Taxonomies for the analysis of research designs in Public Administration

Abstract

This article departs from the assumptions that the sustainable future of public administration as the delivery of services needs high quality scholarly research and that high quality of scholarly research is determined by inter alia the proficient application of sound research methods. Consequently, this article reports on the refinement of taxonomies for analysing Public Administration research. It argues that sound research is the result of a valid relationship between research methods, units of analysis and the units of observation. It is furthermore argued that an improvement in the quality of research can only happen if Public Administration researchers are proficient in the core research methods of Public Administration. Therefore, this article proposes a method for empirically identifying the core research methods of South African Public Administration. Ten research methods were identified that Public Administration scholars can utilise.