Unmasking Administrative Evil

Introduction and Overview

PART I: WHAT IS ADMINISTRATIVE EVIL?

1. The Dynamics of Evil and Administrative Evil

2. Compliance, Technical Rationality, and Administrative Evil

PART II: HISTORY AND CASES

3. Administrative Evil Unmasked: The Holocaust and Public Service

4. Administrative Evil in the 21st Century: From Abu Ghraib to Immigration and Customs Enforcement Raids

5. Public Policy, Administrative Evil, “Surplus Populations,” and Administrative Racism

6. Organizational Dynamics and the Pathway to Administrative Evil: The Case of Flint, Michigan

PART III: THE FUTURE OF ETHICS IN PRAETORIAN TIMES

7. Administrative Evil and Public Ethics in Praetorian Times

8. Toward a New Context for Public Ethics: Four Approaches

Afterword: Expiating Evil and Administrative Evil

Appendix A: Foreword to the Third Edition, Philip G. Zimbardo

Appendix B: Foreword to the Revised Edition, Charles B. Perrow

Appendix C: Foreword to the First Edition, Curtis Ventriss

Biography

Ashley E. Nickels is Professor in the School of Peace and Conflict Studies at Kent State University, USA. As an interdisciplinary scholar, her research focuses on issues of power and democratic participation in the fields of urban politics, public administration, and peace and conflict studies. Dr. Nickels is the author of the award-winning book, Power Participation and Protest in Flint, Michigan. She also serves as co-Editor-in-Chief of Administrative Theory & Praxis (a journal founded by Unmasking Administrative Evil author, Guy Adams).

Felipe Blanco is Assistant Professor in Public Administration at the University of Colorado, Denver, USA. His research interests include social equity and ethnoracial inequalities, representative bureaucracy, comparative public administration, and comparative public policy. Dr. Blanco has been recognized with several prestigious awards, including the Network of Schools of Public Policy, Affairs and Administration (NASPAA) Staats Emerging Scholar Award and the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) Founders’ Fellowship, among others. He was also named a Rising Graduate Scholar by “Diverse: Issues in Higher Education.”

Amanda D. Clark is Assistant Professor of Instruction in the School of Economic, Political, and Policy Sciences at the University of Texas at Dallas, USA. She also serves as Director of the Initiative for Civic Leadership at UT Dallas. Her research focuses on election administration, citizen engagement/democracy, and governance. Dr. Clark credits her experience working at the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Office in 2020, where she ran early voting, as a key component to her drive to understand and support public service. She serves on the editorial board for Administrative Theory & Praxis and as a co-leader of the Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the Scholars Strategy Network.

“The work is endless, but confronting administrative evil is non‑negotiable if we want organizations to honor human dignity. Previous editions awakened us to administrative evil. This edition pushes the conversation further with even greater clarity. Engage with it. Share it. Carry its lessons into the systems you touch.”

Mary E. Guy, University of Colorado Denver