, not
consistent uniformity. Nevertheless, each agency conformed quite well; in a scoring system of 3
for strong compliance, 2 for moderate, and 1 for weak, the Park Service and Peace Corps scored
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an average of 2.9 across all nine attributes, the CDC and VSP 2.8, and the Weather Service and
Social Services 2.6 (Goodsell, 2011, p. 251).
Sources of Mystique
The uniqueness of institutional life requires us to examine its concrete details, and hence most
of our remaining pages discuss salient aspects of the particulars of what was uncovered by my
fieldwork in these six agencies. I begin with the matter of overall agency charisma and then
discuss the “charges” encountered in each template row.
Substantively, the mystiques of these agencies fall into two groups. In one, it has to do with a
mandated national stewardship and the awesome responsibility that confers. For the Park Service,
this is to preserve the nation’s natural and cultural treasures for future generations. For the Weather
Service, it is to reduce the uncertainties of an enormously dynamic planetary envelope of air and
water that makes life possible yet also endangers it. As for the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, the stewardship is to protect human populations from nature’s capacity to devastate
through disease.
The second general category of mystique is to carry on activities that are deemed absolutely
essential to human well-being and hence morally imperative. The Department of Social
Services reaches out to those who personally live on the edge of survival, whether out of economic deprivation or familial abuse. The Virginia State Police protects citizens from crime,
terrorism, and self-destruction by speeding, alcohol, and drugs. The Peace Corps is devoted to
the cause of helping low-income peoples in less-developed countries build for themselves a
better future.
Accordingly, when examining this set of agency mystiques closely one finds a strong presence of moral principle embedded within the performance of professionalized tasks. Passions are
at work but within an institutionalized framework.
The life of the Weather Service is immersed in the science of meteorology and the vast instrumentation involved in making forecasts. Weather people are totally bound up in their numerical
models and vast databases. When gathered together they talk only shop and when at home examine their personal instruments. Yet when dangerous storms approach, they gladly spend 18-hr
shifts in their forecasting centers, determined to give precise and timely warning of hurricanes,
tornadoes, blizzards, and floods.
The CDC’s applied science of epidemiology attracts the interest of newly minted MDs interested in the field of public health. The best of them enter the agency’s elite training program,
called the Epidemic Intelligence Corps (EIS). As members of this elite group of novices they
stand ready to rush to scenes of disease outbreak anywhere in the world to diagnose the cause and
trace the origins. Each graduating class gives an academic-style conference in Atlanta that
attracts public health experts from throughout the country (McKenna, 2004).
At the Department of Social Services in Mecklenburg County, teams of eligibility workers
take pride in developing comprehensive, individualized welfare-to-work plans for clients who
have never had a regular job. Cooperating state employment officials later vet them for employability and local corporations interview them for openings. In its divisions of protective services,
social workers respond on a 24-by-7-by-365 basis to reports of abuse going on in dysfunctional
households. This involves driving alone on some of the meanest streets in town in the dead of
night if necessary. At the same time, each approach to the household door is done in accord with
strict rules of professional conduct.
Criminal investigators of the Virginia State Police assigned to interagency drug task forces
become intent on cracking narcotic distribution rings via successive undercover penetrations.
When enough evidence has been collected and bust day comes, federal, state, and local agents move
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in together, resulting in wide media coverage. This work is carried out by thoroughly trained
detectives who report on their moves daily to division headquarters.
For rangers in the National Park Service, the source of mystique is the magnificent beauty and
deep cultural meaning of the national parks under their care. They take very seriously their duty
to protect the parks “in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the
enjoyment of future generations,” to quote the NPS Organic Act (Act of August 25, 1919,
Sec. 1). At training centers, they are schooled in the court decisions handed down on application
of this and related laws and are expected to follow published management polices when exercising judgment in their widely scattered parks.
Staff and volunteers of the Peace Corps are given an even more cosmic charge to “promote
world peace and friendship” by furnishing trained manpower and fostering international understanding (Act of September 22, 1961, Sec. 1a). Although its work has experienced varied treatment by presidential administrations since its creation under President Kennedy, as the 50th
anniversary of the agency passes its popularity on college campuses and fame around the world
are as strong as ever. Margaret Mead described the Peace Corps as nothing less than “an ethical
enterprise” (Mead, 1966).
Charged With Purpose
Mission definition (Cell 1). Attention is now turned to how the studied agencies individually
meet the requirements of each cell of the template. Cell 1 admonishes that a central mission
purpose must permeate the agency. This attribute is centrally acute to formation and maintenance
of its belief system; mission is the originator of the institution’s mystique and a primary sustaining source thereafter. Its upper-left placement in the template matrix portrays it as the starting
point for both the direction column and the purpose row.
Although all six agencies are guided by statutory mandates, it is interesting that in only three
cases is the mission itself stated in law. The statutory missions of the Park Service and Peace
Corps have already been noted. Their wording lives on as belief language that is constantly
referred to, almost like scriptural passages in religion. The meaning of unimpaired for future
generations is debated almost daily in policy conversations in the NPS, and in the Peace Corps
the discussion is endless on whether world peace and understanding can best be promoted by
volunteers trained in specific skills or those who hold potential for cultural sensitivity and nondirective guidance of villagers.
Much of the critical literature on bureaucracy contends that goal ambiguity as found in agency
missions distinguishes government from business, whose goal is the singular one to make money.
By contrast, administrative institutions are intended to meet complex social goals and not just
help a bottom line. It is noteworthy, however, that despite assumptions by many that this feature
inhibits agency success, scholars have failed to correlate successfully the variables of goal clarity
and high performance (Rainey, 2010).
The Weather Service illustrates why the matter is more complicated than a plurality or confusion of ends. An 1890 statute assigned the NWS three tasks: to forecast weather and river conditions, inform the public of impending storms and floods and maintain the nation’s meteorological
assets (Whitnah, 1965). Even though these goals are actually complementary, the NWS as an
institution ignores them in practice in favor of easily understood rallying cries, such as “saving
lives and livelihoods” and becoming “America’s calm, clear and trusted voice in the eye of the
storm.” The lesson to be drawn is that lists of functions whether singular or multiple are irrelevant anyway; the efficacious mission expression acts as a verbal symbol and is not an instrument
of rational communication.
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It is thus not surprising that the three agencies without a statutory basis for their mission have
nonetheless developed, over time, compelling expressions of institutional reason for being. In all
three cases, this was done by extrapolating, in an unconsciously teleologic manner, an ultimate
purpose from their basic nature—basically a vision of maximal fulfillment of potential. For Social
Services, this is in terms of performance: “To Be the Best” (abbreviated “TB2”). For the State
Police it is in regard to superiority of personnel: “Virginia’s Finest,” inscribed on the base of a
statue of a trooper outside the police academy. As for the CDC, for the most recent past director
the measure of potential was program outcome; stated as “Healthiest Nation,” it called for elevating the health of Americans to the uppermost level reached in public health indicators.
Societal need (Cell 2). The contribution of cell 2 is to be charged with purpose because of the
urgency of the societal need being met. At times, the need definition may be obvious or “objective,”
as in making flying safe or halting epidemics. However, underneath almost all assumptions of what
a government must do are subjectively held attitudes, determined by one’s political orientation.
Once an organic act is passed and the agency is launched, it falls to the administrators to
interpret the need in detail. This requires them to make political decisions too. One course is to
allow the defined need to remain stabilized and become, over time, reified as inevitable. However,
times change and successive administrators wish to make their mark, hence enlargement of the
need definition becomes unavoidable. The results of this shift can strengthen or weaken the agency,
depending on how the political winds are blowing.
Among the six agencies, different situations obtain in this regard. Over its lifetime, the VSP
expanded its scope of activity slowly and steadily, with acceptance by the Virginia General
Assembly at each step. The agency moved from identifying highway speeders as the main problem to a succession of added needs, such as keeping order during disturbances, combating insurance fraud and auto theft, performing background checks on gun buyers, and operating a terrorism
intelligence center.
By contrast, the NPS over time actually redefined what is a “national park,” thus meeting
additional needs than before. From the traditional concept of protected wilderness or cultural
site, it referred also to ‘parks’ as recreational areas near cities, strings of unconnected urban park,
public performance venues, economic development areas, and nonland memorials (e.g., the
underground railroad). The CDC adopted still another strategy of need redefinition. Its beginning
imperative was to fight communicable and infectious disease. Over time, it added battling
chronic diseases like tuberculosis and cancer, preventing disease, as in combating smoking and
obesity, and later attaining optimal levels of wellness (hence the Healthiest Nation goal).
Record of achievement (Cell 3). This attribute helps to legitimize the agency in the eyes of others by possession of a known record of achievement. Because of the highly varied nature of
administrative programs, “success” must have different meanings. In buttressing the reputation
of their agencies, mission mystique administrators must know what kinds of evidence are possible and then obtain them to the extent feasible.
In rare cases, time-series data on positive outcomes are available. Among the six studied
organizations, the Weather Service is the best illustration. It keeps continuous “validation” statistics which are measures of how closely the predicted weather matches the weather that later
transpires. Also the NWS calculates annual warning performance averages, such as the mean
lead-time for tornado warnings (11 min in FY 2008), the accuracy of flash flood warnings (77%),
and the accuracy of next-day precipitation forecasts (33%; Goodsell, 2011, p. 88).
The NPS keeps track of annual visitation numbers to the national parks, a measure parallel to
sales figures in private commerce. Beginning with 1916 on a decennial basis, the totals were (in
millions) 0.35, 2.3, 12.0, 21.8, 61.6, 133.1, 216.6, 237.1, and 265.8. In 2004, the figure was
277.9, down somewhat from 2000, probably due to the introduction of entry fees.
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In many agencies, assessment data are necessarily marred by the presence of exogenous variables and/or the lack of outcome data, meaning that it is mainly effort that is measured. From
1996 to 2007, the DSS welfare-to-work program produced 24,025 graduates, although we do not
know how many initially applied. Yet it is encouraging that only 10% of those who completed
the program later returned for cash assistance. With respect to the Peace Corps, in FY 2008 public health projects mounted by volunteers affected 900,000 individuals, 4,900 organizations,
and 8,500 communities. Regardless of outcome, these are impressive activity figures. As for the
State Police, data on its firearms transaction program show not only frequency numbers but also
concrete outcomes: out of a total of 268,136 background checks conducted in FY 2008, 2,777
resulted in purchase denial and 263 in arrest warrants (Goodsell, 2011, pp. 149, 205, 242).
Charged With Energy
The middle row of the template provides the energy needed to pursue energetically the charge
of purpose enunciated in the top row. This involves employee motivation, organizational culture,
and attitudes toward agency history.
Intrinsic motivation (Cell 4). Several scholars have assumed that, at least potentially, public service as a generic normative principle can have motivating effect on those working in government.
Probably even more important is personal value alignment with the mission of a specific employing agency. This refers to what is called intrinsic motivation, that is, formed by attraction to the
work itself (Boardman & Sundquist, 2009; Miller & Whitford, 2010; Rainey & Steinbauer, 1999).
Some survey data are available on our agencies, but their reliability is undermined by their
anonymous, voluntary collection online, as part of the government-wide Federal Human Capital
Survey. Over the first decade of this century, a response of 91% to 93% agreement was yielded
for the NPS by the FHCA statement “The work I do is important.” CDC employees responded to
the same sentence in the range of 86% to 88%. By contrast, the question “How satisfied are you
with the policies and practices of your senior leaders?” produced positive responses between
27% and 37% in these two organizations, revealing dissatisfaction with Republican leadership
during the Bush II presidency (Goodsell, 2011, pp. 43, 132).
Intrinsic motivation typically forms in two ways, self-selection and socialization. With respect
to the first avenue, parental influence is particularly important for the NPS and VSP. Several
park rangers interviewed said they joined because of favorable childhood experiences camping
or hiking in the parks. At the VSP, elimination of a longstanding nepotism rule opened the way
for offspring to enter their parents’ profession, and at present many second and even third generation troopers are on the force.
Some other self-selection influences were at work as well. Many NWS professionals became
initially interested in meteorology because of training in weather prediction received in the
armed forces. In DSS and the CDC, career pathways are by higher education degrees: the MSW
in the former and an MD with public health specialization in the latter. Peace Corps volunteers
fall into a category of their own, where interest is stirred by personal ideals and influences received
in the college setting.
As for socialization experiences, one is preservice training and indoctrination in advance of
full-status employment. The CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service has already been mentioned;
its members learn by doing, and those who make it become serious members of this narrow but
crucial field. The State Police subjects its recruits to a full-time 44-week training program intended
to screen out those unable or not fit to be lawmen and women. It consists of 20 weeks of physically and psychologically stressful boot camp at the headquarters of police academy, followed
by 4 weeks of applied training in the field, 12 weeks of advanced instruction back at the academy, and then 8 weeks of ride-along highway patrol experience with a veteran trooper.
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In the early years of the Peace Corps, volunteers were prepared by contract university classes,
conditioning camps in Puerto Rico, and later residential training camps in California, Hawaii,
and the Virginia Islands. Today, all of these arrangements have been scrapped in favor of flying
accepted recruits directly to their destination country, where they live for 3 months with local
families while attending language and culture-sensitivity classes.
Postemployment in-service training is also used for socialization purposes. Weather Service
personnel are sent to short courses at an NWS training facility in Kansas City, Missouri; the
instruction concentrates on management and technical subjects, although students are also invited
to tell stories to each other from their own work experiences. The Park Service maintains two
training facilities named after the agency’s founders, the Stephen T. Mather Training Center
at Harpers Ferry and the Horace M. Albright Training Center near the Grand Canyon. An NPS
fundamentals course, taught at these locations and also online, is designed around eight universal
competencies: mission comprehension, agency orientation, resource stewardship, NPS operations,
fundamental values, communication skills, problem solving skills, and individual development.
Institutional culture (Cell 5). The organization’s culture is a community of shared values that mediates between the organization’s purpose and its policies. It is manifest by, among other things,
founding myths, informal stories, specialized language, symbolic artifacts, and repeated rituals.
Like cell 1, it is fundamental to mission mystique and occupies the center block of the matrix.
On studying the cultures of these agencies, I perceived three general types. One revolves
around the technical means for carrying out the mission, that is, the “tools of the trade.” In the
Weather Service, the compelling cultural symbols are components of the technologies used in
forecasting, such as Doppler radar towers rising from the ground and weather satellites flying
overhead. Within local weather forecasting offices, the center of attention is several desk consoles
equipped with four computer screens; known as Advanced Weather Information Processing
System (AWIPS), these are the workstations at which the assumptions behind alternative numerical models are manipulated to produce the automated local forecasts received by the public.
The State Police too have a tools-oriented culture. The high point for newly minted troopers
graduating from the police academy is being assigned one’s badge, a Sig Sauer 357 semiautomatic pistol, and a new police cruiser equipped with supercharged hemispheric engine. In subsequent field training and later on in retraining exercises, troopers undergo innumerable trials and
tests on shooting and driving ranges. While engaged in these strenuous activities, troopers fail
together, succeed together, and in the process are recemented into a common community despite
being placed all over the Commonwealth.
A second quite different source for generating cultural meaning is the buildings in which
work is done. The DSS headquarters in Charlotte is called the Kuralt Centre, named after the
agency director whose son was Charles Kuralt of “On the Road” fame. Its design and décor are
consciously used to convey the caring qualities of the DSS culture. When entering the building,
one encounters a pleasant, high-ceiling lobby at the front of which is a large reception desk
manned by “greeters.” They inquire as to what each incoming client needs, with the problem
taken care of on the spot if possible, and, if that is impossible, directed to nearby seating areas.
If “customers”—as they are called—are accompanied by children, they are shown a pleasant
staffed child care room known as the tot lot.
The CDC headquarters in Atlanta is not a single building but a campus of more than a dozen
major structures. Its cultural messages are quite different. A drive-in entrance off Clifton Road is
marked by a prominent stele-type sign that bears the agency’s blue and white emblem. After passing through security, visitors are free to enter the atrium of the Harkins Communications Center,
where abstract art objects are displayed on an upper floor and historical artifacts like iron lungs on
the floor below. On the two stories of common back wall of the atrium, huge rotating slide images
project photographs of CDC scientists and epidemiologists working around the world.
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The third type of cultural wellspring is that part of the external world to which the agency
relates. For the NPS, this is the national park units, particularly such famed Western wonders
such as Yellowstone, Yosemite, and the Grand Canyon. The sanctity and romance of these grand
national places fuel the passion that underlies the belief system of the agency’s 22,000 men and
women that supervise the park units for which they are responsible.
Similarly, the culture of the Peace Corps is centered on the remote villages and other sites in
economically deprived foreign lands in which its 8,000 volunteers spend 2 years of their lives.
Making certain the volunteers are properly selected, prepared, placed, and housed is much of
what occupies the employed staff. The rationale for all this activity is to pave the way for the
unfolding of thousands of unique and unpredictable village and rural projects. These include
classroom teaching, agricultural projects, health education, small enterprise creation, and youth
development activities. It is their hoped-for success in human terms that is at the heart of the
institution’s culture.
An honored past (Cell 6). This attribute reinforces the culture’s impact by honoring the agency’s
past. The institution is an organization not only wrapped in values but also wrapped in memories.
Recollections of the past connect what is pressing at the moment to what happened before, transforming contemporary events into the latest episode of a lengthy saga. Celebrating these achievements helps create a mythic past that enhances institutional self-esteem. Agency history can also
play a part in forming the institution’s identity by having the story of “what we were created to
be” repeated over and over again.
The agencies covered in the study include several exemplars of how this can be done. The
legendary history of the NPS, told in numerous commercially published books, is replete with
commentary on its two founders, Stephen Mather and Horace Albright. Mather, president of the
Twenty Mule Team Borax Company in Chicago and a brilliant propagandist, led a nationwide
campaign in 1915 to have Congress create a National Park Service. He was assisted in this effort
by Albright, a young Berkeley law student at the time. Although Mather became the agency’s
first director, during extended periods when he was sidelined by repeated bouts of mental illness,
it was Albright who got the organic law passed and the institution launched. Bronze plates commemorating Mather’s achievement hang in every national park, and at the training center named
after him, Albright’s well-worn ranger flat hat is lovingly displayed under glass.
Both the CDC and VSP have established extensive museums at their agency headquarters. As
mentioned, the CDC’s exhibit is on the lower lobby floor of its Harkness Center in Atlanta. In
addition to displaying early medical equipment, the museum contains a shrine to its founder,
Joseph W. Mountain. On it are displayed his photograph, his microscope, and uniform and sword
as Rear Admiral in the Public Health Service commissioned officer corps. Unlike the other agencies, this founder was never employed in the agency; but as director of state services at the Public
Health Service in Washington, it was Mountain who instigated creation of a predecessor wartime
agency in 1942 and the agency itself in 1946.
The VSP museum is located in the main police academy building in Richmond. It consists of
a suite of rooms containing displays of early weapons, ammunition, and insignia. Several books
of old photographs are available for perusing. Manikins dressed in period uniforms and a policeequipped Harley Davidson motorcycle are on display. Downstairs from the museum is another
public display space, the Colonel Charles W. Woodson, Jr. Memorial Gallery. Named after the
VSP founder, it contains the painted portraits of the 53 men and 2 women killed in the line of
duty over the institution’s history.
Two departures from the norm obtain in relation to honoring history. When Richard “Jake”
Jacobsen moved from San Diego to Charlotte in 1994 to take over the DSS, he learned that
although the agency had been founded by one Lucius Ranson in 1919, almost no archives or files
from the 75 years since existed. He decided to correct this shortcoming, and his first step in that
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regard was to replicate a countywide conference of community and government leaders that Ranson
had organized at the beginning of his directorship. This was done, and throughout Jacobsen’s
directorship he celebrated in some way the agency’s annual birthday.
The Peace Corps also has been unorthodox. To supplement the many books privately published
on its history, the agency periodically prints a paperback containing personal memoirs by former
volunteers. Recently the ex-volunteers themselves have placed online a virtual museum of old photos and recollections of project experiences, and it is planned to have this take physical form soon.
The National Weather Service is a total exception to the practice of recalling its past. This is
so despite a colorful history going back to 1870 that includes transmitting weather information
to Washington for display on the tower of the Smithsonian castle and establishing a weather
bureau to warn Great Lakes vessels of storms heading East. Yet almost no effort is made to
relay this 140-year story to present-day personnel. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration, which oversees the NWS as well as several small ocean agencies, took advantage of this history vacuum by ostentatiously celebrating its 200th birthday in 2007. It was done
on the thin excuse that President Jefferson created a Survey of the Coast in 1807. The speculation at NWS was that this was part of a NOAA tactic to build up the O in its initials at the
expense of the A.
Charged With Vitality
The third row of the template assures that the institution will remain vital over time and not
descend into an ingrown, phlegmatic bureaucracy. This is achieved by encouraging internal dissent, autonomously innovating within limits, and forming a habit of ongoing renewal and learning.
Internal contestation (Cell 7). As Rosemary O’Leary has argued in her book on guerilla government, constructive dissent can help institutions question old ways and consider new ones (O’Leary,
2006). Among our agencies, several examples were encountered to make contestation possible
at the administrative level. The Peace Corps has an independent inspector general that investigates allegations of wrongdoing as well as makes studies of identified problems. At the State
Police headquarters in Richmond, a telephone “idea line” is always open to the superintendent’s
office, by means of which employees can contact the colonel directly, whether anonymously or
by name. An ombudsman at the DSS reviews thousands of cases a year and has the power to stop
any pending action. Also a fatality review team investigates any unusual cases and automatically
those involving a death; wholly independent of department control, it meets monthly and includes
one or more school officials, physicians, mental health experts, antidomestic violence advocates,
the police, judges, and parents.
In another instance, weather forecasting offices employ the practice of 360-degree feedback,
which in this case involves periodic one-on-one conversations between the office head and each
of its supervisors. In these sessions, the two leaders critique each other’s actions since the last
session; any significant items emerging are identified for remedial action and, if appropriate,
discussed at a morning station meeting.
In the Park Service and Peace Corps, the contestation process goes beyond administrative
matters to policy questions. This is an important distinction, hence these two agencies stand out
in meeting the cell 7 requirement. As alluded to earlier, in both agencies contestation derives
from competing interpretations of the mission held by opposing factions within the organization.
These are long-standing differences of viewpoint that have lingered on over the lifetimes of these
institutions, although the disagreement is far more constructive than destructive.
In the NPS, the bifurcation in mission emphasis is between science-oriented ecologists who
argue that preserving natural resources unimpaired for future generations means keeping ecosystems pristine and untouched. Opposing this are public-use sympathizers that urge construction of
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visitor facilities such as campgrounds, roads, and interpretive centers. Although relevant court
decisions give preservation a first priority, the application of this doctrine in specific situations
is always open to debate.
At the Peace Corps, the difference revolves around a bias toward furnishing poor nations with
trained manpower versus an emphasis on promoting understanding in America of served peoples
and an understanding of America by these peoples. Staff stereotyped as hard-nosed “developers”
stress the former point of view, whereas gushy “lovers” favor the latter position.
As for the CDC, over past years debate has occurred periodically between advocates of the
initial infectious disease function and those wishing to prevent disease or emphasize wellness.
These conversations went on openly until President Bush’s director, Julie Gerberding, took several steps to centralize power in her office, thus countering the multiple “centers” idea suggested
by the agency name. This move upset many people and led several leading scientists and center
heads to resign. An employee blog, CDC Chatter, buzzed over the matter and internal memos
were leaked to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, with the result that the reporter on the CDC beat
published several damaging articles. Back at the agency, an issues management staff quietly
contracted to have the reporter’s articles assembled for analysis. When this step was leaked, the
paper filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the resulting report, which was partially
granted after President Obama took office. He did not reappoint Dr. Gerberding.
Qualified autonomy (Cell 8). This cell concerns having latitude, within limits, to engage in policy
innovation in a relatively autonomous way. In his study of policy innovation in the early history
of the Forest Service, Bureau of Chemistry and Post Office, Daniel Carpenter found that this was
made possible by the political support built up because of creative leaders, strong cultures, networks of support, and the legitimacy-building nature of their programs (Carpenter, 2001).
The Weather Service was able to build today’s sophisticated forecasting system in the 1990s
despite some congressional opposition. Although US$10 billion was authorized for the project,
midway in its development a few influential members put up a fight for the benefit of constituents who thought their districts were losing their local forecasting coverage because of termination of their outdated weather stations. They got a law passed requiring numerous time-consuming
studies and reports. The NWS director who conceived the project responded that when the project is complete, their districts would be better served by more powerful Doppler radar sites
located in technically better locations. Eventually, the project was completed, but four more
radar towers were added to the system following a technical review.
At the Mecklenburg DSS, a burst of innovation illustrates what can be done by a politically
astute administrator who is given room to act, namely the aforementioned Jake Jacobsen. He
created political space for himself by talking the language of tight financial management, tapping
new streams of federal and state dollars, expanding the welfare fraud unit, and emphasizing the
department’s contribution to the Charlotte economy. Jake used that leeway to launch an antipoverty campaign involving numerous community groups, establish telephone systems that quickly
connected clients to their case workers, and develop a remotely accessible integrated file system
that permitted workers to do all their case paperwork by Internet from car or home. Eventually,
however, the enthusiasms of this proactive director wore thin with the county administration, and
he was transferred to another position pending retirement.
Also examples occurred where these mission mystique agencies were stopped dead in their
tracks, demonstrating that even premier agencies can be controlled by elected officials. When an
NPS director refused to renew a special-use permit granted to presidential crony Bebe Rebozo to
dock his private boat at Biscayne National Park in Florida, President Nixon fired him outright.
More recently, the agency was not able to persuade President Obama to veto a bill allowing guns
in the national parks. In the early 1990s, a State Police superintendent resisted the demands of
the governor to forego an investigation of a friend of the chief executive and also to ferry him by
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VSP helicopter to a social event 60 miles from Richmond. Without admitting he had been forced
out, the superintendant suddenly resigned and was replaced by an outsider from another state.
Renewal and learning (Cell 9). The final attribute of the mission mystique belief system is a
continuing commitment to renewal and organizational learning. The literature on organizational
learning points to several factors that allow this to take place: employee participation and empowerment, an open sharing of information and ideas, a standing tolerance of differing perspectives,
a nonpunitive atmosphere that does not disgrace those who disagree, and a strong commitment
to the organization’s mission (Moynihan & Landuyt, 2009).
Theorists in this field speak of three “loops” of organizational learning (Nielsen, 1993;
Romme & van Witteloostuijn, 1999). Single-loop is when the organization learns how to solve a
given problem. An illustration is VSP’s invention in 1989 of the concept of the instant background checks on gun buyers as a feasible alternative to gun registration. Double-loop learning
constitutes deeper intervention whereby conditions are altered so that the problem disappears.
This occurred in the Peace Corps when, as mentioned, it eliminated the problem of inadequately
grounded volunteer training by having it done in countries of assignment by foreign nationals.
Triple-loop organization learning takes place when steps are successfully taken to heighten
the organization’s overall ability to introduce change rapidly when conditions warrant, a capacity sought for in cell 9. Ideally, this trait is acquired by experience with “learning forums” that
become venues where new ideas can develop. Several such forums exist in the studied agencies.
The CDC encourages the formation of employee-sponsored “communities of practice” that discuss newly emerging themes in public health that attract interest, such as gender aspects of public
health. In his antipoverty campaign, Jacobsen created a Charlotte-Mecklenburg Resolves Committee,
named after a committee created to revolt against the British in colonial days. Composed of heads
of all governments in the area, it was a forum in which ideas for cooperating to this end were
tossed around.
In the Park Service, a habit prevails of conducting, every couple of years or so, a national
conference on some “blue sky” issue relating to the organization. These meetings variously include
different levels of employee and outside expertise as well as top brass. Examples of topics are
how to attract more than White, middle-class families to the parks; how to present more authentically the history of America and the first Americans; and how to better incorporate topics like
biodiversity and sustainability into park interpretation.
Inspired by an Air Force technique of postincident inquiries known as the hot wash, the
Weather Service conducts service assessments or formal inquiries following a weather event
that caused high fatalities or heavy damage. Teams of noninvolved NWS personnel investigate the event minutely and make recommendations that are then circulated in published form
throughout the agency.
In the Peace Corps, a process of constant renewal occurs at the volunteer level. Midway in
each volunteer’s assignment, the country director’s office arranges a meeting of that individual’s
project advisory committee, which consists of the volunteer and two or three staff members. The
volunteer is asked to speak frankly about how her project is going with respect to both positive
developments and disappointments. Treating the volunteer as the expert on the subject rather
than a subordinate subject to discipline, she is asked how the project could be reframed, approached
more sensitively, or replaced in the future. Ideas generated by these meetings are recorded and
incorporated in later planning.
Strength at the Institutional Center
I argue in this essay that the institutional center of public administration, that is, the government
agency, always needs strengthening in general but especially now to meet the challenges of
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oversight of third parties and politically mandated funding cutbacks. In that defunding is frequently followed by more devolution and leaves even fewer resources for its oversight, the two
challenges are linked.
What does it mean to strengthen this institutional center? The proposal advanced here is to
urge agencies to look to a normative ideal called mission mystique that contemplates an intensely
purposive, energized and vitalized administrative agency. In the previous discussion three specific needs were identified that should be filled by a strengthen center: a clearly articulated and
necessary mission; continuity of a competent workforce and institutional memory; and a generous and confident capacity for change. While application of the ideal must be tailored to the
unique situation of each agency, and despite the likelihood that many public organizations will
find it difficult to attain the quality of mystique, the elements of its template signify not a finished
product but a set of constructive directions in which all government agencies and local jurisdictions might seek to move forward at this time. We review the possibilities in this regard.
Mission articulation. The mission must be more than a forgotten clause in an old law or a bland
product of strategic planning. It ought to be a lively, galvanizing utterance that symbolizes an
important public cause. It should be capable of exciting those who work for the organization and
drawing the attention of interested members of the public as an important collective goal.
The mission must be stated in language that is simple and carries an emotional punch. It needs
to be short enough to be memorable and suitable for spot placement on documents and artifacts.
Examples noted from our examined agencies are “saving lives and livelihoods” (the Weather
Service), “To Be the Best” (Department of Social Services), “unimpaired for future generations”
(the Park Service,) and “to promote world peace and friendship” (the Peace Corps). As for hypothetical examples, a municipal department of public works could seek to achieve “a clean and
healthy city,” an airport authority to provide “a gateway to the community and world,” and a
public school system to assure “a well-prepared next generation.”
With such clearly desirable articulations of purpose, agencies could lay the groundwork for
inspiring their own personnel and constituencies. They could also help to convince third parties
that their causes are legitimate and thus their oversight responsibilities must be taken seriously.
In addition, the thought could be expressed that it is hoped that contractors, collaborators, and
volunteers will feel enthusiastic about becoming active participants in the pursuit of truly compelling goals.
Good mission wordsmithing can also pay dividends in the defunding debates, especially if it
goes to the core of the mission and does not try to pad its content. Hence moving from the particular to the ethereal in the mission’s declaration, as the CDC did by shifting from a fighter of plagues
to an all-knowing physician of wellness, is not a good idea; nor is redefining parks to include all
kinds of recreation and development projects, as indulged in by the NPS. Agencies should keep to
the basics, argue for the obvious, and be prepared to sacrifice marginal programs to build credibility with appropriators. Also they should be ready to point out quite emphatically what would be
lost to the nation or community if those central installations or services did not exist.
Workforce continuity. Voluntary departures and retirements occur all the time in any agency,
but massive layoffs caused by budget cuts or a large-scale replacement of veteran careerists by
contract or partner personnel could jeopardize the agency’s degree of good functioning that is its
best defense in hard times.
The danger is particularly great for agencies that depend on highly specialized workers and
professionals. These are essential to give the organization the expertise needed to do their inhouse jobs and at the same time perform ably in selecting contractors, defining their assignments,
monitoring their work, and assessing outcomes. Without them, the agency becomes dependent
on the more advanced technical knowledge of others, always a vulnerable position.
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Hence the need is to create a positive social atmosphere that pulls valuable employees away
from more tempting offers elsewhere and implants in them a desire to stay on for the long haul.
Then they will be on hand to support the rebuilding process when cutbacks end. Hence the
agency must instill passion in its people, support that passion with a close cultural community,
and build institutional pride by reference to a distinguished past. The NPS, CDC, and Peace
Corps especially illustrate instilling passion, the NWS, DSS, and VSP building the community,
and the CDC, VSP, and Peace Corps referring to the past.
In any case, the bottom line is offering human beings concrete experiences that bond them,
without artifice or pressure, to the agency and its cause in which they believe. Examples are
formal induction ceremonies (as in the VSP and Peace Corps), transformative training events
(CDC, VSP, Peace Corps), all-hands social occasions (VSP, DSS), unfettered blogs (CDC, NPS,
Peace Corps), learning forums (NPS, NWS, CDC, Peace Corps), moments of crisis and triumph
(NWS, CDC), and shared myths (Peace Corps, NPS).
Capacity to change. At the same time, the template insists that agency believers do not bask
in the glory of the past or in the mystique of the present. Adherents must constantly be looking
to the future, where reputations for achievement will depend on adopting to ever emerging new
technologies, adjusting to new political forces and conditions, and absorbing new public values.
This means that experimentation, innovation, and organizational learning must be ongoing.
The key here is to keep the organization open to new ideas. Several devices for this are used
by our agencies, such as periodic national conferences at the NPS, hot wash-type service assessments at the NWS, and in-country volunteer advisory committees at the Peace Corps. Another
Peace Corps practice, probably unique in the annals of public administration, is its 5-year limit
on full-time employment above the clerical grades. This rule not only forestalls a rule-bound,
inflexible organization but also augments the flow of incoming ideas by creating openings to hire
ex-volunteers and former staff who are returning from assignments in other international and
private sector service organizations.
In addition to being open, the mission mystique agency is tolerant of dissent and debate. If
possible, this should extend to the policy implications of the mission itself. This characteristic is
well modeled in the Park Service and the Peace Corps; here, ongoing mission debates do not
constitute harsh factional battles, but reasoned yet deeply felt differences over which aspects of
the mission should be stressed. The counterexample is the CDC, with its issues management
program and obsession over critical press coverage.
External collaborators and third parties will be impressed to find forward-looking ideas circulating within their funding agencies, as over against a green eyeshade stodginess. Agency use of up
to-date information technology can encourage rapid responses relative to agency oversight of their
work. Similarly, a good defense against budget cutters is to be ahead of the game in using IT to
increase productivity. DSS illustrates an agency that particularly capitalized on being high-tech.
In general, a compelling aura. Being endowed with an aura of being a public organization deserved
of special respect and admiration is, of course, the objective of mission mystique itself. This
summary feature of the model makes the agency stand out as particularly distinctive and worthy
in its class. It is therefore able to assume a commanding position as an implementer of public
policy and as a social asset of inherent value to the nation, state, or community.
Moreover, with this reputation and respect, the agency is able to carry out the increasingly
important task of oversight of devolved government activity. It is able to do this from the commanding heights of distinctive prominence. Furthermore, this prominence and admiration make
harder the defunding or downgrading of authority. Why shut down one of the most effective
entities in the government? And one that emulates the private corporation itself in terms of intensity of aims, energized culture, and capacity to change?
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It has been noted that, in the case of these six agencies at least, two themes recur: professional
excellence and ethical principle. In the first, the institution prides itself in being able to perform
difficult and specialized tasks well. In the second, it returns to Heclo’s observation that institutions
are repositories of lasting values that give lives meaning beyond self-interest calculation. Would
it be too much to say that the intertwining of these two great themes of public professionalism and
moral integrity lie at the normative heart of American public administration?—the first being a
legacy of modernism and the Progressive movement and the second an outgrowth of communal
urges to counter an otherwise individualistic society?
Edging Toward Mission Mystique
If we have a clearer idea of what institutional “strength” is, then, how do we get there? In addition to ideas derived from the text above, a number of thoughts come to mind.
One is that mission mystique is the opposite of the usual “reform” concept. It applies not to
management techniques but rather attitudes and behaviors throughout the organization. It is not
a standardized, “one size fits all” panacea but a framework for self-analysis whose application
must be individualized. It is not a superficial reshuffling of organizational boxes but goes to the
purpose, culture, and history of the institution. Moreover, especially important in these frugal
times, it does not require a costly gaggle of consultants but mainly do-it-yourself soul searching
and conversation within the organization itself.
A second point is that there are a number of practical steps that can be considered to create
and preserve a committed workforce. Candidates for recruitment can be invited to visit agency
facilities to expose them to its values. Formal induction ceremonies can impress on newcomers
the importance of entering the fold. During their 1st year, employees can be attached to mentors.
Ways can be found to hear stories told by veteran members about their experiences. Creative
ways of expressing agency values by means of awards, prizes, and emblems can be sought. Wideranging discussions can be held on what binds the institution together and how it should look in
20 years. Cultural consciousness can be reinforced by banquets, celebrations, and social events.
An interactive blog or listserv can operate to spread news and vent feelings. Supervisors at all
levels can be receptive to hearing out dissenting voices and transmitting forward thoughtful ideas.
When serious controversy breaks out, it should be confronted openly at staff meetings, “town”
meetings, or agency conferences.
A third and final point is that working toward mission mystique requires leadership. Unlike
the pioneers who founded the organization, these leaders must see themselves not as great builders but careful crafters of evolutionary change in an existing, living institution. Their task is to
turn crises like sudden calls for devolution or defunding into opportunities and guide the institution forward with full appreciation of the present.
A fine example of such a leader is Loret Miller Ruppe, who was appointed director of the Peace
Corps by President Reagan. In 1981, as now, budgets were being cut and government was seen as
not the solution but the problem. The numbers of volunteers had fallen drastically since the heady
early days, and staff morale was in the cellar following organizational absorption of the agency
into ACTION. When Ruppe met her White House contact, he casually commented that the Peace
Corps was one of those “mushrooming” federal bureaucracies that would probably be abolished.
Furious, Ruppe replied the agency was hardly mushrooming and resolved then and there to
prevent its dismantlement from happening. Despite her solid Republican credentials as Reagan’s
campaign manger in Michigan, she believed fervently in the Peace Corps cause. Besides, one of
her daughters was a volunteer.
Director Ruppe then set out to preserve the institution by redirecting it. She looked for ways
to make country projects more attractive to conservatives and hit on the idea of small business
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19
Goodsell
creation. She began speaking around the country to Republican gatherings and business groups,
pointing out that the Peace Corps with its staffing by citizen volunteers is the best kind of bureaucracy conservatives could ask for. When the president of Fiji came to Washington and told her
how appreciative he was of the Peace Corps volunteers in his country, she put a bug in his ear to
mention this to President Reagan when he visited the White House. Soon the Gipper himself
became a staunch friend of the agency, demanding in budget-cutting discussions that it must be
spared (Ruppe, 1986). From this point onward, the pathway to greater heights was set. Now the
Peace Corps is 50 years old and an outstanding example of mission mystique.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or
publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
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Bio
Charles T. Goodsell is professor emeritus of public administration at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg. He was
educated at Kalamazoo College and Harvard University and is author of books on American bureaucracy,
the politics of public architecture, and Latin American politics and administration.
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