This volume is intended, as the author indicates in his introduction, to present Spanish public administration not as something akin to a business enterprise, but as an organization at the service of the political community. His “Leitmotiv” is the formation of the Spanish administration on the Napoleonic model; he intends to discover where certain structural limitations are properly Spanish or derive from the Napoleonic system.
His purpose is admirably achieved. The historical background appears in an essay on Olivan’s classic study, the “clearest exposition of the Napoleonic system.” Succeeding chapters on organic structure and peripheric administration were originally introductions to the Spanish translations of Mooney’s Principles of Organization and Chapman’s The Prefect in Provincial France. Stressing the “destruction of active, deliberative, and consultative functions” under the Napoleonic prefectural system, the author points out how the appointment of civil governors under a spoils system in Spain has eliminated some of these evils and permitted the province to occupy a central position in local government. He looks to ultimate full citizen participation in local life.
There is, the author asserts, a definite need for reform; Spain is being driven to eliminate what is “degenerative and pathological” in its administration to preserve what is “of positive value.” Discussing American administrative science, he sees a new emphasis on leadership; Spain he finds woefully deficient in institutional leadership. He would revise the system, but cautions against its destruction.
Those not losing patience with the involved style will find this a very valuable introduction to the subject.
