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Rational Capitalism and Municipal Government: The Progressive Era

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 January 2016

Joseph L. Tropea
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Extract

Municipal administration was changed dramatically in the United States during the Progressive Era. Most explanations of this transformation have been society centered rather than state centered. Society-centered explanations, based on such factors as social movements, ethnicity, religion, social class, occupational composition, and population size have not provided a coherent account of the range and nature of the transformations in municipal administration in the Progressive Era. For example, democracy was expanded through municipal autonomy delegated by state legislatures and contracted by limiting ward representation, business practices were copied organizationally and challenged legally, and municipal administration was decentralized in proprietary functions and centralized in bureaucracy. Most importantly, society-centered factors have not accounted for the legal shaping of the state, in particular in framing the municipality’s administration and proprietary transactions. Empirical relationships between such state-centered changes as court-mandated contract responsibilities and, for example, social class or ethnicity have not been established—nor can they be cogently argued.

Type
Research Article
Information
Social Science History , Volume 13 , Issue 2 , Summer 1989 , pp. 137 - 158
Copyright
Copyright © Social Science History Association 1989 

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