The Role of Public Administration: A Global Perspective

From my experience with public administration in my country, Cape Verde, and through readings in the area of development administration, I have found that a distinctive role and specific societal goals are usually ascribed to public administration in developing country. In studying American public administration approaches and operation, I was stuck by the fact that the definition of roles and societal goals for public administration seems not to be a forefront concern in the field. How to do things and achieve efficiency, in a managerial and rational perspective, seemed to draw much more attention than the purpose of doing things. Somehow, the contrast with the concept of development administration seemed too sharp, and I became curious about the reasons for such disparate approaches. Historical, cultural, and environmental differences would probably not be the only explanation for that since the concept of development administration was shaped, in the late 50’s and 60’s, by American authors and institutional aid agencies, and then “offered” to developing countries. At the same time, looking to poor results of the successive prescriptions of the development administration movement, I was no sure that such a concept and the framework it establishes was worthwhile. What practical answers and arrangement did they bring to the needs and challenges of public administrations in developing countries? …

Turismo em Cabo Verde:um estudo exploratório

Esta dissertação é um trabalho exploratório sobre o turismo em Cabo Verde. Partindo de um esquema teórico herdeiro fundamentalmente da Sociologia e Antropologia do turismo, começaremos por discutir alguns dos seus temas centrais para o nosso objecto de estudo. O turismo em Cabo Verde é assumido como o eixo central do desenvolvimento do país e a indústria turística cabo-verdiana encontra-se em franca expansão. Através de uma caracterização do fenómeno turístico em Cabo Verde, desde o seu florescimento até aos dias de hoje, pretendemos dar conta da evolução do sector e das recentes reconfigurações no panorama turístico cabo-verdiano que se espelham nos discursos narrativos e visuais presentes na promoção turística deste destino. Com base numa análise do discurso promocional, procuramos desvendar a forma como este arquipélago é descrito enquanto destino turístico, revelando a diversidade de elementos presentes na imagem turística contemporânea de Cabo Verde.