Publication
Reflections on comparative teaching in public administration
In this article, Kohei Suzuki and his co-authors reflect on their extensive scholarly experience teaching comparative public administration across diverse countries including Canada, the Netherlands, Qatar, and the United States.
- Author
- Kim Moloney, Kohei Suzuki, Mehmet Demircioglu, Cristina Stanica, Srinivas Yerramsetti, Aroon P. Manoharan, James L. Perry
- Date
- 01 November 2025
- Links
- Read the full article here
The authors highlight the opportunities and challenges inherent in teaching comparative public administration, emphasising the need to confront biases in knowledge directionality, in particular the dominance of Anglo-American and Western European perspectives. They argue for a more critical, context-sensitive, and locally grounded approach that balances global and local realities ('glocal' perspective). The authors note divergences rather than convergence in public administration curricula internationally and underscore the importance of incorporating diverse local contexts, histories, and development experiences into teaching. They share practical examples of pedagogical practices, assignments, and activities that encourage students to analyse public administration comparatively and critically. The article stresses the potential of comparative public administration education to prepare students to engage thoughtfully with global administrative challenges while being sensitive to local variations and complexities.