14 ◾ Mordecai Lee
from the news media, reporting to the electorate on agency activities, and generally
being responsive to the public. ese are not luxuries in the context of democratic
governance. Rather, they are obligations that can’t be ignored, even if and when a
politician denounces them as self-serving and wasteful propaganda. e qualita-
tive dierence between public administration and business administration is the
governmental context of agency management. In a democracy, public administra-
tors must engage in certain activities that are expected as the sine qua non of gov-
ernment. For example, government managers must respond to inquiries from the
news media, whether the particular issue would put the agency in a good light or a ...