On The Intellectual Foundations Of Administrative Thought Of Woodrow Wilson

Most of the previous studies on Wilson’s administrative thought are interpretive studies on his dichotomy of politics and administration,but it neglected to analysis and confirm his intellectual foundations.Different from the interpretation of single text,my study attempts to re-understand Woodrow Wilson’s administrative thought the interpretation of intellectual foundations.The central thesis of this paper is that Woodrow Wilson was a constitutionalist administrative thinker.By replacing single text with whole text,"intellectual foundations" can shows Wilson’s whole academic thought and methodology.That is to say,Wilson’s constitutionalism value orientation,scientific epistemology and institutionalism methodology form his unique conceptual system,and the four aspects together constitute the intellectual foundations of Wilson’s administrative thought.The specific viewpoints of intellectual foundations and core concepts are as follows: "constitutionalism" is the basic problem that he always thinks about;The value orientation of constitutionalism is the hardcore of Wilson’s thought.Scientific view is the basis of his theoretical argumentation,including Darwin’s theory of organic life and historicism.Institutionalism is its basic methodology.Wilson’s conceptual system includes the relationship between politics and administration which responds to his "constitutionalism";"Party politics" is the key argument for presidential leadership.As the legitimacy of the government,the rule of constitution is challenged by the rule of man.In the context of civil reform,Wilson did support the idea that the "administration" should not be violated by "partisan politics." However,the traditional way of interpreting a single text and the latent scientific managerialism extended this view to Wilson’s entire administrative thought,which marked Wilson with a simplistic and absolute label of "political and administrative dichotomy".Through the intellectual foundations,we can see that in the deep political power distribution,Wilson always insisted on a conservative reform view that administration should be placed within the framework of the constitutional government rather than outside it,so as to respond to the dual transformation requirements at home and abroad.Only when Wilson’s understanding of "politics" is clearly classified as "party politics","congressional government" and "constitutionalism" and its corresponding understanding of "administration" can we understand the rich connotation and hard core of Wilson’s " politics and administration dichotomy".In the study of Wilson’s administrative thought,compared with the traditional way of interpretation,the " intellectual foundations" method shows a better interpretation result.Finally,this paper concludes that "constitutionalism" is the value orientation of Wilson’s intellectual foundations,and his administrative thought is elaborated around the theme of constitutionalism.Early Wilson insisted on an "anti-political" administrative thought.After the expansion of presidential executive power and the rebalancing of constitutional structure,the mature Wilson reaffirmed the constitutional idea and developed a constitutional administrative thought.